num_pages: 400
description: For the first time in the history of our planet more than half the population-3.3 billion people-is now living in cities. City is the ultimate guidebook to our urban centers-the signature unit of human civilization. With erudite prose and carefully chosen illustrations this unique work of metatourism explores what cities are and how they work. It covers history customs and language districts transport money work shops and markets and tourist sites creating a fantastically detailed portrait of the city through history and into the future.The urban explorer will revel in essays on downtowns suburbs shantytowns and favelas graffiti skylines crime the theater street food sport eco-cities and sacred sites as well as mini essays on the Tower of Babel flash mobs ghettos skateboarding and SimCity among many others. Drawing on a vast range of examples from across the world and throughout history City is extensively illustrated with full-color photographs maps and other images. Acclaimed author and independent scholar P. D. Smith explores what it was like to live in the first cities how they have evolved and why in the future cities will play an even greater role in human life.
language: English
title: City: A Guidebook for the Urban Age
publisher: Bloomsbury Press