One of the best attended sessions at the November 2002 annual conference of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning (ACSP) focused on stories and storytelling in planning. Interest in multimedia and the use of narratives in planning continues to grow. Below two of the participants in the 2002 session give a quick answer to the question: "why have planners become interested in stories?"

Digital Ethnography and Community Development

In 2003 Leonie Sandercock received a Canada Foundation for Innovation grant to establish the Vancouver Cosmopolis Laboratory at SCARP. This Lab is now being used to explore the uses of multimedia in planning practice and research. The first product of the Lab was the 50 minute documentary film, by Giovanni Attili and Leonie Sandercock, 'Where Strangers become Neighbours: the story of the Collingwood Neighbourhood House and the integration of immigrants in Vancouver'. Information about and a preview of this film can be found at www.mongrel-stories.com. This film received a Special Mention in the International Federation of Housing and Planning's film competition (Sept 2006) and an Honorable Mention in the Documentary section of the Berkeley Video and Film Festival (Oct 2006). The film has been accepted for distribution by the National Film Board of Canada. MANIFESTO of the VANCOUVER COSMOPOLIS LABORATORY

The "Where Strangers become Neighbours" Film was recently shown at the 2006 annual meeting of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning (ACSP), in Ft. Worth, Texas (Nov. 11, 2006). Leonie Sandercock's introduction, prior to the showing of the film, is available as an audio file (3 megabytes, 9-5_Sand-Attili-DigEthnog-intro.mp3). The one-hour open discussion among those who attended the showing (about 40 planning scholars, students and researchers), is also available as an audio file (30 megabytes, 9-5_Sand-Attili-DigEthnog-disc.mp3).

Barbara Eckstein and James A. Throgmorton (eds.) (2003) Story and Sustainability: Planning, Practice, and Possibility for American Cities. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Leonie Sandercock (Ed.) (1998) Making the Invisible Visible: A Multicultural Planning History. California Studies in Critical Human Geography, 2. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Leonie Sandercock (2003). Cosmopolis II : mongrel cities in the 21st century. New York, Continuum.