Framing Luchtbal : Local Muslim Community and Global Urban Machinery

Abstract

Luchtbal is a neighbourhood in the North of Antwerp, the major harbour city of Belgium. Since the last decades, the urban quarter became largely inhabited by migrant families. In this paper I will explore some relation between the extremely different scales in the urban process of migration. On the one hand I will elaborate on the historical evolution of the modernist social housing project of Luchtbal, and the way it became the migrant neighbourhood of today. On the other hand I will elaborate on the particular case of the local Atthawid mosque, and the ambivalent role it plays for both the social apparatus of the residential quarter and the global urban machinery.