scholarly journals Enriching Our Understanding of Architecture Through Disability Experience

2013 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-19
Author(s):  
Ann Heylighen ◽  
Caroline Van Doren ◽  
Peter-Willem Vermeersch
Keyword(s):  
Built Environment ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Disabled Persons ◽  
The Body ◽  
Sensory Experiences ◽  
Bodily Experiences ◽  
Museum Design ◽  
The One ◽  
Contemporary Architecture ◽  
The Relationship

The relationship between the built environment and the human body is rarely considered explicitly in contemporary architecture. In case architects do take the body into account, they tend to derive mathematical proportions or functional dimensions from it, without explicit attention for the bodily experience of a building. In this article, we analyse the built environment in a way less common in architecture, by attending to how a particular person experiences it. Instead of relating the human body to architecture in a mathematical way, we establish a new relationship between architecture and the body—or a body—by demonstrating that our bodies are more involved in the experience of the built environment than we presume. The article focuses on persons with a sensory or physical impairment as they are able to detect building qualities architects may not be attuned to. By accompanying them during a visit to a museum building, we examine how their experiences relate to the architect's intentions. In attending to the bodily experiences of these disabled persons, we provide evidence that architecture is not only seen, but experienced by all senses, and that aesthetics may acquire a broader meaning. Senses can be disconnected or reinforced by nature. Sensory experiences can be consciously or unconsciously eliminated or emphasized by the museum design and use. Architects can have specific intentions in mind, but users (with an impairment) may not experience them. Attending to the experiences of disabled persons, and combining these with the architect's objectives, provides an interesting view of a building. Our analysis does not intend to criticize the one using the other; rather the combination of both views, each present in the building, makes for a richer understanding of what architecture is.

scholarly journals Our Third Skin

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Charlotte Corbett Hughes-Hallett
Keyword(s):  
Urban Environment ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Sensory Deprivation ◽  
Human Action ◽  
The Body ◽  
Interior Architecture ◽  
Fundamental Parameters ◽  
A Site ◽  
Contemporary Architecture ◽  
The Relationship

<p>It can be argued that there is an absence of reverence between contemporary architecture that governs our urban environment and the human body. Current architectural forms are unwittingly unresponsive to the dynamic flow of human action thus realising a denaturalisation of the human body’s transformations. The natural body deliberately expresses itself through reactive and interactive dynamic fluctuations whilst planar verticality and horizontality are qualities that commonly delineate the revered contemporary architecture of our lived realities. This thesis explored the human body as both a metaphorical and literal site. Provoking an investigation into how the body responds to the surface of architecture in an attempt to redefine how the design of architecture can better respond to the body as an active controller for defining space and generating form. This notion elicits the exploration of the relationship between; body and space, body and surface, body and form. By actively trying to understand the fundamental parameters of interior architecture that enhance our experience of being, this thesis is a commentary on how principles of interior architecture can be extracted and adapted to thrive within the ubiquitous realities of the urban environment. This is an effort to return form back to something more intimately attuned to the body’s stature. The motivation of this thesis was to create a design methodology that transitions from concept, to design and reach its realisation – where material enables the abstract intellect of form to be thought. With each phase propelled by the aspiration to better understand the relationship between the biological body and architecture. Following the framework of body space, interaction, and form, the methodology of the thesis has been developed at three scales of immediacy, maturing from the wearable to the inhabitable. The first level of immediacy considered and intuitively explores the body as a ‘site’. By using the biological body and the scale of the body to understand the body as a vessel that both contains and occupies space. The second level of immediacy and scale increased and responded to the intimate expressions of the self upon the surface of architecture. An investigation into how the anatomy of the body responds to the planar and static nature of surface. Actualising an experiential surface that departs from being a flat rigid surface and becomes suppler like an epidermis. Such an architecture that excites and transforms the body that is subject to it. As the methodology manifests the possibility of using the body as a design generative, the third and last level of immediacy is an amalgamation and development upon the previous analyses. The existential dialect between the surface of the body and the surface of architecture generates the contours of a ‘vertical somatic topography’. Site and material are introduced to shift the ephemeral form to reach physical conception through a series of scale models. The chosen site’s organisation and behaviour of material(s) directed and balanced the variations of form. The form creates a new immersive spatial condition that entices passer-byers to rediscover an omitted space in the city. The antithetical form of the installation deconstructs and disturbs the space in which it is presented imposing an affective reaction between body and surface - counteracting the sensory deprivation and suggests a space to slow, ingest, interact, and confer yourself in a moment of realisation of the surrounding architecture’s immobility and insensitivity to the ever dynamic natural body.</p>

scholarly journals Our Third Skin

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Charlotte Corbett Hughes-Hallett
Keyword(s):  
Urban Environment ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Sensory Deprivation ◽  
Human Action ◽  
The Body ◽  
Interior Architecture ◽  
Fundamental Parameters ◽  
A Site ◽  
Contemporary Architecture ◽  
The Relationship

