The Instrumentalization of Fictional Narrative in Relation to Architecture-Urban Environment: The Example of “Laughable Places” Workshop

Interdisciplinary approaches and distinctive representation methods are needed to expand the range of meaning in the architecture and to consider the design process in unique frameworks. Literature disrupts the static images produced for the city in the context of the imaginative weight and the various dynamics it makes with the reader also uses the city, space, and architecture to create a different dimension of representation. This situation, which is inspected in the article regarding the relationship between literature, city, and architecture, will be examined through the "Laughable Places" workshop, that is part of the e-workshop days held at Gebze Technical University in February 2021. In this sense, firstly the relationship between literature and architecture and the revealing of their potentials are handled through the imaginative, representational and textual dimensions. Than through various workshops where the relationship between fictional narrative and architecture is applied, it is reviewed in which contexts fictional narrative can be included in the intellectual process of design. This review has been grouped according to the method in the workshop setups, using the fictional narrative based on literary works or the writing fictional narratives by participants. The workshop process was interpreted through the hybridity of the two approaches.

Documentário Grafite.mp4: reflexões sobre a interface comunicação educação

A partir das disciplinas Educação e Tecnologia e Narrativa Ficcional e Documentário do Curso de Rádio e Televisão da UFMA, foi elaborado um produto audiovisual que relaciona arte urbana, comunicação e educação. O “documentário grafite.mp4” apresenta o processo de ensino baseado nas experiências de vida advindas dos educadores e educandos através do ato comunicativo, onde a arte urbana funciona como meio de repensar esses processos dentro do espaço escolar. Logo, este presente trabalho busca analisar teoricamente tais atos evidenciados na produção do documentário, traçando caminhos conceituais para compreendê-los, através do tripé teórico comunicação,experiência e educação.Grafitti.mp4 documentary: refletions on the education communication interfaceAbstractFrom the subjects Education and Technology and Fictional Narrative and Documentary of the Radio and Television Course at UFMA, an audiovisual product was made to relate urban art, communication and education. The “grafite.mp4 documentary” presents the teaching process based on life experiences arising from educators and students through the communicative act, where urban art works as ways of rethinking these processes within the school space. Therefore, this present work seeks to theoretically analise such acts evidenced in the production of the documentary, tracing conceptual paths to understand them, through the theoretical tripod communication, education and experience.Keywords: Communication; education; experience; documentary.

Suicide of a Tenor Amidst the Stage Setting of the Werther Opera's Death Scene

Background: Reporting on suicide can elicit an increase in suicides, a phenomenon termed the “Werther effect.” The name can be traced back to an alleged spike in suicides after the publication of Goethe's novel The Sorrows of Young Werther in 1774, in which the protagonist Werther dies by suicide. Aims: Acknowledging the importance and primacy of systematic ecological and individual-level studies, we provide a historical single-case report of the suicide of a “late arrival of the Werther epidemic,” as the death was headlined in a news report in 1927. Method: Archival research on tenor Paul Vidal's suicide was conducted. Results: Vidal reconstructed the scene of the final act of the opera Werther in his apartment and died by a gunshot, as did Werther. Limitations: Causal interpretations must be made with caution. Conclusion: Striking similarities between Werther's and Vidal's deaths support the idea of strong identification with the fictional narrative and suggest causal effects. Considering the repeated high level of immersiveness and the intense emotions of opera performances, it is likely that performing the role of Werther increases identification processes, contributing to detrimental effects. The lack of knowledge regarding the role of fictional suicide stories on artists' suicides is discussed.

