Theory of Architecture Seminar

Abstract

The elective course/seminar "Architectures of Gender: body_building" seeks to provide an interdisciplinary introduction to gender theory in its relation to architecture.

Objective

Participating students will become familiar with contemporary gender-based approaches to architecture and spatial practice, and learn to apply this knowledge to critical discussion of historical and current examples.

Content

The body as ontology, epistemology, and representation has long provided a model for architecture. Architecture, in turn, has contributed to the construction of the human body, especially in the modern era – for example, through techniques of measuring, norms and standards. How does this relationship change today, as the boundaries between human body and technology increasingly blur, and the presumed integrity of the body becomes subject to debate and alteration? This seminar addresses the mutual co-construction of the body and its surrounding built environment historically as well as theoretically, in particular from the perspective of technofeminist (and more recent xenofeminist) thought. Since the 1960s, architectural theories have referred to the figure of the “cyborg.” In 1985, Donna Haraway famously subverted this initially technocratic concept into an emancipatory tool to counter gender bias, binary constructions, the “reproductive matrix” and essentialist ontologies of nature. Over the last three decades, feminist scholars have further deterritorialised and appropriated different technologies to their own ends. Revisiting feminist theorization and speculations, both past and present, we ask for the utopian potential of this un- and re-building of the body in its capacity to destabilize its associated understandings of nature, technology and culture. Weekly close-readings and discussions of key texts will familiarize the participants with provocative voices in the field, as well as provide the basis and methods for a research-oriented assignment in small groups.

Resources