desbordamiento urbano

English translation: urban eruption

GLOSSARY ENTRY (DERIVED FROM QUESTION BELOW)
Spanish term or phrase:desbordamiento urbano
English translation:urban eruption
Entered by: Robert Forstag

14:52 Sep 29, 2014
Spanish to English translations [PRO]
Social Sciences - Anthropology / Spain - urban development - Henri Lefebvre
Spanish term or phrase: desbordamiento urbano
The term apparently is a translation of one aspect of a dialectic introduced by Henri Lefebvre (1901-1991)between and attempted "cercamiento" (containment) of the city's vital communal forces on the part of capitalist elites and the "desbordamiento" of these forces that strive to break free of the oppressor's yoke.

***
The extract below is from an academic paper regarding conflicting interests and forces in the Spanish city of Bilbao:

El segundo, como forma de apuntalar el desbordamiento urbano (re)generador de lo común, se asienta en una lógica de vertebración vecinal que se apoya en el discurso movimentista que reivindica el derecho a la ciudadanía (derecho a la belleza, marginalidad, centralidad, cultura) en los términos definidos por Jordi Borja (2002), situando el conflicto en el centro del dinamismo urbano.

I really don't think "spillover" or "spillage" work here. Other ideas? Thanks.
Robert Forstag
United States
Local time: 02:26
urban eruption
Explanation:
I think it's something more abstract than spreading beyond spatial boundaries, and I also think you and Phil are right to link it to revolution. I've been trying to get a handle on it by dipping into Lefebvre, and specifically his The Urban Revolution (La Révolution urbaine), a significant title. He writes at one point (I quote from the English translation; I can't get hold of the French original):

"On the one hand a path is opened to exploration; on the other there is an enclosure to break out of, a consecration to transgress." (p. 31)
http://books.google.es/books?hl=es&id=5_dbeJX3EPsC&q=déborde...

A suggestive passage, though unfortunately Google Books won't let me see the wider context. But breaking out and transgression may well be the semantic area we should be working in here.

"Desbordamiento" is a bursting of the confines, and I feel intuitively that it's intended here to denote a violent, sudden, forceful transgression. I don't think I'd go as far as revolution; but eruption (etymologically a breaking-out, after all) might be an option. Here's a quotation from another of Lefebvre's works, The Production of Space:

'There is no "reality" without a concentration of energy, without a focus or core—nor, therefore, without the dialectic: centre–periphery, accretion–dissipation, condensation–radiation, glomeration–saturation, concentration–eruption, implosion–explosion.'
http://books.google.es/books?id=IJAsBHN02nwC&pg=PA197&lpg=PA...


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Note added at 1 hr (2014-09-29 16:22:18 GMT)
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I note, by the way, that "eruption" is a word applied in several places to May 1968, including by Lefebvre himself (rendering, I think, the French "irruption").

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Note added at 1 hr (2014-09-29 16:25:37 GMT)
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There are also words like "outburst" or "outpouring", though they don't seem quite right. Anyway, even if this doesn't give you the answer, I hope it may help you on the way, as a kind of staging post.

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Note added at 2 hrs (2014-09-29 16:53:31 GMT)
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Yes, I think it would, and I was actually going to suggest it at first. I held back simply because I felt that it should be something conveying a sort of explosion of energy, yet that may not necessarily be so.

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Note added at 6 hrs (2014-09-29 21:40:12 GMT)
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I am very interested, as always, to read Donal's comments. On the last point he raises, I would just say that eruption seems to me to be eminently active. It is not transitive, however: it is something cities do rather than something that is done to them, and that, I think, is inherently true of desbordamiento (and indeed débordement).

I don't get the sense that the phenomenon denoted by desbordamiento is spatial, and I wouldn't use a translation that implies that.
Selected response from:

Charles Davis
Spain
Local time: 07:26
Grading comment
Excellent solution. Thank you, Charles. Thanks also to everyone else who responded and commented.
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer



Summary of answers provided
3 +3urban eruption
Charles Davis
4urban sprawl
liz askew
4(civic) breakout
David Hollywood
3cities bursting their banks
DLyons


Discussion entries: 7





  

Answers


7 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
urban sprawl


Explanation:
urban sprawl - The Free Dictionary
www.thefreedictionary.com/urban sprawl
The unplanned, uncontrolled spreading of urban development into areas adjoining the edge of a city. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English ...


