HOME IS THE PLACE WHERE OUR HOUSE IS : An antropological exploration into the architectural understanding of the uninitiated Social-antropological essay written as part of diploma exam in architecture,

Bergen School of Arcitecture, 2013, Henning Wenaas Ribe

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Sections . x Prelude pp 3 Sandviken : adaptation or contrast? . 1 Introduction / Pre-conceptions / Professional Mysteries pp 4 Specialisationism.

. 2 Proper living Space, Bodily Reactions pp 5 Mans perception of space; territoriality

.3 Home is not only a House, its a Place pp 6 The cosmology of Place : Architecture of Home : Continuous Space

.4 Real or Rational Space : Local or Global Identity pp 7 Modern Ideal Space / Architecture of Memory .5 Architecture of the Uninitiated / Expression of Values pp 9 The case of Sandviken : Consclusions

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. x Prelude Sandviken : the discussion of adaptation or contrast

Why does a proposed modern addition to the range of historical buildings in Sandviken evokes rage,

anger and debate? The refrain of the oppositors to this project claim that it doesn´t fit in, its ugly in

general, it looks like something else(a computer screen, lego brick, a houseboat), that these are

environments worth conservation, it ruins the pittoresque of the image, that its in itself nice, but doesnt fit

in etc, while on the other hand the arguments for rests on critiquing the old, whats wrong with the

contemporary, a fresh breath of air, the mix of old and new is good, this is a place where I want to live. In

total of 200 posts, 192 where negative to the architectural proposal and 7 positive. How can it be that

such a "simple thing" as a form contrast can spark of a debate with so much feelings and engagement?

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.1 Introduction / Pre-conceptions / Professional Mysteries Specialisationism.

Sandviken, a bay of strands is a west facing mountain wall just north of Bergen city center, Vågen. In Sandviken lies a body of buildings stretching in time from some 200 years ago until present day. New architecture projects here usually endure resitstance and critique in local media and forums, especially architectural projects that does not seem to fit in. In this work, I will with the perspectives of social anthropology to go in and dissertate a little bit in this situation to provide more insight into what is going on, who are the actors here and what are thee bearing motives for ther positioning in the debate over the future of Sandviken. When ever a new architectural project in Sandviken appears, usually through the local media of Bergens Tidende and Bergensavisen, it often recieves the critique that it does not fit in, and that it isn´t in harmony with its surroundings. How it looks, meaning, what are the colour, size, material, roof shape in relation to its surroundings seem the be valued as important qualities. Although some object its so nice to have something new happening, the overall opinion seem the be focused on the issue that it should fit in. That arcitecture today should fit in, is not a common argument among professionals, where contrast, expression of time and singular identity of building plus many more are higher valued. It is believed that these more nuanced points of understanding is more important than the common notion of harmony. What is at stake her is the definition of place. Who are the players who get to define place and how. And how can a place be discussed. In newspaper debates anger and apathy rules the common tone, and it seems that people are discouraged to engage in architectural disussions, as they know that decisions are made in an office far from their reach, and that their position usually gets objected into categories irreleveant to modern arcitecture and planning. This quadrant of arcitectural actors, meaning landlords, arcitects, entrepeneurs and municipality are professionalising the process of building place, and it seems that this is creating an apathying distance to the public. Professional motives gain more weight in the planning process and hence the distance to the people living in a place gets larger. In modern architecture, it seems that professional discourses are more important to arcitects and other building professionals than to develop and form space for the inhabitants of a place. In this work I will look upon how place can be read as home for people, how landscape and arcitecture form a basic immediacy, history and identity for people and how modern ideologies, professional cultures intervene in and oppose this landscape.

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.2 Proper living Space, Bodily Reactions Mans perception of space; territoriality

"When men build buildings they are making statements which communicate with the users of the buildings...When man structures his space, he also structures his life in a very special way" (Hall:1963) These statements is to be seen in relation to the human animal. Living organisms structure micro-space, the personal space is around them, and these are deeply connected to the nerveous system. The way an individual organises and structures are seldom consciously aware to him(Hall:1963). One might add, that when man structures his space, its a continuation of the nervous system into physical space. "The restrictions are not so much in the buildings as they are in man himself" (Hall:1963). Hediger, a zookeeper mentions that the "first property any organism has, is the space it occupies"(Hall:1963). Territory is the place an animal or group defends for covering their needs for food, for mating and for breeding their youngsters. This knowledge suggests, that man as an animal, have these very basic needs for space, personal space creating boundaries towards the outside, the other. Home ground means basic safety. Hall´s notion of quality in architecture is "when buildings are created which communicate man`s own indigenously patterned ways of handling space. A particular pattern should not be imposed intellectually even on people within our own culture, for we have learned that people will respond to identical surroundings in different ways depending on how long they have lived there" (Hall:1963). Man, as an animal is organizing its surroundings, and the structuring of space is an ongoing process, it relates to different actors and aspects of life. Space and arcitecture forms the foundations for human thought and existence, the very space for in which the body moves. Discussing the qualities of the space is arcitecture. The argument of dr. Edward Hall clearly demonstrates that arcitecture is something that involves all human being, conscious or not, and that the organisation of territory and space serves as fundamental relational processes on organism level. This implies an arcitecture engaging actively with the place it works.

