Understanding the raison d'être of urban parks and gardens

This thesis suggests that the raison d'etre of urban parks as a part of the urban collage are beyond the properties of their physical existence. The main aim of the thesis is to reveal and examine the reason d'etre of urban parks and gardens. In order to examine the causes of the existence of the parks and to discuss the relationship established within the context of the city, four concepts have been defined in the thesis. These concepts are defined as follows; social play, everyday life, revolution, and ideology. In order to explain the associations, Foucault's book titled Order of Things was examined. The concepts described under the chapter titled "The Four Similitudes" in this book have been transformed and used as reference point in this thesis. The main focus of the thesis is to show that the reason for the existence of urban parks and gardens is dependent on such a relationship which could be defined as the concepts have established with each other and urban parks, along with all of the actions and events that take place in urban parks as open public spaces. In this thesis, the effects of urban parks on everyday life as social playgrounds, the function of play as a revolutionary tool against the point where everyday urban life is stuck, and the relation between the ideology of these concepts and urban space are discussed in detail. The relationships of the concepts with each other and urban parks, along with the transformations and their effects, are discussed through the urban parks and gardens found in Ankara. The effects of the presence and absence of urban parks on the city have been examined in the framework of such perspectives. Through the relationships revealed in the thesis, it has been discussed that the reason for the existence of urban transcends their physical assets and that urban parks carry an important role within the urban reality.