In from the Periphery: Becoming (G)locally Cosmopolitan in Springvale

Abstract

How might notions of what is cosmopolitan be geographically reinterpreted through the diverse settlement of recent migrants and refugees in Australia? This article brings this question to bear on Springvale, a suburb in the Australian city of Melbourne, discussing the area’s geographical circulation of people, businesses and products as a means of understanding the interstices between marginalised cultures or traditions and the role of architecture and the built environment in this context. Discussion of these questions involves the description of the physical and spatial environment of Springvale, concentrating on its commercial and industrial centres. In part, this illustrates the marginalisation of certain buildings and uses, but also how the process of establishing new kinds of activity and identity alters the nature of environments. The result is that these perceptually and geographically peripheral zones are paradoxically becoming centres in a diversifying metropolis, affording new nodes of usage and inhabitation that are arguably becoming sites of “local cosmopolitanism.”

Keywords:

• Architecture
• built environments
• refugees
• multicultural environments

Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the support of the Australian Research Council. This text discusses research undertaken as part of the ARC Discovery Project Architecture and Industry: The Migrant Contribution to Nation-Building (2019–22). Within this project, thanks are due to Sophanara Sok for sharing the experiences of Cambodian refugees in the area and Councillor Richard Lim from the City of Greater Dandenong, who shared his visions for the future of Springvale. Thanks are also due to Rhonda Diffey of the City of Greater Dandenong’s Archive; Chris Keys of the Springvale Historical Society; Jan Trezise of the Enterprise Hostel Committee; Bon Nguyên, President of the Vietnamese Community in Victoria; Hanh Do, Kim Bui-Quang and other members of the board of the Vietnamese Museum Australia, as well as two Springvale business owners who prefer to remain anonymous.

All human participation recorded in this article is covered by the ethics approval obtained for the ARC Discovery Project noted above. This was provided by the University of Tasmania’s Social Sciences Human Research Ethics Committee: Ethics Ref No. HOO18177, under which all participants gave consent for publication of their stories and quoted statements.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

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2 Steven Vertovec and Robin Cohen, eds., Conceiving Cosmopolitanism: Theory, Context and Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022).

3 Amanda Wise, “Everyday Multiculturalism: Transversal Crossings and Working Class Cosmopolitans,” in Everyday multiculturalism, ed. Amanda Wise and Selvaraj Velayutham (Basingstoke: Houndmills, 2009), 21–45.

4 Yannis Tzaninis, “Cosmopolitanism beyond the City: Discourses and Experiences of Young Migrants in Post-suburban Netherlands,” Urban Geography 41, no. 1 (2020), 144.

5 Ayona Datta, “Places of Everyday Cosmopolitanisms: East European Construction Workers in London,” Environment and Planning A 41, no. 2 (2009): 353–70; Susan Koshy, “Minority Cosmopolitanism,” PMLA 126, no. 3 (2011): 592–609; Pnina Werbner, “Vernacular Cosmopolitanism,” Theory, Culture and Society 23, nos. 2–3 (2006): 496–98; Pnina Werbner, Anthropology and the New Cosmopolitanism: Rooted, Feminist and Vernacular Perspectives (London: Bloomsbury, 2008).

6 Datta, “Places of Everyday Cosmopolitanisms,” 353.

7 Abdi Hersi, Indigo Willing, Ian Woodward and Zlatko Skrbiš, “Minority Cosmopolitanism: Afro-Cosmopolitan Engagement Displayed by African Australians,” Journal of Intercultural Studies 41, no. 2 (2020), 166.

8 Justine Greenwood, “Cosmopolitan Capitals: Migrant Heritage, Urban Tourism and the Re-imagining of Australian Cities” in Migrant, Multicultural and Diasporic Heritage Beyond and Between Borders, ed. Alexandra Dellios and Eureka Henrich (London: Routledge, 2020), 119–32.

9 Rebecca Williamson, “Vernacular Cosmopolitanisms in Suburban Peripheries: A Case Study in Multicultural Sydney,” Sites: A Journal of Social Anthropology and Cultural Studies 13, no. 1 (2016): 111–33.

10 Arjun Appadurai, Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization (Minneapolis, University of Minneapolis Press, 1996).

11 Yen Lê Espiritu, “Thirty Years AfterWARd: The Endings That Are Not Over,” Amerasia Journal 31, no. 2 (2005): xiii–xxiv; Eric Tang, Unsettled: Cambodian Refugees in the New York City Hyperghetto (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2015); Viet Thanh Nguyen, “Speak of the Dead, Speak of Viet Nam: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Minority Discourse,” New Centennial Review 6, no. 2 (2006): 7–37; Ma Vang, “Critical Refugee Studies,” Critical Ethnic Studies 6, no. 1 (2020), https://manifold.umn.edu/read/critical-refugee-studies/section/21cc6956-947d-4127-8aa8-a22974331ad1.

12 David Beynon, “Centres on the Edge: Multicultural Built Environments in Melbourne,” in Everyday Multiculturalism Conference Proceedings, ed. Selveraj Velayutham and Amanda Wise (Sydney: Macquarie University, 2007), https://www.alsocan.com.au/writings/centres-on-the-edge-multicultural-built-environments-melbourne.pdf. See, also, Amanda Wise and Selveraj Velayutham, eds., Everyday Multiculturalism (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2009).

13 Nikos Papastergiadis, Cosmopolitanism and Culture (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2013), 192.

14 Nikos Papastergiadis, Cosmopolitanism and Culture (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2013), 197–98.

