by Nora Arsovska
“High columns and domes in antique-roman style. This is the description for the new building of the Constitutional Court, legislative organ of greatest importance in Macedonia. .. Zivkovski (the author) sais that this building will raise the consciousness of the Macedonian nationality for their own cultural heritage.” Quotation from a short column written and announced by the magazine Kapital.
Antique-roman style/raising the consciousness of the Macedonian nationality for their own cultural heritage. The above quotation represents the current state of conducted public opinion, which actually is an image of non-existing productive critics or an instrumentalized public thought.
What is actually happening with the public sphere in countries in transition? Where is it positioned in the state constellation? The public sphere, according to Habermass is a category that should intermediate between the society and the state and it should shape the public opinion. It is public information for which battles had been fought against the hidden politics of monarchies. The public opinion has enabled the democratic control of the government activities.
On contrary, the situation in countries like Macedonia is different. The public opinion is not a democratic tool for controlling the government activities. It is easily bribed and corrupted, especially for the cost of identity.
During the 18th century, the bourgeois public sphere had been formed representing the rational exploration and debate between the government and the private sector. The literature clubs, newspapers and political magazines, institutions for political debate that had been formed show the liberal and democratic public sphere in the early modernism. That had been a society where individuals criticize the common interests, where the individuality and citizenship could have shaped the society through their activities in the public sphere.
Another situation in the epoch of the modernism that Habermass illustrates (similar to the situation in our society) is the transition from the entrepreneurs, market capitalism into the governmental or monopolistic capitalism. This is the stage where the state and the private corporations overtake the vital functions of the public sphere and at the same point the liberal and democratic public discussion transfer into sphere of domination. Through the mechanism of bureaucracy the government manipulates the economy, trying to prevent the crises and at the same time controls the public functions like education, social care, and public mediums.
The giant corporations enter the public sphere and transform the individuals from citizens and public debaters into mere observers of the political, cultural and public matters. The developments of new media, marketing, public relations are becoming controlling tools of the private corporations. These tools empower the private corporations in the realm of public sphere and at the same time suppress the rational individuals and citizens.
After analyzing the transformation of the capitalism, Habermass encourages the idea of communicative acting. The instrumental acting directly connects the instruments to the goals, without rethinking the rationality of the aim. The communicative acting is focused on inter-subjective communication and understanding the goal, or forming consensus over a question.
The described tool according Habermass is the tool for initiating critics and reconstruction of the society.
Reference:
Steven Best and Douglas Kellner, 1991, Postmodern Theory, Critical Interrogations, The Guilford Press
Friday, April 10, 2009
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Space Syntax as a new Master Planning Tool
by Biljana Spirkoska
The architectural knowledge is knowledge of formal and spatial architectural possibility and of how to use this knowledge to create an actual form. Accordingly, the two domains of architectural knowledge are the physical and the spatial forms of buildings. These domains of knowledge are about complexes of relations between things- physical elements on the one hand and individual spaces on the other. As such they are subject to the general way of thinking about complex relations: namely that, as with the grammar of a language, we think of words, but with the unconscious rules that form them into sentences. This is the problem of architecture: its primary domains of knowledge are non-discursive: we deal with them competently, but intuitively.
This is where architectural theory enters. It has always been the aim of classical architectural theories to render the non-discursive discursive-so we can talk about it in an explicit way. However, Hillier argues two problems with the ways in which architectural theories had approached the analysis of the non-discursive in architecture: firstly, most aimed at the analytics of physical form, few aimed at the analytics of space, and secondly this has usually been done in a partially normative, rather than fully analytic way. In effect architectural theories tent to be normative rather than analytic and close down the solution space in the direction of particular aesthetics, rather than open it up as theory should.
What he suggests it is needed is a "general theory of description of space, able to describe the differences between one spatial pattern and another in a way that is both analytic, in that it could describe all kinds of case, and theoretical in that it would aim at an effective description in terms of as few terms and concepts as possible."
In an answer he develops the space syntax project as: "a search for a spatial language to describe the relational properties of spatial patterns in buildings and cities, so a language of the spatial non-discursive, with sufficient precision to design with it and testable through comparing and correlating spatial and functional patterns."
