The Arab city and modernity

Khaled Ziyada... The Arab city and modernity... What remains of the urban past and its traditions and customs?... And what is the state of our urban and architectural modernity?... If Ibn Khaldun were able to return to Cairo, where he lived, he would not recognize it, nor would he notice the greatness that made it the largest city in the Islamic world in the 14th century, and Muhammad Kurd Ali would not be less amazed if he wandered today in the streets of Damascus, which he wrote plans for in the early 20th century, as well as Ali Al-Wardi with Baghdad after he wrote pages of Iraq's social history. The old cities have receded, their features have changed, and they have faded away, and their populations have multiplied many times over due to modernity, and modernization led to the emergence of a new city beside the old one, which its inhabitants abandoned, and the modern commercial center was deserted, and large, crowded suburbs appeared on its outskirts, with no trace of architectural heritage and expressing the crises of modernity. This is what the book tries to narrate some of its faces and phenomena, asking: Are social science schools still capable of interpreting the city in its transformations, or do we need to reconsider concepts and methodologies?