<p>It can be argued that there is an absence of reverence between contemporary architecture that governs our urban environment and the human body. Current architectural forms are unwittingly unresponsive to the dynamic flow of human action thus realising a denaturalisation of the human body’s transformations. The natural body deliberately expresses itself through reactive and interactive dynamic fluctuations whilst planar verticality and horizontality are qualities that commonly delineate the revered contemporary architecture of our lived realities. This thesis explored the human body as both a metaphorical and literal site. Provoking an investigation into how the body responds to the surface of architecture in an attempt to redefine how the design of architecture can better respond to the body as an active controller for defining space and generating form. This notion elicits the exploration of the relationship between; body and space, body and surface, body and form. By actively trying to understand the fundamental parameters of interior architecture that enhance our experience of being, this thesis is a commentary on how principles of interior architecture can be extracted and adapted to thrive within the ubiquitous realities of the urban environment. This is an effort to return form back to something more intimately attuned to the body’s stature. The motivation of this thesis was to create a design methodology that transitions from concept, to design and reach its realisation – where material enables the abstract intellect of form to be thought. With each phase propelled by the aspiration to better understand the relationship between the biological body and architecture. Following the framework of body space, interaction, and form, the methodology of the thesis has been developed at three scales of immediacy, maturing from the wearable to the inhabitable. The first level of immediacy considered and intuitively explores the body as a ‘site’. By using the biological body and the scale of the body to understand the body as a vessel that both contains and occupies space. The second level of immediacy and scale increased and responded to the intimate expressions of the self upon the surface of architecture. An investigation into how the anatomy of the body responds to the planar and static nature of surface. Actualising an experiential surface that departs from being a flat rigid surface and becomes suppler like an epidermis. Such an architecture that excites and transforms the body that is subject to it. As the methodology manifests the possibility of using the body as a design generative, the third and last level of immediacy is an amalgamation and development upon the previous analyses. The existential dialect between the surface of the body and the surface of architecture generates the contours of a ‘vertical somatic topography’. Site and material are introduced to shift the ephemeral form to reach physical conception through a series of scale models. The chosen site’s organisation and behaviour of material(s) directed and balanced the variations of form. The form creates a new immersive spatial condition that entices passer-byers to rediscover an omitted space in the city. The antithetical form of the installation deconstructs and disturbs the space in which it is presented imposing an affective reaction between body and surface - counteracting the sensory deprivation and suggests a space to slow, ingest, interact, and confer yourself in a moment of realisation of the surrounding architecture’s immobility and insensitivity to the ever dynamic natural body.</p>

Correction of Posture Deviations in the Sagittal Plane Using the Pilates Method

2019 ◽  
pp. 3-13
Author(s):  
Alexandru Cîtea ◽  
George-Sebastian Iacob
Keyword(s):  
Low Back Pain ◽  
Back Pain ◽  
Postural Control ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Sagittal Plane ◽  
The Body ◽  
Lower Limbs ◽  
Low Back ◽  
Pilates Method ◽  
The Relationship

Posture is commonly perceived as the relationship between the segments of the human body upright. Certain parts of the body such as the cephalic extremity, neck, torso, upper and lower limbs are involved in the final posture of the body. Musculoskeletal instabilities and reduced postural control lead to the installation of nonstructural posture deviations in all 3 anatomical planes. When we talk about the sagittal plane, it was concluded that there are 4 main types of posture deviation: hyperlordotic posture, kyphotic posture, rectitude and "sway-back" posture.Pilates method has become in the last decade a much more popular formof exercise used in rehabilitation. The Pilates method is frequently prescribed to people with low back pain due to their orientation on the stabilizing muscles of the pelvis. Pilates exercise is thus theorized to help reactivate the muscles and, by doingso, increases lumbar support, reduces pain, and improves body alignment.

