The Use of Narration as a Tool for Enriching Emotional Cognition in Urban Planning: A Research in the Città Diffusa of the North - East Italian Region

Abstract

This paper argues on the importance of narration (written and oral) as a socio-spatial diagnosis tool for urban studies. Throughout the use of novels, as well as of oral testimonies of their authors, hidden dimension of the urban space are revealed. We need tools to understand these dynamics and help to create a link between society and research. Exploring the emotions of the individual who is living in a particular urban space is crucial for planners, if we want an environment in which people flourish and reach their best of their development. Planning analysts are taught to separate cognitive and emotional qualities of judgment and tend to study cognitive rather than emotional relationships. In order to respond to the needs of a particular society in urban planning, we need to know as much as possible about this society, and the authors inside of it, could act as the “voice” of a patient (society) while narrating his emotions to a researcher. The paper continues in reporting some of the results of a research done in the città diffusa of the Italian North-East Region, with the collaboration of four contemporary Italian authors of the Region.