My History is Not Mine

<p>Globalisation has helped spread Eurocentric modernist architectural principles across most cultures. In a very real sense, many Eastern cultures are having their own unique architectural histories rewritten, even erased, and in danger of becoming lost. Burmese poet Zeyar Lynn’s poem “My History is Not Mine” represents a powerful lament, decrying the loss of unique cultural identities. Global contemporary architecture rarely recognises the rich litany of ideas that may arise from contemporary responses to cultures, and this design research-led thesis investigation seeks possible solutions to this loss. This investigation is framed around Lynn’s poem “My History is Not Mine”. It seeks to reinterpret some of the most ‘traditional’ elements of modern architecture—room, wall, ceiling, floor, threshold, window, etc.—through fictional narrative theory, allegory and experiential constructs. Eastern superstitions are used as provocateurs, starting points that help the project explicitly move away from traditional Eurocentric formalist architectural precepts. The goal is to test an architectural design method that prioritises the experiential and challenges some of the expected ‘norms’ within which Eurocentric modern architecture has been traditionally situated. This investigation is grounded in speculative architectural design. The three principal design stages of the methodology progress iteratively from physical analogue model, to digital animation, and finally to virtual gaming environment. The intention is to challenge traditional notions of architecture and the way architectural design concepts are conceived, and this is carried forward using a methodology that shifts experimental outcomes from the visual to the experiential—a virtual, time-based approach that deviates from conventional architectural design processes—in order to privilege the investigation of shifts in spatial conditions and experiential perceptions over time. The first stage of the investigation was to explore the abstraction of Eastern superstitions into physical models—‘allegorical artefacts’. These initial experiments were set up as a starting point to help propel the project towards a provocative and evocative pathway of discovery. By examining how these superstitions might be interpreted in a virtual gaming environment in the final stages of the investigation, the investigation challenges how these design interpretations can actively enable important architectural elements, such as threshold, spatial enclosure, visual axes, etc., to be redefined—placing the viewer into an experiential realm that is removed from traditional architectural referencing—and engage them as changes in spatial conditions experienced over time, rather than as primarily object-based. The time-based design outcomes are framed, experienced and tested in relation to Jerome Bruner’s theory of “The Narrative Construction of Reality”. Bruner posited ten requisite steps for achieving a meaningful narrative experience for the reader of narrative fiction. Fictional narrative relies on enabling the participant to self-identify within a fictional context as a vital tool that allows the participant to navigate through the story. This design-led research investigation examines how Bruner’s literary theory might be applied to an architectural experience, to help enable the experiential to become a driver for architectural design, where the participant’s own self-positioning in a time-based scheme becomes a vital element in constructing a unique architectural experience. The framework synthesises the design outcomes within a narrative experience that looks to discover unique solutions to the research objectives. The investigation applies Bruner’s ten constructs of narrative fiction to the architectural experience: diachronicity (relationships over time), particularity (unique cultural attributes), intentional state entailment (agency), hermeneutic composability (synecdoche), canonicity and breach (disruption of the expected), referentially (creation of new realities), genericness (changing the way a story is told), normativeness (multiplicity), contextual negotiability (cultural sensitivity and culturally negotiated meanings), and narrative accrual (collective representation). This thesis asks: How can experiential cultural artefacts be engaged as a conceptual framework to generate an allegorical architectural project? How can the digital gaming interface be used to help architectural design methods better explore the experiential as a design generator?</p>

The Hand of the Engraver

<p>The manner in which we dwell leaves scars upon the landscape. These scars are often left behind long after occupancy ceases. Countless derelict landscapes across New Zealand bear these scars left by human occupancy, but many are too advanced for remediation. Rather than removing scars, this thesis proposes allowing future generations to witness these scarred landscapes so that their intrinsic stories can provide important lessons for the future, while helping to provide unexpected new approaches to the revitalisation of these sites. Quartz Reef Point in Central Otago has been selected as the site for this design-led research investigation; it is an abandoned strip mine that appears so violated, that it has lost all apparent means of restoration or reuse. This design-led research project proposes that by building upon these scars, rather than ignoring or hiding them, these scars can be reinterpreted as lessons for the future that can help enable future generations to learn from past mistakes. The damage at Quartz Reef Point strip mine has been caused by ‘scratching’ the surface of the site so severely that natural systems have suffered inexorable damage. In the art of engraving, the surface of a copper plate is also deeply scratched––and the resulting ‘damage’ to the plate allows a story to unfold. This design research investigation looks at how the art of engraving can be applied to architectural design processes in ways that help tell the story of severely damaged sites such as Quartz Reef Point. Hans-Jörg Rheinberger’s book The Hand of the Engraver: Albert Flocon Meets Gaston Bachelard is used to establish a framework for this investigation. In this book, the architectural engraver, Albert Flocon, shares dialogues with the architectural philosopher, Gaston Bachelard––two distinct points of view about storytelling. The thesis proposes that when these two points of view are integrated with the voice of the architectural designer, the thesis author, new approaches for meaningful architectural interventions can be discovered to help bring the story of Quartz Reef Point to life for future generations. Using Hans-Jörg Rheinberger’s book The Hand of the Engraver as a generative starting point, the thesis investigation asks the research question: how can the engraver, the philosopher and the architectural designer be brought together to explore new ways of looking at scarred landscapes that not only reinvigorate them, but offer their tales as important lessons for the future? This investigation proposes that architecture can engage scars on the landscape in narrative ways that enhance visitors’ awareness about the site and its tragic history. Jerome Bruner, senior research fellow at New York University, outlines a framework that he argues is necessary to advance a successful fictional narrative. Architectural heritage theorist Jennifer Hill discusses how retaining visible scars in the built environment can offer insights into how the ongoing transformations of a site contribute actively to the narrative of place. Environmental psychologist Jonathan Sime argues that contextual elements of derelict sites, in combination with a fictional narrative, can culminate in an enhanced ‘sense of place’ through unexpected architectural responses. This thesis proposes to integrate the theoretical arguments of Jerome Bruner, Jennifer Hill, and Jonathan Sime in a design-led research approach to the reinvigoration of severely scarred landscapes. In the thesis investigation, architectural elements and environmental scars are conceptualised as overlapping, each line advising the other. In this way, the thesis looks to communicate contextual narratives in a way that not only revitalises place identity, but also enables us to fully engage a site’s heritage and learn from past mistakes.</p>