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Note added at 8 mins (2014-09-29 15:01:07 GMT)
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reseña de la sesión del 27 de enero de 2011
territoriosostenible2011.blogspot.com/.../resena-de-la-...
Translate this page
31 Jan 2011 - ... Norte América se dirigen hacia la creación de centralidad y a no continuar los procesos de desbordamiento de las ciudades (urban sprawl).

liz askew
United Kingdom
Local time: 06:26
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in category: 7

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
neutral  philgoddard: That is the usual meaning, but it's not the case here.
3 mins

agree  Henry Hinds
12 mins

disagree  Audra deFalco (X): Not the case here. Sprawl refers to areas or places.
3 hrs
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5 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5
cities bursting their banks


Explanation:
Lefebvre's key "L'irruption de Nanterre au sommet" has been translated as "Explosion: Marxism and the French Revolution". And "l'irruption" as "explosion" is possible, although highly interpretative!
The first issue here seems to me to be the key distinction between irruption and eruption - is the sense inward or outward? French allows either the outward or inward usage (although the latter is much more usual). However "desbordamiento" is clearly the latter, but how does Lefebvre use the term?

The outward usage of "irruption" in French is "Envahissement, débordement, pénétration brutale de forces naturelles" - and "débordement" indeed seems close to "desbordamiento". So we are looking at the semantic field of overflow which may include explosion/eruption. And this not in the passive sense of "sprawl", even though that does get the direction right.

Charles' eruption certainly works, but I wonder if eruption/explosion quite capture the active nature of what is intended? The almost rape of the enclosing space!

DLyons
Ireland
Local time: 06:26
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 7
Login to enter a peer comment (or grade)

1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 3/5Answerer confidence 3/5 peer agreement (net): +3
urban eruption


Explanation:
I think it's something more abstract than spreading beyond spatial boundaries, and I also think you and Phil are right to link it to revolution. I've been trying to get a handle on it by dipping into Lefebvre, and specifically his The Urban Revolution (La Révolution urbaine), a significant title. He writes at one point (I quote from the English translation; I can't get hold of the French original):

"On the one hand a path is opened to exploration; on the other there is an enclosure to break out of, a consecration to transgress." (p. 31)
http://books.google.es/books?hl=es&id=5_dbeJX3EPsC&q=déborde...

A suggestive passage, though unfortunately Google Books won't let me see the wider context. But breaking out and transgression may well be the semantic area we should be working in here.

"Desbordamiento" is a bursting of the confines, and I feel intuitively that it's intended here to denote a violent, sudden, forceful transgression. I don't think I'd go as far as revolution; but eruption (etymologically a breaking-out, after all) might be an option. Here's a quotation from another of Lefebvre's works, The Production of Space:

'There is no "reality" without a concentration of energy, without a focus or core—nor, therefore, without the dialectic: centre–periphery, accretion–dissipation, condensation–radiation, glomeration–saturation, concentration–eruption, implosion–explosion.'
http://books.google.es/books?id=IJAsBHN02nwC&pg=PA197&lpg=PA...


--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 hr (2014-09-29 16:22:18 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

I note, by the way, that "eruption" is a word applied in several places to May 1968, including by Lefebvre himself (rendering, I think, the French "irruption").

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 hr (2014-09-29 16:25:37 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

There are also words like "outburst" or "outpouring", though they don't seem quite right. Anyway, even if this doesn't give you the answer, I hope it may help you on the way, as a kind of staging post.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 2 hrs (2014-09-29 16:53:31 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

Yes, I think it would, and I was actually going to suggest it at first. I held back simply because I felt that it should be something conveying a sort of explosion of energy, yet that may not necessarily be so.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 6 hrs (2014-09-29 21:40:12 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

I am very interested, as always, to read Donal's comments. On the last point he raises, I would just say that eruption seems to me to be eminently active. It is not transitive, however: it is something cities do rather than something that is done to them, and that, I think, is inherently true of desbordamiento (and indeed débordement).

I don't get the sense that the phenomenon denoted by desbordamiento is spatial, and I wouldn't use a translation that implies that.

Charles Davis
Spain
Local time: 07:26
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 12
Grading comment
Excellent solution. Thank you, Charles. Thanks also to everyone else who responded and commented.
Notes to answerer
Asker: Thanks so much, Charles. Perhaps even "transgression" would merit consideration here.


Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  philgoddard: Good idea.
36 mins
  -> Thanks a lot, Phil

agree  Elizabeth Joy Pitt de Morales: Yes, I think you're correct for this context. Your comment makes a lot of sense.
1 hr
  -> Thanks very much, Elizabeth!

agree  Audra deFalco (X): LOVE this. This is it; not urban sprawl which is a physical concept.
1 hr
  -> Thank you very much, Audra :)
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10 hrs   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5
(civic) breakout


Explanation:
I would say

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Note added at 10 hrs (2014-09-30 01:46:01 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

or: "revolt" as you yourself suggest

David Hollywood
Local time: 03:26
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 12
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