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.3 Home is not only a House, its a Place The cosmology of Place : Architecture of Home : Continuous Space

In the work "Home as modern folk culture", Marianne Gullestad investigates the phenomena of home and the different meanings it has to people in different parts of the society. Seeing three categories of people; "ordinary people", mainly working class, academics and the directors, she very finds them to emphazise different qualities and aspects of the home, how it looks, is represented, is functional, traditional and that the home is an expression for a creative effort, (Gullestad 1989) a kind of existential relation the for the subject when constituting a meaningful world.1(Friedman 1992) This meaningful world invokes in a sense the subjects cosmology, "meaning the notions and attitudes towards man, in relation to nature and in relation to society in general. Cosmology expresses in myths and tales, but also in moral rules, rituals and practise of everyday life.... Mental barriers are formed into physical barriers, walls, doors, spatial practices and objects"(Gullestad 1989). The environment we inhabit, is basically an expression for the possibilities of our cosmology. To begin to understand architecture and place we have to understand these human perspectives underlying our actions and the invisible borders of what we allow ourselves to do and what not. Gullestad talks about home as an expression of a barrier between the public and the private. The door, the lock, the nametag on the wall, can all be seen as symbolic marks and a concretized expression of a basic biological need for protection and safety. Within the home the individual is the sovereign. It (almost) undisputed sets the rules and regulations for the house and property. Gullestad argues that the concept of home brings together both idea of place and the idea of a community attached to this place. Home means the warm, the safe, the cozy, and perhaps also the boring, while one on the other hands talks about going out, to a party, on the city, on travel etc, which stands for the more exciting, dangerous and hard. Home stands in relation and in contrast to this out. Also Gullestad holds, that the home today has become a source for deeper meanings, and is, in a secular notion becoming something sacred.(Gullestad 1989) Within this lies a freedom for the subject to express and form their life without the negotiation of the other. A sort of love unconditional. This sort of protectionism and love is essential to see when we now go on to talk about place. In an extended perspective, place is like home. To whomever sees oneself inhabiting a place, it is the immediate reality accessible to experience, the source for memories, symbols of community and and values of higher individual meaning. That Sandviken and Bergen and the whatever unclear the content of these concepts are, it is very clear that they are valued in multiple ways, where different

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notions of space and place exist in a continuum. As mans time on earth is by far exceeded by space, in this temporal process of continuous space, every stone will be turned and every argument spent for man to put a mark on earth.

.4 Real or Rational Space : Local or Global Identity Modern Ideal Space / Architecture of Memory

(Diagram from Friedman 1992)

The debate over the modern seahouse in Sandviken, brings to view some authorative positions2 in the discussion about place. The definition of nice and not nice is, or maybe good and not so good. In Sandviken many people seem to have a common understanding of what is nice, and only a few oppose it. The new building is not only new, it is modern, and to some degree it seems that its the modernity of the building that they oppose. Why? Social antropologist Jonathan Friedman offer some very interesting theories on how identity, space and authority is connected. He makes a landscape of two opposing authorative assumptions about the world, in relation to the subjects feeling or claim to identity. In general, what he defines as the western world, has claimed its ancestery to the greek sivilization some 2500 years ago. Modern ideas and scientism still do. The basic assumptions of the world more or less lies within the discourse led within academic environments, tracing back to, or building their authorative knowledge about the world. We know this as the discussion of the evolving world. The evolving world contains within it, the idea of a continous developing human world etc. Hence to Friedman we can fairly categorize this as the modern world, or life world, the world from which within the scientific subject(i.e. the one who knows) lives his life. Antropologically we must see this as the evolution of a scientific culture, built on

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values of idealism, objectivity, truth, rationality, etc. In short we name this the modernist intellectual approach. "Modernism embodies a strategy of distantation from both nature and culture, from both primitive or biologically based drives and what are conceived of as superstituous beliefs."(Friedman 1992). On the other hand, Friedman introduces "traditionalism...opposes the alienated freedom of modernity and attempts to reinstate the values and cultural fixity of a supposedly lost world." (Friedman 1992) Outside scientific discourse lies a whole other world of people and ideas, that outflourish the general notions coming from scientism. Outside science lies what anthropologist refer to as supposedly authentic culture, if that is a possibility. The authenticity is in a way what antropology seeks to point at or define, and they do this from the point of view as outside observers, yet self proclaiming neutrality and objectivity towards the subjects investigated. At times "modernism tends to extremes of rationalism and developmentalism", and "traditionalism can be associated with the early reaction...to classical evolutionism."(Friedman 1992) "Traditionalism is best expressed in the form of the value-laden relativism that emphasizes the special merit of cultural difference and defends the latter against the homogenizing power of modernity." (Friedman 1992) Clearly being a large discussion, I will focus on emphasizing these points from Friedman, and coining them towards the discussion of a building in Sandviken, Bergen might seem like a leap, but still I would claim the validity of these stories in the ongoing debate on the question; How should future Sandviken look? As this debate is clearly about the look of things, not developmental, functional, economical, trafical, constructional etc or other more pragmatic values involved the making of architecture. The look of the building expresses values clearly modern, as its design is very rational when it comes to placing, using abstract circles, also the shape of the circle gives the

