Call me old-fashioned. I don't mind. Call me a sentimental Leftie. I don't mind that either. I do mind, though, when I am told in a book-length study that claims to be a serious work of history that its focus is upon urban society and its manifestations as a text rather than a state of affairs. I object, too, when a debatable proposition is advanced as an unchallengeable axiom. Mayne claims that his book is a defence of the post-structural ‘linguistic left’ against the charge of historians that it has ‘muddied historical analysis by introducing a spurious disconnection between language and culture on the one hand, and the material world and practical politics on the other’ (p. 4). But is it such a defence? Am I foolish to take exception to claims which raise fundamental questions about how we know the world? Mayne, if I have understood him properly – and his language is not always easy to follow – is a proponent of a particular epistemological standpoint which underpins a theory of language as a self-subsisting social entity from which there is no referent in the extralinguistic world. Language as a significatory rather than a representational phenomenon is thus assigned a very considerable autonomy in relation to other social phenomena and one which is much greater than historians and social scientists had previously allowed. The alleged superiority of texts over sources is derived from a tradition of philosophical enquiry that stands outside and at odds with the empirical character of historical and social science.

Liverpool's designation as European Capital of Culture for 2008, together with the 800th anniversary of the founding of the borough in 2007, has (unsurprisingly) generated a number of books dealing with different aspects of the city's history. The five volumes reviewed here represent just a small selection of those available, ranging from the deliberately academic to much more popular publications. Together they provide much of interest for urban historians. If these books have a common theme it is the argument (or assumption) that for much of its history, and in many different respects, Liverpool was (and remains) in various ways different from other British cities. The celebration of difference lies very much at the heart of Liverpool's Capital of Culture activities, and these books provide additional perspectives on Liverpool's demographic, social, cultural, sporting and architectural distinctiveness.

Is the growth of cities and towns determined by broad impersonal forces and situational factors? Or can growth be significantly influenced by the attitudes, perceptions and decisions of the citizens? General surveys of urbanization have leaned to the first interpretation, stressing macro-economic trends, political context and location with respect to resources, transportation and markets. Studies of individual cities tend to emphasize the particular actions of key local leaders and their unique circumstances, and may seem to disregard the comparable experience of other cities.

The automobile is often misconstrued as being exclusively responsible for the decline of traditional street culture. This paper argues that the marginalisation of street vendors may also be related to developing definitions of the street as the locus of respectability, unobstructed circulation, nationalism and civic pride. Street entrepreneurs of the 1850s became urban nuisances by the 1900s, associated more with obstruction and underservedness as with convenience and enterprise. Licensing records of bootblacks and coffee-stall keepers as objects of municipal benevolence reveal their economic and social roles in the micro-geography of the city. While nostalgia can distort the realities of historical and contemporary public spaces, the street evacuated of social density and diversity is one of the great losses of modern urban life.

Sources of information abound for the study of German urban demography in the ‘late’ early modern era – the period from about 1600 to 1800. Yet we are still a long way from a comprehensive grasp of urbanpopulation trends. Frequently-cited figures for the total population of German cities are often based on the uncritical replication of casual estimates. Intensive case studies which exploit the full range of available sources are more reliable, yet only the smallest towns can be subjected to the process of ‘total reconstitution’. A true understanding of German urban demography in the early modern era may come less from the endless accumulation of data than from a thoughtful comparison of findings from different cities.

Writing in Urban History in the spring of 1991, Peter Borsay considered how the gap between the ‘popular presentations of the urban past’ produced by the growing heritage industry and ‘the booming academic study of urban history’ might be bridged. Heritage, he argued, was ‘deeply bound up with the meanings and functions of towns’ and urban historians should play a crucial role within communities ‘engaged in a complex discourse with the past . . . that for many was fundamental to their livelihood and identity’. Borsay's concerns 27 years later continue to be mirrored in academic discussions surrounding heritage and materiality, echoing wider questions that surround the relevance of urban history beyond the academy. Recent conferences have also demonstrated the continued salience of Borsay's argument, considering the potential of the study of cities to shape approaches to their management through work with local communities, heritage partners, cultural institutions and professional groups. This emphasis on knowledge exchange and partnership has also attracted the support of funding bodies through collaborative doctoral awards that have sought to ‘increase opportunities for all researchers to develop their work in collaboration with public, private and third sector partners that increase the flow, value and impact of world-class arts and humanities research from academia to the UK's wider creative economy and beyond’. This has included the author's own work on the heritage of Middlesbrough's iron and steel industries, which has involved working collaboratively with local archives and heritage partners.

This study offers an investigation into the prevalence of interpersonal verbal hostility and litigation in Nantwich, a town that was undergoing radical change during a period of crisis in the seventeenth century. It surveys the vicissitudes of midwife and moneylender, Anne Knutsford, whose outrageous language was met with a petition by opposing factions of Nantwich society. Through an intensive case-study, it identifies a complex interplay of dispute, transaction and reputation during one turbulent decade from 1660 to 1670. Such a close telling of the intimate details and dynamics of relationships gives rare insights into the goings on of daily urban life. Pieced together from a complicated labyrinth of suit and counter-suit, it establishes Anne Knutsford as a formidable creditor and highlights the fragility of social relationships under pressure from material hardship.

In 1927, the Nationalist government launched an ambitious project to transform Nanjing into a modern capital. During this reconstruction process, private lands were seized in the name of public interest for the construction of public works. In the face of opposition from affected landowners, Nationalist leaders shifted the emphasis from ‘public interest’ (gonggong liyi) to ‘public obligation’ (shimin zeren), stressing the duty of urban residents to support capital reconstruction and stigmatizing opponents as anti-development. This article examines compulsory land expropriation in Nationalist China and shows how the government turned discourses of public interest and public obligation into modern land laws.

This article examines a moment of uncertainty in early 1970s Glasgow motorway history: the planning of the East Flank of the Inner Ring Road and the potential removal of the Barrows Market. As sociological influences against wholesale urban clearance came into maturity in planning and community action, Glasgow planners carried out a feasibility study into the socio-economic costs of uprooting the commercial life of the Barrows. I suggest that reading this technocratic document for its cultural assumptions, ambiguities and tensions, rather than its engineering vision, opens up a different approach to the history of motorway planning.