Yidan Gao
2017 ; Paganoni , 2012 ). This is because the attractiveness of an urban imaginary is essential to the marketing projectof a city as a location for economic activities ( Harvey , 1989 , p . 13 ).
For example , Liverpool brands itself as ‘ The World in One City ’, harnessing ethnic diversity as recourses to bid for the title of European Capital of Culture in 2008 in pursuance of prosperity in tourism and local business ( Krüger , 2015 ). However , it merely creates an illusion of equality with imagined projections of the non-white ethnic groups ( Krüger , 2015 ). The promotional film in the campaign ( River Media , 2002 ) portrays samba dancers in a sexualized camera position , which is a stereotyped representation of the Brazil females and an orientalist staging of ‘ the other ’ ( Krüger , 2015 ; Said , 1978 ). The orientalist thinking , arguably , can hinder the communication of genuine respect and acceptance towards the others . This is because it does not go beyond a parochial lifestyle to learn about the authentic experiences of the transnational inhabitants . Conversely , generic and
77 stereotyped representations of social groups efface different groups ’ particularistic relations with the city , which derives from history and social complex .
In addition , a neoliberal cosmopolitan city is topdown , controlled and stratified ( Georgiou , 2013 ). It is built and represented upon the strategies formulated by hegemonic power such as corporates and governments ( Georgiou , 2013 ). Hegemonic power choreographs ‘ communal experience of consumption ’ based on global cosmopolitan conventions to realise the cosmopolitan vision of ‘ sharing across difference ’ ( Georgiou , 2013 , pp . 53 , 65 ; Paganoni , 2012 ). Georgiou ( 2013 ) argues that neoliberal cosmopolitanism produces non-place , which is opposite to a place that is related to identity , relationality and historicity ( Augé , 2009 [ 1995 ]). For example , a video at Suria KLCC shopping mall in Kuala Lumpur ( Hour Philippines TV , 2019 ) represents the neoliberal cosmopolitan city as a non-place . In this space , the overriding identity of the people in the shopping mall is a consumer . Moreover , the decorations and the global