MAPPING CULTURE

6.5 Section summary
This mapping exercise provides a brief snapshot of the cultural spaces and value chain
characteristics specific to Redfern Street Village. It illustrates a preliminary mapping of
how cultural venues are distributed in this area and provides initial insights into their
relationships to processes of creation, production, dissemination, use and education.
Such a visualisation and analysis of a specific village area demonstrates how this
mapping and data collection process provides a foundation for current and future City
of Sydney research, policy and community initiatives. For example, a future City of
Sydney study can update the database to map cultural infrastructure changes in the
area, based on how cultural spaces and value chain dimensions evolve (knowledge
that could be richly augmented with qualitative research). In more immediate terms,
this mapping exercise provides an additional resource for multi-sectoral negotiations
and dialogue in response to major development proposals impacting on Redfern
Street Village. Decisions stemming from these proposals will significantly enable or
constrain the future of cultural spaces, activities and other features of ‘creative
clusters’ in the locale. For this reason, clearly communicating current cultural assets
and gaps is vital.
Redfern Street Village is under increasing scrutiny due to urban and cultural
developments strongly impacting on the area. The role of policy making in recognising
the complex dynamics and distribution of cultural practices is significant. As Professor
Brendan Gleeson (University of Melbourne) states:
There is a strong role for public policy in protecting culture in the suburbs … As cities
become more polymorphous, we need to give attention to investing in new cultural
manifestations . (quoted in Davies, 2016)
Recognising the complexity of cultural development and the ‘micro-dynamics’ of
infrastructure, networks and agents ‘allows us to identify the emergence of structures
and organisational forms that support and facilitate the connectivity and growth of
the system’ (Comunian, 2010, p.7). As is highlighted in this mapping exercise,
understanding the distribution of cultural venues and activities in specific villages is a
key starting point for exploring such complexity. Cultural mapping can, therefore, be
utilised to stimulate dialogue and discussion across the City of Sydney’s (2014)
‘strategic priority areas’; that is, to support how challenges are addressed and
opportunities augmented in support of the vision that all residents, workers,
businesses, industries, institutions and visitors can fully contribute to, and engage
with, the ‘cultural and creative life’ of Sydney.
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