15 City of Greater Dandenong Archives; Springvale Historical Society Archives; Enterprise Hostel Committee; Vietnamese Community in Victoria; Vietnamese Museum Australia.

16 Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. Brian Massumi (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1987; orig. 1980).

17 Greater Dandenong Council, “Springvale Activity Centre: Historic Narrative” (Melbourne: Greater Dandenong Business, 2017); James Jupp, Andrea McRobbie and Barry York, “Metropolitan Ghettoes and Ethnic Concentrations,” Working Papers on Multiculturalism 1 (1990), 111 (published for the Office of Multicultural Affairs, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet by the Centre for Multicultural Studies, University of Wollongong).

18 John van Kooy, “Refugee Women as Entrepreneurs in Australia,” Forced Migration Review 53 (2016): 71–73.

19 Christine Stevens, “Balancing Obligations and Self-Interest: Humanitarian Program Settlers in the Australian Labor Market,” Asian and Pacific Migration Journal 6, no. 2 (1997): 185–212; van Kooy, “Refugee Women as Entrepreneurs in Australia,” 72.

20 Sophanara Sok, interview with David Beynon and Jane McDougall, audio, June 17, 2022.

21 Greater Dandenong Council, “Springvale Activity Centre: Historic Narrative” (Melbourne: Greater Dandenong Business, 2017), https://www.greaterdandenong.vic.gov.au/_flysystem/filerepo/A4699971.

22 Annie Wong, representative of Guan Di Temple, interview with authors, audio April 17, 2022.

23 Anonymous Business Owner, interview with David Beynon, audio, 2020.

24 Jeffrey Hou, Transcultural Cities: Border Crossing & Placemaking (New York: Routledge, 2013).

25 Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), xix.

26 David Beynon and Ian Woodcock, “Interpretation/Translation/Quotation? Contemporary Architects’ Interventions into Multicultural Australia,” Quotation, Quotation: What Does History Have in Store for Architecture Today? ed. Gevork Hartoonian and John Ting, Papers of the Society of Architectural Historians, Australia New Zealand 34 (Canberra: SAHANZ, 2016), 26–34.

27 Yansong Wang and Yapeng Duan, “A Study on the Classification and Value of Ming Dynasty Paifang in China: A Case Study of Paifang in Jinxi County,” Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering 15, no. 2 (2016), 149.

28 Cameron Lucadou-Wells, “Asian Gateway: We Don’t Want to See Springvale Split up,” Star Journal [online article, nvn, npn] (2013). https://dandenong.starcommunity.com.au/news/2013-08-02/asian-gateway-we-dont-want-to-see-springvale-split-up/

29 Sanjoy Mazumdar, Shampa Mazumdar, Faye Docuyanan and Colette Marie McLaughlin, “Creating a Sense of Place: The Vietnamese-Americans and Little Saigon,” Journal of Environmental Psychology 20, no. 4 (2000), 321.

30 Greater Dandenong City of Opportunity, “Mayor Cr Eden Foster (Yarraman Ward),” https://www.greaterdandenong.vic.gov.au/councillor/mayor-cr-eden-foster-yarraman-ward; Maribyrnong City Council. “Deputy Mayor, Cr Cuc Lam PSM,” https://www.maribyrnong.vic.gov.au/My-neighbourhood/Deputy-Mayor-Cr-Cuc-Lam-PSM.

31 Councillor Richard Lim, interview with David Beynon, Springvale, Vic., August 2022.

32 Jeffrey Hou, “Your Place and/or My Place?” in Transcultural Cities: Border-Crossing and Placemaking, ed. Jeffrey Hou (London: Routledge, 2013), 1–16.

33 Homi Bhabha, The Location of Culture (London: Routledge, 1994), xx.

34 Koichi Nagashima, “Glocal Approach Toward Architecture of the Future,” XX UIA Beijing Congress (1995), 10.

35 Paul Gilroy, After Empire? Melancholia or Convivial Culture? (London: Routledge, 2004).

36 Sheila Giffen, Christopher Lee and Renisa Mawani, “Worlds at Home: On Cosmopolitan Futures,” Journal of Intercultural Studies 40, no. 5 (2019): 525–33.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

David Beynon

David Beynon is an Associate Professor in Architecture at the University of Tasmania. He investigates the social, cultural and compositional dimensions of architecture, and adaptations of architectural content and meaning in relation to urban renewal, migration and cultural change. He completed his architectural qualifications at the University of Melbourne in 1990 and then worked in architectural practices in Singapore and Brisbane before registering as an architect and funding alsoCAN Architects in Melbourne with his partner in 1995. He then completed a PhD in Urban Design in 2002 (also at the University of Melbourne) and combined architectural practice in Melbourne with academic work at Deakin University before joining the University of Tasmania in 2019.

Freya Su

Freya Su is a PhD candidate in architectural science at the University of Tasmania. Freya examines the relationship between climate data selection methodology and hygrothermal simulation. Before embarking on her current studies, she assisted Mark Dewsbury and co-authored publications about condensation. In 2015, Freya found Snug House Tasmania, conducting airtightness testing and energy efficiency assessments in a multi-disciplinary building design studio.

Van Krisadawat

Van Krisadawat is a PhD candidate at the University of Tasmania. His research focuses on using mapping processes as a form of historiography. He is also interested in architectural/urban representation techniques and data visualisation. He completed his Bachelor of Architectural Studies from Victoria University of Wellington and Master of Science in Architecture from KU Leuven. He worked as an architect at Benoy Architecture in Hong Kong and at Hassell Studio (AUS practice) in Bangkok