Bodily Dasein and Chinese Script Components

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kwan Tze-wan
Keyword(s):  
Human Body ◽  
The Body ◽  
Chinese Script ◽  
Chinese Characters ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Constitutive Principle ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Social Environmental ◽  
The One ◽  
Definition Of

AbstractIn the Shuowen, one of the earliest comprehensive character dictionaries of ancient China, when discussing where the Chinese characters derive their structural components, Xu Shen proposed the dual constitutive principle of “adopting proximally from the human body, and distally from things around.” This dual emphasis of “body” and “things around” corresponds largely to the phenomenological issues of body or corporeality on the one hand, and lifeworld on the other. If we borrow Heidegger’s definition of Dasein as Being-in-the world, we can easily arrive at a reformulation of Xu Shen’s constitutive principle of the Chinese script as one that concerns “bodily Dasein.” By looking into various examples of script tokens we can further elaborate on how the Chinese make use not only of the body in general but various body parts, and how they differentiate their life world into material nature, living things, and a multifaceted world of equipment in forming a core basis of Chinese characters/components, upon which further symbolic manipulation such as “indication”, “phonetic borrowing”, semantic combination, and “annotative derivation”, etc. can be based. Finally, examples will be cited to show how in the Chinese scripts the human body (and its parts) might interact with other’s bodies (and their parts) or with “things around” (whether nature, living creatures, or artifacts) in various ways to cover the social, environmental, ritual, technical, economical, and even intellectual aspects of human experience. Bodily Dasein, so to speak, provides us with a new perspective of understanding and appreciating the entire scope of the Chinese script.

scholarly journals The relationship between body weight and exterior measurements in domestic ostriches during the first four months after hatching

2007 ◽  
Vol 23 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 13-20
Author(s):  
Andrey Kurtenkov
Keyword(s):  
Body Weight ◽  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Other ◽  
Phenotypic Correlation ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Selection Of

It is related leg problems to the realization of the necessity of doing a detailed analysis of the phenotype correlations between body weight and exterior measurements. As a result of the study, lower coefficients have been obtained of the correlation between the girth of the tarso metatarsus on one hand, and the body weight and the girth behind the wings, on the other hand (respectively 0.563 and 0.608), compared with the one between the body weight and the girth behind the wings (0.898). It is advisable in the selection of ostriches to take into consideration the necessity of a higher phenotypic correlation between the girth of the tarso metatarsus on the one hand, and the body weight and the girth behind the wings on the other hand, with a view to preventing leg problems.

scholarly journals Skin to Skin: A Provocative Expression of the Dynamic Relationship Between the Surface of the Body and the Surface of Architecture

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Thomas Ibbotson
Keyword(s):  
Built Environment ◽  
Horizontal Plane ◽  
Ground Plane ◽  
Modern Architecture ◽  
The Body ◽  
Dynamic Force ◽  
Dynamic Relationship ◽  
Building Typology ◽  
Skin To Skin ◽  
Contemporary Architecture

<p>It can be argued that modern architecture has expelled the building’s relationship to the ground. Raised on pilotis, modern buildings constructed the platform as an artificial ground plane. Ultimately, the platform was a two-dimensional plane, flattened to aid our transition across the built environment. This horizontal plane merely tolerated inhabitation. Unfortunately the language synonymous with this plane has been extended into contemporary architecture. It is proposed that the rigidity and stability expressed by the surface of the horizontal plane has failed to reflect the body, stimulate interaction, or challenge the inhabitant of architecture. To free the horizontal plane from its rigid axis this thesis aims to break away from the conventional building typology inflicted by modern architecture. As the force of gravity restricts our inhabitation of the built environment to the horizontal plane we directly engage with this surface of architecture. It provokes the question, how can the design of the horizontal plane engage the body and challenge the inhabitant to intensify the experience of architecture? An exploration of the skin-to-skin relationship between the surface of the body and the surface of architecture directs this thesis toward a provocative design exploration and evokes an expressive horizontal plane. To challenge the restrictive conception of architecture’s horizontal plane the program of inhabitation for this design project explores the practice of yoga. Now conceived as a dynamic force, the body can be activated by architecture’s horizontal plane. This surface provides an expressive canvas with the capacity to embody the dynamic movements of yoga. It aids, activates and challenges the participant’s body and amplifies the experience of yoga. An expressive horizontal plane, central to the inhabitation of a yoga centre, generates a dynamic space that provokes a dialogue of interaction between the inhabitant and the surface of architecture. A dynamic plane has emerged.</p>

Be[ing] You

2015 ◽  
pp. 18-32
Author(s):  
Lorna Ann Moore
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
The Body ◽  
Mirror Stage ◽  
Head Mounted Display ◽  
Personal Accounts ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way ◽  
Video Performance