The fundamental proposition of space syntax, one that underlines all others in some sense, is that the emergence of spatial patterns from the placing and shaping of objects is subject to simple laws. These are not in any sense laws which tell human beings what to do, but take the form: if we do this with objects than that emerges in an ambient pattern of space. These simple but pervasive spatial laws could only be brought to light by learning to analyze space configurationally that is by considering relations between all spatial elements, however defined and all others.
As a set of techniques, space syntax is about: applying configurational analyses to different representations of space: rooms, convex spaces, lines, street segments and similar, and through this- identifying structure in the spatial patterns and looking for observable functional correlates of these spatial patterns. In this way cultural patterns can be identified, underlying deep structures in architectural space can be brought to light, clear structure-function relations can be showed, theoretical ideas can be experimented, designs to see how they would work in context can be simulated and spatial laws about the relation between the placing and shaping of objects and the shapes of space that emerge from this can be identify. Once created, those analyses are powerful design tool, since they can be used for exploration of the effect of changes by just drawing and re-analyzing.
Space syntax is increasingly being used as a master planning tool, not only at the scale of the urban area, but also at the scale of the city and its region.
The strength of the space syntax urban models in comparison to the traditional planning models is seen in its ability to synthesize with great precision all kind of urban data-movement, land use, densities and similar- on the basis of a functionally intelligent spatial analysis of the street network and use it in a new kind of evidence-based design, to work across urban scales with the same level of precision at the micro scale as at the macro scale, to deploy science in design in a way which does not tell the designer what to do, but helps the designer to understand what he or she is doing, and to create theories which do not close down the solution space, but open it up to new thinking about design and new problems.
This text has been based on the lecture ''Space Syntax as a Thinking Machine for Architecture'' held by Bill Hillier on the 11th International Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar.
The architectural knowledge is knowledge of formal and spatial architectural possibility and of how to use this knowledge to create an actual form. Accordingly, the two domains of architectural knowledge are the physical and the spatial forms of buildings. These domains of knowledge are about complexes of relations between things- physical elements on the one hand and individual spaces on the other. As such they are subject to the general way of thinking about complex relations: namely that, as with the grammar of a language, we think of words, but with the unconscious rules that form them into sentences. This is the problem of architecture: its primary domains of knowledge are non-discursive: we deal with them competently, but intuitively.
This is where architectural theory enters. It has always been the aim of classical architectural theories to render the non-discursive discursive-so we can talk about it in an explicit way. However, Hillier argues two problems with the ways in which architectural theories had approached the analysis of the non-discursive in architecture: firstly, most aimed at the analytics of physical form, few aimed at the analytics of space, and secondly this has usually been done in a partially normative, rather than fully analytic way. In effect architectural theories tent to be normative rather than analytic and close down the solution space in the direction of particular aesthetics, rather than open it up as theory should.
What he suggests it is needed is a "general theory of description of space, able to describe the differences between one spatial pattern and another in a way that is both analytic, in that it could describe all kinds of case, and theoretical in that it would aim at an effective description in terms of as few terms and concepts as possible."
In an answer he develops the space syntax project as: "a search for a spatial language to describe the relational properties of spatial patterns in buildings and cities, so a language of the spatial non-discursive, with sufficient precision to design with it and testable through comparing and correlating spatial and functional patterns."
The fundamental proposition of space syntax, one that underlines all others in some sense, is that the emergence of spatial patterns from the placing and shaping of objects is subject to simple laws. These are not in any sense laws which tell human beings what to do, but take the form: if we do this with objects than that emerges in an ambient pattern of space. These simple but pervasive spatial laws could only be brought to light by learning to analyze space configurationally that is by considering relations between all spatial elements, however defined and all others.
As a set of techniques, space syntax is about: applying configurational analyses to different representations of space: rooms, convex spaces, lines, street segments and similar, and through this- identifying structure in the spatial patterns and looking for observable functional correlates of these spatial patterns. In this way cultural patterns can be identified, underlying deep structures in architectural space can be brought to light, clear structure-function relations can be showed, theoretical ideas can be experimented, designs to see how they would work in context can be simulated and spatial laws about the relation between the placing and shaping of objects and the shapes of space that emerge from this can be identify. Once created, those analyses are powerful design tool, since they can be used for exploration of the effect of changes by just drawing and re-analyzing.