The Hand of the Engraver

<p>The manner in which we dwell leaves scars upon the landscape. These scars are often left behind long after occupancy ceases. Countless derelict landscapes across New Zealand bear these scars left by human occupancy, but many are too advanced for remediation. Rather than removing scars, this thesis proposes allowing future generations to witness these scarred landscapes so that their intrinsic stories can provide important lessons for the future, while helping to provide unexpected new approaches to the revitalisation of these sites. Quartz Reef Point in Central Otago has been selected as the site for this design-led research investigation; it is an abandoned strip mine that appears so violated, that it has lost all apparent means of restoration or reuse. This design-led research project proposes that by building upon these scars, rather than ignoring or hiding them, these scars can be reinterpreted as lessons for the future that can help enable future generations to learn from past mistakes. The damage at Quartz Reef Point strip mine has been caused by ‘scratching’ the surface of the site so severely that natural systems have suffered inexorable damage. In the art of engraving, the surface of a copper plate is also deeply scratched––and the resulting ‘damage’ to the plate allows a story to unfold. This design research investigation looks at how the art of engraving can be applied to architectural design processes in ways that help tell the story of severely damaged sites such as Quartz Reef Point. Hans-Jörg Rheinberger’s book The Hand of the Engraver: Albert Flocon Meets Gaston Bachelard is used to establish a framework for this investigation. In this book, the architectural engraver, Albert Flocon, shares dialogues with the architectural philosopher, Gaston Bachelard––two distinct points of view about storytelling. The thesis proposes that when these two points of view are integrated with the voice of the architectural designer, the thesis author, new approaches for meaningful architectural interventions can be discovered to help bring the story of Quartz Reef Point to life for future generations. Using Hans-Jörg Rheinberger’s book The Hand of the Engraver as a generative starting point, the thesis investigation asks the research question: how can the engraver, the philosopher and the architectural designer be brought together to explore new ways of looking at scarred landscapes that not only reinvigorate them, but offer their tales as important lessons for the future? This investigation proposes that architecture can engage scars on the landscape in narrative ways that enhance visitors’ awareness about the site and its tragic history. Jerome Bruner, senior research fellow at New York University, outlines a framework that he argues is necessary to advance a successful fictional narrative. Architectural heritage theorist Jennifer Hill discusses how retaining visible scars in the built environment can offer insights into how the ongoing transformations of a site contribute actively to the narrative of place. Environmental psychologist Jonathan Sime argues that contextual elements of derelict sites, in combination with a fictional narrative, can culminate in an enhanced ‘sense of place’ through unexpected architectural responses. This thesis proposes to integrate the theoretical arguments of Jerome Bruner, Jennifer Hill, and Jonathan Sime in a design-led research approach to the reinvigoration of severely scarred landscapes. In the thesis investigation, architectural elements and environmental scars are conceptualised as overlapping, each line advising the other. In this way, the thesis looks to communicate contextual narratives in a way that not only revitalises place identity, but also enables us to fully engage a site’s heritage and learn from past mistakes.</p>