This chapter discusses the one-to-one interactions between participants in the video performance In[bodi]mental. It presents personal accounts of users' body swapping experiences through real-time Head Mounted Display systems. These inter-corporeal encounters are articulated through the lens of psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan and his work on the “Mirror Stage” (1977), phenomenologist Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1968) and his writings on the Chiasm, and anthropologist Rane Willerslev's (2007) research on mimesis. The study of these positions provides new insights into the blurred relationship between the corporeal Self and the digital Other. The way the material body is stretched across these divisions highlights the way digital media is the catalyst in this in[bodied] experience of be[ing] in the world. The purpose of this chapter is to challenge the relationship between the body and video performance to appreciate the impact digital media has on one's perception of a single bounded self and how two selves become an inter-corporeal experience shared through the technology.

scholarly journals James Joyce and the Epiphanic Inscription: Towards an Art of Gesture as Rhythm

Humanities ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 109
Author(s):  
Alberto Tondello
Keyword(s):  
James Joyce ◽  
Human Body ◽  
Mutual Influence ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Shed Light

In Agency and Embodiment, Carrie Noland describes gesture as “a type of inscription, a parsing of the body into signifying and operational units”, considering it as a means to read and decode the human body. Through an analysis of James Joyce’s collection of Epiphanies, my paper will examine how gesture, as a mode of expression of the body, can be transcribed on the written page. Written and collected to record a “spiritual manifestation” shining through “in the vulgarity of speech or gesture, or in a memorable phase of the mind itself”, Joyce’s Epiphanies can be considered as the first step in his sustained attempt to develop an art of gesture-as-rhythm. These short pieces appear as the site in which the author seeks, through the medium of writing, to negotiate and redefine the boundaries of the physical human body. Moving towards a mapping of body and mind through the concept of rhythm, and pointing to a collaboration and mutual influence between interiority and exteriority, the Epiphanies open up a space for the reformulation of the relationship between the human body and its environment. Unpacking the ideas that sit at the heart of the concept of epiphany, the paper will shed light on how this particular mode of writing produces a rhythmic art of gesture, fixing and simultaneously liberating human and nonhuman bodies on the written page.

Comedies of Tough Love

2018 ◽  
pp. 503-519
Author(s):  
Joanne Diaz
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  
The Other ◽  
Much Ado About Nothing ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Love's Labour's Lost ◽  
The One ◽  
Ars Amatoria ◽  
The Relationship

Shakespeare’s comedies feature characters who are always open to the possibilities of Ovidian transformation, and in four comedies in particular—Two Gentlemen of Verona, Taming of the Shrew, Love’s Labour’s Lost, and Much Ado about Nothing—the transformation can be a painful one. This chapter surveys these four comedies in order to understand the relationship between teaching and taming. I engage with recent Shakespeare criticism that foregrounds the importance of Ovid’s work to the rhetorical practices of Tudor-era grammar schools. I also draw upon readings of Ovid’s Heroides, Ars Amatoria, and Metamorphoses in order to articulate a vision of a pedagogical enterprise that on the one hand privileged translation and transformation and on the other hand attempted to regulate the bodies of Tudor schoolboys. In doing so, I explore the complex Ovidian engagements that produced knowledge of the body and of relationships in Shakespeare’s culture and on his stage.

Embodied Masculinity: Sex and Sport in a (Post) Colonial Chinese City

2007 ◽  
Vol 190 ◽  
pp. 432-450 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tiantian Zheng
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  
Masculine Identity ◽  
Japanese Colonialism ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
Chinese City ◽  
North East ◽  
Bodily Experiences ◽  
Identity Based ◽  
The One ◽  
The City

AbstractThis article examines the historical formation of local masculine identity in the city of Dalian in north-east China. I argue that the experiences of Dalian-Chinese men under Japanese colonialism (1905–45) established a model of masculine identity based on bodily resistance. The article explores Dalian men's encounter with colonialism by comparing two different forms of bodily experience: military calisthenics in Japanese-run schools for Chinese boys and street soccer. On the one hand, military calisthenics impressed Chinese schoolboys with a sense of subjugation focused on the body. Bodily movements were performed under the strict scrutiny of Japanese drill masters and formed an integral part of everyday rituals of obedience. On the other hand, street soccer emerged as a popular and potentially creative activity among Chinese schoolboys. In contrast with the controlled motions of military calisthenics, soccer offered a sense of freedom in its unrestricted and improvised movements. Matches against Japanese teams even more explicitly infused soccer with a spirit of nationalistic resistance. In conclusion, I argue that these bodily experiences are crucial to understanding the historical reformations of Dalian male gender identity.

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