Space syntax is increasingly being used as a master planning tool, not only at the scale of the urban area, but also at the scale of the city and its region.
The strength of the space syntax urban models in comparison to the traditional planning models is seen in its ability to synthesize with great precision all kind of urban data-movement, land use, densities and similar- on the basis of a functionally intelligent spatial analysis of the street network and use it in a new kind of evidence-based design, to work across urban scales with the same level of precision at the micro scale as at the macro scale, to deploy science in design in a way which does not tell the designer what to do, but helps the designer to understand what he or she is doing, and to create theories which do not close down the solution space, but open it up to new thinking about design and new problems.
This text has been based on the lecture ''Space Syntax as a Thinking Machine for Architecture'' held by Bill Hillier on the 11th International Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar.
Labels:
Urban Planning
Monday, April 6, 2009
Collective memory under siege
by Stefan Lazarevski
The recently held Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar revealed several issues that planners, architects, sociologists and other city researchers are being occupied with at the moment. The questions of control and freedom, core and periphery, state and society as well as networks that are enforced, based on Michael Hardt’s and Antonio Negri’s perception of the new World-order, were addressed. There were two focal points; the relationship between theory and practice overshadowed by the economic, political, social and moral issues that pervade in any globalized society; and how to escape the conformist role that architecture tends to aspire by focusing on moods, ornaments and atmospheres.
Sounds familier? Yes, it already had been an issue in the early 20’s when the founders of Bauhaus Gropius and Mies van der Rohe demanded a “resolute affirmation” of the current conditions and responses adequate of the needs, goals and the time.
Now, standing in the turning point of humanity, clinched between economic and moral crises, architecture must once again rise and answer the social dilemmas. This can, very easily, be understood as self-centered and arrogant position of architects but it also must be considered that, as Keller Easterling said in her expose, some of the most radical changes to the globalized world are being written, not in the language of law and diplomacy, but rather in the language of architecture, urbanism and infrastructure. Finally, the city is the physical evidence of the collective memory and the changes in global trends will most definitely be embedded in the urban form and architectural language and as such will remain to justify our actions in the society of our time.
In her book “The city of collective memory”, Christine Boyer asks probably one of the most fundamental question of the identity of cities and ultimately the nation states; the question of what is collective memory? Today when identity is attacked by forces of globalization, is the collective memory under siege? This question seems to be very liable in a societies that are driven by political figures and pseudo-scientific workers on constant alert of strengthening the national identity. The rise of the nation states has mobilized and commercialized the collective memory, bringing it to a mere product, that can be easily sold, once it’s branded. This only proves that collective memory is rather political question than programmatic and in most of the cases it has nothing to do with the past. The reflection of such memory is to be found in different layers of the city which piled over the time.
However, what happens with the memory once it has been subjected to the instants of war, of genocide, of totalitarian rule or nationalistic amnesia? Is it a break from conventional form of memory or an absolute memory free situation? Christine Boyer argues that memory is absolute zero in such actions, that Bogdan Bogdanovic describes as urbicid; but she does not differentiate the true from the false memory. Perhaps this is the right approach, because if collective memory conveys only data, than the value of that information or its accuracy is of no importance to the identity structure. Then why totalitarian rule is bad for collective memory? In the globalized world, most of the spectacular architectural production by star architects happens in countries with soft or absolute totalitarian rule. The cities in these countries get inerasable urban form and thus build up its own collective memory.
“The more centralized the power, the less compromises need to be made in architecture” says Peter Eisenman. However, the liability of such collective memory hovers over the issues of morality, truth and its independent reading. Sure, we have the chicken, but is it really not important if it came first or was it the egg. The lack of dialog, transparency and process, corrupts and undermines this collective memory giving it a questionable and false face. Yes, it is a memory but it is a declarative one.