My History is Not Mine

<p>Globalisation has helped spread Eurocentric modernist architectural principles across most cultures. In a very real sense, many Eastern cultures are having their own unique architectural histories rewritten, even erased, and in danger of becoming lost. Burmese poet Zeyar Lynn’s poem “My History is Not Mine” represents a powerful lament, decrying the loss of unique cultural identities. Global contemporary architecture rarely recognises the rich litany of ideas that may arise from contemporary responses to cultures, and this design research-led thesis investigation seeks possible solutions to this loss. This investigation is framed around Lynn’s poem “My History is Not Mine”. It seeks to reinterpret some of the most ‘traditional’ elements of modern architecture—room, wall, ceiling, floor, threshold, window, etc.—through fictional narrative theory, allegory and experiential constructs. Eastern superstitions are used as provocateurs, starting points that help the project explicitly move away from traditional Eurocentric formalist architectural precepts. The goal is to test an architectural design method that prioritises the experiential and challenges some of the expected ‘norms’ within which Eurocentric modern architecture has been traditionally situated. This investigation is grounded in speculative architectural design. The three principal design stages of the methodology progress iteratively from physical analogue model, to digital animation, and finally to virtual gaming environment. The intention is to challenge traditional notions of architecture and the way architectural design concepts are conceived, and this is carried forward using a methodology that shifts experimental outcomes from the visual to the experiential—a virtual, time-based approach that deviates from conventional architectural design processes—in order to privilege the investigation of shifts in spatial conditions and experiential perceptions over time. The first stage of the investigation was to explore the abstraction of Eastern superstitions into physical models—‘allegorical artefacts’. These initial experiments were set up as a starting point to help propel the project towards a provocative and evocative pathway of discovery. By examining how these superstitions might be interpreted in a virtual gaming environment in the final stages of the investigation, the investigation challenges how these design interpretations can actively enable important architectural elements, such as threshold, spatial enclosure, visual axes, etc., to be redefined—placing the viewer into an experiential realm that is removed from traditional architectural referencing—and engage them as changes in spatial conditions experienced over time, rather than as primarily object-based. The time-based design outcomes are framed, experienced and tested in relation to Jerome Bruner’s theory of “The Narrative Construction of Reality”. Bruner posited ten requisite steps for achieving a meaningful narrative experience for the reader of narrative fiction. Fictional narrative relies on enabling the participant to self-identify within a fictional context as a vital tool that allows the participant to navigate through the story. This design-led research investigation examines how Bruner’s literary theory might be applied to an architectural experience, to help enable the experiential to become a driver for architectural design, where the participant’s own self-positioning in a time-based scheme becomes a vital element in constructing a unique architectural experience. The framework synthesises the design outcomes within a narrative experience that looks to discover unique solutions to the research objectives. The investigation applies Bruner’s ten constructs of narrative fiction to the architectural experience: diachronicity (relationships over time), particularity (unique cultural attributes), intentional state entailment (agency), hermeneutic composability (synecdoche), canonicity and breach (disruption of the expected), referentially (creation of new realities), genericness (changing the way a story is told), normativeness (multiplicity), contextual negotiability (cultural sensitivity and culturally negotiated meanings), and narrative accrual (collective representation). This thesis asks: How can experiential cultural artefacts be engaged as a conceptual framework to generate an allegorical architectural project? How can the digital gaming interface be used to help architectural design methods better explore the experiential as a design generator?</p>

Precolonial Igbo Voices in Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater (2018): A Palimpsestic Search for “Home”

The present article examines how Freshwater (2018), the debut novel of the Nigerian writer Akwaeke Emezi, offers a layered portrayal of precolonial Igbo and western narratives. By recourse to the auto-fictional narrative mode, the fiction deploys a constant tug of war which suggests the culturally hybrid nature of discourses connected to spiritual belief, self-identity dynamics and gender. My analysis pivots around three main discussions. Firstly, I trace and exemplify the aesthetic and thematic imbrication between Igbo cosmology (and Animism) and Christianity. Secondly, I seek to evince the unconventional depiction of plural consciousnesses coexisting in an individual in an effort to contest long-established truisms of self formation. I also focus on the ensuing amalgam between western conceptions of mental illness, trauma and Igbo mystic interpretations of reality. Considering the peripheral Igbo stance the novel depicts, the fiction will be contextualised within the current literary meta- and trans-modernist axis. Thirdly, I refer to transgender issues mapped up and brought to the fore through the main character’s predicament; a search for existential answers commingling divergent paradigms. Thus, Freshwater offers a peculiar polyphony of numinous narratorial voices which strive to question extant (neo)postcolonial truths.

