The Space of the Surface

2001 ◽  
Vol 33 (12) ◽  
pp. 2205-2218 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean La Marche

In this paper I examine how notions of the surface are being reconstituted in architectural theory and practice. Specifically, I contrast how modernist-influenced theory treated surfaces with how some architectural theorists today are beginning to think about them. Whereas modernist theory saw surfaces as dedicated to the expression of interior volume, recent interactive technologies such as ‘smart walls’ mean that surfaces no longer are fixed but can, instead, be changed in ways that are beyond the control of the architects who designed the structures of which they are a part. This means that surfaces are much less predictable and much more subject to transformation by individual users than in the past. Such a technological revolution, I argue, is ‘de-authorizing’ architecture as it is understood in conventional, professional, and disciplinary terms, and is bringing about new conceptions of time and space in architectural practice.

2015 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 361-367 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Robinson

Sustainability is the most significant force to change architecture since the breakthrough of modernism a century ago. So far the contributions of architects to this mandate have largely amounted to technological interventions. Yet the urgent call for sustainability demands going beyond merely technological solutions to modify behavioral patterns, cultural habits and even our deeply ingrained ideas about ourselves. The very notion that architecture could modify behavioral patterns, or the sedimentation of habits seems far-fetched in an epistemological framework that has drawn strict lines between outside and inside, subject and object, body and mind — all the dualities that the cognitive and neurosciences have been gradually working to undermine. Our practice as architects has been unconsciously shaped by centuries of formalist thinking that have turned buildings into inanimate objects; a habit of thinking that has weakened our role and contributed to the sense that architecture is a luxury item, one among many consumable commodities — though we can no longer deny that it is the very fabric of our survival and flourishing.Further, the once healthy plurality of our architectural theory has left us without a coherent philosophical framework with which to confront the climate crisis. For John Dewey, theory and practice were not ontologically separate domains, but two distinct yet inseparable and necessary aspects of engaging in the world. This essay explores how Dewey's pragmatic philosophy could help to build a theoretical framework that would allow us to apply and integrate the findings of the cognitive and neurosciences into our architectural practice and education, so that we might respond not only to the constraints and opportunities of the given context — site, program and energy resources—but also to the limits and affordances of our perceptual systems and the whole of our body and mind.


Author(s):  
Charlie Alfred

Historically, architecture has been about the structure of the solution, focused on the components that make up a system and the connectors which enable their coordinated interaction. Given this solution focus, systems, enterprise, and software architecture evolved in different directions. During the past 15+ years, architectural theory and practice have been undergoing a gradual, but significant, shift in focus. Five trends which highlight this shift are: decision rationale, challenges vs. requirements, systems-of-systems, contextual analysis, and design cognition. Each of these trends facilitates a necessary shift from the architecture of the solution to the architecture of the problem. In addition to enabling a clearer link between the problem and solution, these trends also help to unify systems, enterprise, and software architecture by providing a common foundation for collaboration on complex problems.


2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-112
Author(s):  
Vladimir Mihajlov

The essence of the problem in this paper has been recognized in deterioration of public and residential space in the city, after deregulation of architecture in neoliberal context. This field is marked by increasing lack of rules-especially spatial standards in the architectural practice. Therefore, re-exploring the application of space standards in modern context is needed. The paper, thus, tries to give the answer to the following question: why contemporary architectural practice does not insist on standards for the design and planning any longer? Since the production of space in neoliberal context is powered by mighty individuals who tend to be unique and to manifest power, using the spatial standards in architecture is not welcome. However, NEO-Marxist orientation tries to revive the critical reflection of reality, and its main task is to define the standards and types derived from the spatial context. Different approaches, both theoretical and practical ones are necessary requirements in profession. A clear visibility of method is required for problem solving. The wider population should influence the architectural theory and practice by common set of criteria/standards. Finally, both ideological orientations mentioned are based on those who produce urban space and not on those who speculates with it.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Zachary Nowak ◽  
Bradley M. Jones ◽  
Elisa Ascione

This article begins with a parody, a fictitious set of regulations for the production of “traditional” Italian polenta. Through analysis of primary and secondary historical sources we then discuss the various meanings of which polenta has been the bearer through time and space in order to emphasize the mutability of the modes of preparation, ingredients, and the social value of traditional food products. Finally, we situate polenta within its broader cultural, political, and economic contexts, underlining the uses and abuses of rendering foods as traditional—a process always incomplete, often contested, never organic. In stirring up the past and present of polenta and placing it within both the projects of Italian identity creation and the broader scholarly literature on culinary tradition and taste, we emphasize that for so-called traditional foods to be saved, they must be continually reinvented.


