Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>This chapter interrogates the role of slumming, the corporeal or virtual visitation of slums, in the making of slum imaginaries. It focuses on the differences between slumming practices across time, and their effect on the ways slums are perceived. The chapter identifies and compares two significant periods in the history of slumming: the early and contemporary period. It argues that contemporary slumming is to some extant a globalized version of early slumming, using new transport and media technology to expand slumming from a practice largely undertaken within individual cities to a broader international scale. However, this is not just a transformation in scale: contemporary slumming also produces new imaginaries. Slums are no longer predominantly seen as places of despair, but also as places of hope.</jats:p>