outer boundary of the building. Geometry as a basic formgiver, clearly states a more abstract and rational approach towards design, not going into dialogue with the

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landscape or architecture, but rather giving architecure form through the discourse of the modernist carried, out on the values of progress, objectivity, neutrality and truth, not being particual interested in the local, which it categorises in the shelf of irrational or superstitious. .5 Architecture of the Uninitiated / Myths of Modernism Culture, History, Identity :The case of Sandviken, Conclusions Friedman closes his work citing another anthropologist, Sahlins saying "culture is precisely the organization of the current situation in terms of the past"(Friedman 1992) and that is so because subjects in the present fashion to do so. The history that every subject define, that effects the present is in Friedmans terms the actual practice of mythmaking. The modern so-called scientific constructions of other peoples' pasts, is of no higher value than any other. ""Objective" history in this discussion is just as much a social construct as any other history"(Friedman 1992) History is itself the discourse of constructing identity, and this is a recurrent source of conflicting, sometimes deadly perspectives upon the world. That the building form, language, expression, in this context, how it looks, is a continual source of debate and it will probably continue for as long as human are human, in the sense that we are meaningful creatures and that when one is constructing the future, one is doing so in relation to that "constructing the past is an act of self-identification and must be interpreted in its authenticity, that is, in terms of the existensial relation between subjects and the constitution of a meaningful world" (Friedman 1992). When people are agonized by certain architectural projects expressing a totally different cosmology and set of values, even values seeking to devaluate their own, they feel naturally threathened and speaks aout, reacts against it with their bodies, their instinctual, real and authentic reactions towards the other. What they love might be under subtle attack, they feel it, but they don´t necessarily know the reason why. "The constitution of identity is an elaborate and deadly serious game of mirrors. It is a complex temporal interaction of multiple practices of identification external and internal to a population." (Friedman 1992:855), and "the idea that culture can be negotiated and that invention is a question of sign substitution, a kind of cognitive experience in pure textual creativity, are linked to a structure of self and of culture that is perhaps specific to capitalist modernity" (Friedman 1992:855). "Real" culture is far more complex and an temporal expression of a population, that it´s relativity is mainly available to the theoretical modern eye. Its a battlefield, and architects are all in.

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Architecture remains existentially a specialized, yet entangled discipline, at same time distanced and near, sometimes academic, sometimes personal and involved. For the general public to be updated on the newest knowledge in the discipline is impossible. The architect creates a space to work in, but also a distantation to the public in general, be it the one or the other group. This the architect should keep in mind when constructing communities and places for people. Who am I doing this project for? What are the values I want to communicate? What part of history does my project belong to? Is it the entrepeneur, the other architects, myself, the common public, the municipality, an individual etc. Within this, values and acknowledgements will be served. Not positioning a project is impossible. It will always stand in relation to the other his or hers values. Accordingly, there is no such thing as neutral architecture.

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Literature

Friedman, Jonathan (1992) The Past in the Future: History and the Politics of Identity, American

Anthropologist 94(4):837-859, American Anthropologist Association

Gullestad, Marianne (1989) Hjemmet som moderne folkekultur

Hall, Edward (1963) Quality in Architecture, Am. inst. Of Architects Journal : Washington

Internet art icles

Bergens Tidende (2012) Sier ja til funkis-sjøbod http://www.bt.no/bolig/Sier-ja-til-funkis-sjobod-2796227.html

Facebook disussion of new development in Sandviken

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151157476740003&set=a.162522915002.119365.162508655002&t

ype=1&theater

Gardåsen, Tor Kjetil (2006) Modernistisk tilpasningsarkitektur: ugress eller nytteplante?

http://morgenbladet.no/debatt/2006/modernistisk_tilpasningsarkitektur_ugress_eller_nytteplante#.UP-ltKUlby9

Grønvold, Ulf (2009) Brudd eller kontinuitet?

http://omarkitektur.blogspot.no/2009/01/brudd-eller-kontinuitet.html

Endnotes 1 Constructing and creating a world for the subject, could be seen according to Friedman(1992:856) as the

authentic act os self-identification in which every subject creates their world of meaning. 2 By authorative in this discourse, Friedman points at positions not acting relativist to the modern situation, but

claiming authority in the reading of history, and hence the formation of identity in the context.