Geographies of public space: Variegated publicness, variegated epistemologies

Given the rapid diversification and mutation of public space and public life across the globe, this article theorises epistemologies of publicness that move the research agenda beyond the conceptual straitjacket of presence, accessibility and visibility. It develops three theoretical approaches: public space as situated and lived; public space as assemblage; and public space as a liminal zone between inclusion and exclusion. Signposting more open-ended, flexible, processual, performative and ambivalent conceptions of publicness and public space, this article represents one of the first attempts to systematically map the permutations of new theoretical and conceptual developments in the research of public space.