MTV’s The Hills: A Leading American Docusoap

<p>This thesis explores the relatively uncharted academic territory of the American docusoap, and case studies The Hills as a pertinent example of this burgeoning television genre. Docusoap is a ‘mixed-genre’ that enhances factual material with the story-telling techniques of fictional drama. Whilst many academics have studied the origins of British docusoap and have registered the influence upon it of ‘public service’ objectives in programming, less attention has been paid to the emergence of the docusoap in the commercially-driven American television context. It is in this context that the docusoap has entailed a more overt blending of the attributes of ‘documentary’ and ‘soap opera’ for purely entertainment purposes. Testifying to the need to reconcile risk with conservatism in a commercially-driven schedule context, the generic mix within The Hills draws from the genres of soap opera and ‘reality’ TV, both of which bring the advantages and assurances of a well-demonstrated audience popularity. Having recently completed its sixth and final season, The Hills exemplifies current developments within the American docusoap form. This docusoap details the lives of a group of attractive, affluent young people in their early twenties who work and socialise within the entertainment and fashion industries of Los Angeles. Significantly, The Hills maintains the voyeuristic allure of a ‘reality’ TV premise and enhances this by adapting the melodramatic aesthetics and distinctive narrative strategies of soap opera to a degree that is more overt than other docusoaps, aside, of course, from that which characterised its forerunner, Laguna Beach. This thesis undertakes a close examination of the generic and institutional positioning of The Hills in four distinct chapters. Chapter One examines the generic position of docusoap as a ‘mixed-genre’ and the institutional role The Hills performs for the youth-oriented MTV network. Chapter Two analyses the specific fictional narrative techniques The Hills uses to enhance its documented footage whilst Chapter Three addresses the controversies that have emerged due to this docusoap’s blending of the fictional and the factual. Finally, Chapter Four details how the docusoap’s ability to appeal to lucrative young viewers positions The Hills as a powerful promotional tool for MTV’s consumerist messages.</p>

MTV’s The Hills: A Leading American Docusoap

<p>This thesis explores the relatively uncharted academic territory of the American docusoap, and case studies The Hills as a pertinent example of this burgeoning television genre. Docusoap is a ‘mixed-genre’ that enhances factual material with the story-telling techniques of fictional drama. Whilst many academics have studied the origins of British docusoap and have registered the influence upon it of ‘public service’ objectives in programming, less attention has been paid to the emergence of the docusoap in the commercially-driven American television context. It is in this context that the docusoap has entailed a more overt blending of the attributes of ‘documentary’ and ‘soap opera’ for purely entertainment purposes. Testifying to the need to reconcile risk with conservatism in a commercially-driven schedule context, the generic mix within The Hills draws from the genres of soap opera and ‘reality’ TV, both of which bring the advantages and assurances of a well-demonstrated audience popularity. Having recently completed its sixth and final season, The Hills exemplifies current developments within the American docusoap form. This docusoap details the lives of a group of attractive, affluent young people in their early twenties who work and socialise within the entertainment and fashion industries of Los Angeles. Significantly, The Hills maintains the voyeuristic allure of a ‘reality’ TV premise and enhances this by adapting the melodramatic aesthetics and distinctive narrative strategies of soap opera to a degree that is more overt than other docusoaps, aside, of course, from that which characterised its forerunner, Laguna Beach. This thesis undertakes a close examination of the generic and institutional positioning of The Hills in four distinct chapters. Chapter One examines the generic position of docusoap as a ‘mixed-genre’ and the institutional role The Hills performs for the youth-oriented MTV network. Chapter Two analyses the specific fictional narrative techniques The Hills uses to enhance its documented footage whilst Chapter Three addresses the controversies that have emerged due to this docusoap’s blending of the fictional and the factual. Finally, Chapter Four details how the docusoap’s ability to appeal to lucrative young viewers positions The Hills as a powerful promotional tool for MTV’s consumerist messages.</p>