Disappearing Spaces - A day in Addis Ababa's informal city

Disappearing Spaces - A day in Addis Ababa's informal city from Felix Heisel on Vimeo.

Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, is in transformation. Currently the home of approximately four million inhabitants, the city might triple its size within the next 30 years due to the increasing rural to urban migration, as well as natural growth. Already today, Addis Ababa suffers from a housing shortage of estimated 300.000 units. And, according to UN-Habitat, 80% of the existing dwellings are in ‘sub-standard, slum like’ conditions. Thus, in 2004, the government launched a large-scale mass housing program with the ambitious plan to erect 200.000 condominium units within 5 years. To date, 100.000 units were built during the last 7 years, out of which nearly 70,000 are handed over to end users so far. In 2011, the Addis Ababa City Administration announced to redevelop all ‘informal’ and ‘unplanned’ parts of the city until 2020.

Sophia George - Girlie Girlie

The original video. Girly Girly, or Girlie Girlie was a classic Reggae hit from 1986.

Aberlado Carbono y su Conjunto - Quiero a Mi Gente

Christopher DeLaurenti - Towards Activist Sound

Writer, musician and activist Christopher DeLaurenti on sonic protest and his field recordings of social change.

May 1 2012: It was dusk. One of many Occupy Wall Street marches in New York City had fanned out, trickling through the runnels of towers downtown to a giant marble monument close to the river. Dusk awakened my ears and dimmed my vision. “Sound gives us the city in matter and memory,” writes Fran Tonkiss; streets and buildings lost their uneeded names. Not owners, but gatherings of people, sound, and listening defined this place.