Public space practices on urban usage: Community centers in Karsiyaka (Izmir)

All environmental, scientific and socioeconomic transformations happening under historical continuity, show their implications primarily on daily life and as a natural result of this on the individual and society. All the daily encounters embellished with a network of complex relations are shaped in the public sphere and the individual's private sphere which are the platforms of social sphere. In this context, public and private spheres that contain parameters regarding the individual and the society, as well as their interrelations, have moved myriad of scholars throughout history to scrutinise these two concepts and develop various approaches. In this regard, Michel Foucault who makes public sphere analyses through the concepts of biopower and biopolitics in connection to panopticon metaphor, add a new dimension to the public sphere studies by providing explanations for the relations between public sphere, body, power and surveillance. When treated with this kind of an analysis method; it becomes clear that, under the shadow of consumption, public sphere is losing its public aspect. Hence; individuals, while being stuck in the urban space, may concurrently experience physical and mental exhaustions under the intense and fast flow of daily life which hinders individuals to discover their potential. For alleviating or even preventing the problem, many practices are being put into action by national and international administrations. In this context, community centres with a historical background and with their first examples primarily in Europe and later in the United States of America, constitute the spatial focal point of this study. Centres at hand, through developing personal talent and skills, attract attention as practices that offer rehabilitation and enhancement to today's societal structures. Within this scope, with their positions in urban spaces, their spatial equivalents and competencies along with their modus operandi, the centres at hand that have strong integrative roles on social structure must be examined and discussed. In this regard, alongside with the inquiries directed at the historical context of the concept at hand, revealing its representation both in the world and Turkey at the urban space is the main purpose of this study. Thus, the thesis, via unveiling the historical background of community centres in both national and international areas, examines qualified and authentic world samples regarding space and function. In accordance to this, by shifting the study into domestic scale from the global scale it focuses on 8 neighbourhood centres in İzmir's Karşıyaka district, which is the sample space, and after the analysis regarding the relevant centres it generates a proposed guide requirement program which may serve as a base for the administrations. In line with the acquired data, it provides assessments over the Karşıyaka district.