Spatializing diversities,diversifying spaces: housing experiences and home space perceptions in a migrant hub of Istanbul

The neighbourhood of Kumkapi in Istanbul is a superdiverse space by all readings of the term. Having already been at the centre of varying migration flows for decades, its current residential population reveals substantial differences on innumerable fronts. In this article, I explore the role of space as both product and source in shaping the emergence and convergence of such multiple differences on the ground. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, I examine the historic socio-spatial transformation of Kumkapi, reflecting on the emergence of commonalities beyond ethnicity. I further suggest analysing these at a different spatial scale, moving from the neighbourhood down to the living spaces that migrants inhabit, exploring how variable differences materialize and become entangled in processes of where and how migrants access, use and relate to housing. In conclusion, I argue that superdiversity as an analytical concept carries the potential to understand new complexities in relations formed with and through space in the contemporary era.