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Architecture As A Symbolic Medium Heike Delitz, Gebaute Gesellschaft. Architektur als Medium des Sozialen. (Frankfurt/Main, Campus, 2009). Uta Karstein European Journal of Sociology / Volume 52 / Issue 03 / December 2011, pp 570 - 572 DOI: 10.1017/S0003975611000403, Published online: 10 February 2012
Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0003975611000403 How to cite this article: Uta Karstein (2011). European Journal of Sociology, 52, pp 570-572 doi:10.1017/ S0003975611000403 Request Permissions : Click here
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architecture as a symbolic medium*
I n t h i s b o o k H e i k e D e l i t z discusses the relation between architecture and society. In doing so, it is not merely her intention to re-establish a foundation for architectural sociology. She also refers to shortcomings in the formation of sociological theory with regard to architecture. As she correctly asserts, the question of the material shape of a society has never played an important role: classical sociologists such as Max Weber or Alfred Sch€ utz were barely interested in the materiality of the context of action, and theorists such as Georg Simmel, Karl Mannheim or J€ urgen Habermas often produce relevant statements about architectural theory only indirectly. According to Delitz, interesting approaches can be found in authors such as Norbert Elias or Walter Benjamin. Here, however, architecture mainly appears as an ‘‘‘expression’, ‘symbol’ or ‘mirror’ of the social’’ (S.11). Such a conception of architecture would render it merely a ‘‘highly visible copy of prior, ‘actual’ social existence’’ (S.12). This would propagate the classical dualism between the social and the material, a dualism that Delitz believes ought to be overcome. Consequently, Delitz establishes an alternative paradigm in her discussion: architecture as a symbolic medium through which society first constitutes ‘‘this determined society’’ using it to ‘‘create an expressive, visible and tangible shape’’ (S.13). From this perspective, architecture no longer represents the ‘‘neutral shell’’ of the social (S.12) but rather assumes constitutive significance for it. In addition to this (rather macro-social) shape-dimension (‘‘Gestalt’’), architecture also bears the (micro-social) property of an artefact that is continually bound to ‘‘the individual life’’, thereby enabling ‘‘postures, movements and looks’’ (S.14). In this context, Delitz speaks of agencements (‘‘Gef€ uge’’, in English: ‘arrangements’) – aiming once again to overcome the subjectobject-dualism with the help of theoretical work. For this purpose, she draws on two theoretical trends of the 20th century. One is that of the ‘‘vitalism’’ (‘‘Lebenssoziologie’’), little known in Germany, proposed by Henri Bergson and elaborated by authors such as Gilles Deleuze, Cornelius Castoriadis and Gilbert Simondon. In addition to their difference-theoretical and non-Cartesian *
About Heike Delitz, Gebaute Gesellschaft. Architektur als Medium des Sozialen. (Frankfurt/Main, Campus, 2009).
570 Uta KARSTEIN, Universit€at von Leipzig [
[email protected]]. Arch.europ.sociol., LII, 3 (2011), pp. 570–572—0003-9756/11/0000-900$07.50per art + $0.10 per pageÓA.E.S., 2011
architecture as a symbolic medium way of thinking, Delitz appreciates the fact that they consistently account for ‘‘the dynamics and eventfulness of society’’, the continuous and unpredictable state of ‘‘becoming different’’ (S.22). In addition to this French school of thought the author also refers to the philosophical anthropology of Helmut Plessner and Arnold Gehlen. Delitz is especially interested in modern western architecture. According to the author, the particular innovative aims of this period make architecture not just a constitutive, but a ‘‘transitive medium’’ (S.16): the various vanguards are always one step ahead of social development and explicitly demand that the social be actively and collectively shaped in terms of a new base concept. The exemplary studies attached by the author to her programmatic text therefore refer to five important architectural trends of the last century. In the Garden city of Dresden-Hellerau, in the Bauhaus and its conservative opponent of the Stuttgart School as well as in socialist and deconstructive architecture, ‘‘the social-historical entity obviously chose new respective shapes’’ and incited new agencements, according to Delitz (S.218). These ‘‘analyses of agencements and shape’’ (S.211) are all worth reading and extremely informative. One reason for this is that they serve as examples to help the reader understand the fundamental idea of the book. For instance, the Lebensreform movement could not have been realized within the architecture of the Gr€ underzeit. Indeed, the Garden city of Dresden-Hellerau was necessary to create a new design concept that would give a real shape to its central ideas of rhythm through physical education, the fusion of every-day life and arts and a new sense of community; and to make it possible to live and experience these ideas. The intelligent and non-ideological discussions of the Stuttgart School (of which many of the architects later became Nazi sympathizers) and the socialist architecture of the gdr shows how these too were influential. On the other hand, these analyses contradict to some extent the theoretical sources of what Delitz calls architectural sociology. In particular, the concept of the ‘‘social-historical’’ (Castoriadis) cannot adequately treat concrete arguments and conflicts generated by new developments in architecture because it is too general and indistinct. The proposed theoretical conception does not explain how a position is actually deemed avant-garde, i. e. what internal power dynamics are at work that allow this in first place? Another question is how vanguards obtain legitimacy and validity outside the field of architecture, i.e. what (historically contingent) relation they have to architecture and politics, arts, science, public etc. Nor do the favoured concepts do
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uta karstein justice to the highly interesting question of how such architecture is received and appropriated by its users. Her assertions dealing with the complex conflicts and (un-) successful means of acquisition, however, are among the most exciting in her case studies. Despite this criticism, the book raises long-overdue criticisms and questions. In the future, one will be unable to ignore the theoretical account of architecture as a symbolic medium as formulated by Delitz. uta
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