Drawing on ideas from postcolonial theory and literary and cultural studies Garth Myers develops a new framework for re-imagining global urban studies. This framework is developed in dialogue with the work of Martinican poet and thinker Édouard Glissant, in particular his collection of essays entitled, Treatise on the Whole-World, which deploys analogy and juxtaposition to elucidate relationality between places.

Utilizing this methodology, which is comparative in nature, each chapter is based around a pair of cities through which different themes are explored. The pairings are: Fort de France, Martinique with Zanzibar, Tanzania; the Zambian Copperbelt with Scranton, USA; Kingston, Jamaica with Hartford, USA; and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania with Los Angeles, USA. Each chapter combines historical, literary and cultural studies with analysis of a tangible, crucial issue in urban studies. In so doing, the book addresses some of the key concerns of canonical literature in Global North urban studies – from the Manchester School, Chicago School and Los Angeles School, along with the work of Jane Jacobs – and considers what an alternative Glissantian cultural approach might offer.