Professor Eckardt in his expose on modern Empires refers to Foucalt’s ideas of understanding urban society and says that it is all about power. People are controlled by places, by its culture and habits and most certainly by the different forms of power such as the State or the modern companies. Sometimes, they are controlled by the burden of its own collective memory. It is also true that people are the creators of all forms of control and they are the ultimate key in changing them.
“Before any process of memorization can take effect, silencing has to be undone.”
Christine Boyer
This text has been inspired by the lecture ''Collective memory under siege in the age of Empire'' held by M. Christine Boyer on the 11th International Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar.
The recently held Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar revealed several issues that planners, architects, sociologists and other city researchers are being occupied with at the moment. The questions of control and freedom, core and periphery, state and society as well as networks that are enforced, based on Michael Hardt’s and Antonio Negri’s perception of the new World-order, were addressed. There were two focal points; the relationship between theory and practice overshadowed by the economic, political, social and moral issues that pervade in any globalized society; and how to escape the conformist role that architecture tends to aspire by focusing on moods, ornaments and atmospheres.
Sounds familier? Yes, it already had been an issue in the early 20’s when the founders of Bauhaus Gropius and Mies van der Rohe demanded a “resolute affirmation” of the current conditions and responses adequate of the needs, goals and the time.
Now, standing in the turning point of humanity, clinched between economic and moral crises, architecture must once again rise and answer the social dilemmas. This can, very easily, be understood as self-centered and arrogant position of architects but it also must be considered that, as Keller Easterling said in her expose, some of the most radical changes to the globalized world are being written, not in the language of law and diplomacy, but rather in the language of architecture, urbanism and infrastructure. Finally, the city is the physical evidence of the collective memory and the changes in global trends will most definitely be embedded in the urban form and architectural language and as such will remain to justify our actions in the society of our time.
In her book “The city of collective memory”, Christine Boyer asks probably one of the most fundamental question of the identity of cities and ultimately the nation states; the question of what is collective memory? Today when identity is attacked by forces of globalization, is the collective memory under siege? This question seems to be very liable in a societies that are driven by political figures and pseudo-scientific workers on constant alert of strengthening the national identity. The rise of the nation states has mobilized and commercialized the collective memory, bringing it to a mere product, that can be easily sold, once it’s branded. This only proves that collective memory is rather political question than programmatic and in most of the cases it has nothing to do with the past. The reflection of such memory is to be found in different layers of the city which piled over the time.
However, what happens with the memory once it has been subjected to the instants of war, of genocide, of totalitarian rule or nationalistic amnesia? Is it a break from conventional form of memory or an absolute memory free situation? Christine Boyer argues that memory is absolute zero in such actions, that Bogdan Bogdanovic describes as urbicid; but she does not differentiate the true from the false memory. Perhaps this is the right approach, because if collective memory conveys only data, than the value of that information or its accuracy is of no importance to the identity structure. Then why totalitarian rule is bad for collective memory? In the globalized world, most of the spectacular architectural production by star architects happens in countries with soft or absolute totalitarian rule. The cities in these countries get inerasable urban form and thus build up its own collective memory.
“The more centralized the power, the less compromises need to be made in architecture” says Peter Eisenman. However, the liability of such collective memory hovers over the issues of morality, truth and its independent reading. Sure, we have the chicken, but is it really not important if it came first or was it the egg. The lack of dialog, transparency and process, corrupts and undermines this collective memory giving it a questionable and false face. Yes, it is a memory but it is a declarative one.
Professor Eckardt in his expose on modern Empires refers to Foucalt’s ideas of understanding urban society and says that it is all about power. People are controlled by places, by its culture and habits and most certainly by the different forms of power such as the State or the modern companies. Sometimes, they are controlled by the burden of its own collective memory. It is also true that people are the creators of all forms of control and they are the ultimate key in changing them.
“Before any process of memorization can take effect, silencing has to be undone.”
Christine Boyer
This text has been inspired by the lecture ''Collective memory under siege in the age of Empire'' held by M. Christine Boyer on the 11th International Bauhaus Kolloquium in Weimar.
Labels:
Urban Sociology
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