Author(s):  
Pasi Heikkurinen

This article investigates human–nature relations in the light of the recent call for degrowth, a radical reduction of matter–energy throughput in over-producing and over-consuming cultures. It outlines a culturally sensitive response to a (conceived) paradox where humans embedded in nature experience alienation and estrangement from it. The article finds that if nature has a core, then the experienced distance makes sense. To describe the core of nature, three temporal lenses are employed: the core of nature as ‘the past’, ‘the future’, and ‘the present’. It is proposed that while the degrowth movement should be inclusive of temporal perspectives, the lens of the present should be emphasised to balance out the prevailing romanticism and futurism in the theory and practice of degrowth.


2001 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 445-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marguerite Arai ◽  
Maryanne Wanca-Thibault ◽  
Pamela Shockley-Zalabak

While a number of articles have looked at the importance of multicultural training in the workplace over the past 30 years, there is little concrete agreement that documents the common fundamental elements of a “successful” diversity initiative. A review of the training literature suggests the importance of human communication theory and practice without including important research, methodologies, and practice from the communication discipline. This article examines formal diversity approaches, provides examples from the literature of several successful diversity initiatives in larger organizations, identifies the limited use of communication-based approaches in diversity training, and discusses the importance of integrating communication theory and practice in future training efforts.


1992 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 144-151
Author(s):  
Susan Bennett

Through this position paper the author seeks to provide a focus for extended discussion of some of the key issues arising from feminist approaches to theatre research. She indicates some of the insights made possible by feminist theoretical analyses of theatre historiography as well as some of the implications of the various positions inscribed in articles on Canadian feminist theatre historiography over the past ten years. The author hopes to facilitate more discussion of the wide variety of feminist challenges to and transformation of the theory and practice of theatre research and theatre historiography.


2021 ◽  
Vol 46 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 416-445
Author(s):  
Caroline von Gall

Abstract In discussing the concept of the ‘living constitution’ in Russian constitutional theory and practice, this paper shows that the Russian concept of the living constitution differs from U.S. or European approaches to evolutive interpretation. The Russian concept has its roots in Soviet and pre-revolutionary Russian constitutional thinking. It reduces the normative power of the Constitution but allows an interpretation according to changing social conditions and gives the legislator a broad margin of appreciation. Whereas the 1993 Russian constitutional reform had been regarded as a paradigm shift with the intention to break with the past by declaring that the Constitution shall have supreme judicial force and direct effect, the paper also gives answers to the complexity of constitutional change and legal transplants and the role of constitutional theory and practice for the functioning of the current authoritarian regime in Russia.


2021 ◽  
pp. 389-405
Author(s):  
Lars Magnusson

In recent years there has been a renewed interest in Cameralism, both as a discourse and as an administrative political economy, in both theory and practice. Attention has been drawn to how Cameralism—defined as thought and practice—should be understood. The aim of this article is to take a step back and focus on the historiography of Cameralism from the nineteenth century onwards. Even though many in recent times have challenged old and seemingly dated conceptualizations and interpretations, they are still very much alive. Most profoundly this has implied that Cameralism most often in the past has been acknowledged as an expression of—German. as it were—exceptionalism to the general history of economic doctrine and thinking.


2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (11) ◽  
pp. 143-146
Author(s):  
Parvana Ismayil Pashayeva ◽  

The article deals with the problems of introducing of time, time changes and the time-place relations as well. Artistic time is distinguished by belonging of an artistic time to the past in the artistic text, and in epos texts as well. In such kinds of texts one can meet with the changing of situations and various forms of substitutions of grammatical time. Speech moment can be used in defining of criteria for the present, past and the future times in epos texts. And speech moment is being connected with the physical time. Grammatical time comes into effect as a result of time pass components of physical time changings of course. Key words: time, place, epos, artistic time, grammatical time


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