This book examines the affective domain of the city to visibilise the invisible order that informs the complex urban reality in today's world.  Exploring both the lived and imaginary properties of Dhaka, it uncovers alternative spatial logics and signifying relations among other local dynamics shaping urban knowledge. Moving beyond traditional research frameworks, it focuses on ordinary residents’ subjective engagement with the city and conceptualizes the imaginary city as a social intermediary. Taking Dhaka as a case study, the author highlights the complexities in the relationship between the "hard city" (physical infrastructure) and "soft city" (lived, embedded realities), arguing the latter is not merely an emotional response to the concrete urban space. Using an interdisciplinary lens from literature, the book expands the scope of urban studies, promotes inter-Asia references, and enriches empirical analysis of Asia’s cultural changes. It also examines inclusive, competing urban knowledge production sites by analyzing non-official popular cultural products—such as transport art —which circulate and sustain the city’s popular imaginaries. As a valuable addition to psycho-social and cultural urban scholarship, it positions the "imagined city" as a key analytical tool, prompting readers to rethink the boundary between the physical and imaginary urban spaces globally.

Tabassum Zaman is an associate professor of English at BRAC University. An alumna of the University of Dhaka, she earned her PhD in Cultural Studies in Asia from the National University of Singapore (NUS). She was a postdoctoral fellow with the Cultural Studies Research Cluster at the Asia Research Institute (ARI). A city enthusiast, her interdisciplinary work is open to creative theorisation and focuses on non-systematic, vernacular spatial practices that challenge the hegemony of inherited epistemologies. She has written on Bangladesh’s traffic art, urban nostalgia, graffiti and wall art, and contributes to national newspapers. She teaches literature and cultural studies at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.