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| On a Dow on the Arabian Gulf |
"
Teaching
The Techniques Of Making
Architectural Metaphors”©
by
Barie
Fez‑Barringten
Associate
professor
Global
University
Written while a member of the faculty of Dammam
University(King Faisal Universty)
6,849
words on 29 double spaced sheets
Author may be contacted by email: bariefezbarringten@gmail.com
Teaching
the techniques of making architectural metaphors in
the twenty-first century.”
Journal of King Abdul Aziz University Engg...Sciences;
Jeddah: Code: BAR/223/0615:OCT.2.1421 H. 12TH
EDITION; VOL. I and
“Transactions” of
CardiffUniversity,UK.April2010
.Included
in the ERIC Collection as ED535124. This document available on the ERIC Web
site (http://www.eric.ed.gov)
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| Saudi deseert |
Introduction:
This monograph is in response to a
request to explain the application of the metaphoric theorem and metaphors
in teaching architecture in Saudi
Arabia .
It incorporates views by Mark Gelertner presented in 1988 at the
Association of the Collegiate Schools of Architecture's Seventy-sixth annual
meeting. These views are particularly
relevant to any discussion about education in Saudi
Arabia because in various forms they are
widely shared. Happily though these
views do not prevail but do have an important dimension worthy of
consideration. This article applies the
research and scholarship of H.A.Ozman and S.M. Craver, W.J. Gordon, P.Weiss,
G.Dodds and A. Al-Saati into ten divisions which studies teaching the
techniques of making architectural metaphors in the twenty-first century.
The ten sections are:
1. Idealism
and the working metaphor
2. The
metaphor in the ideal educational situation
3. Repertoire
of metaphors with mental schema
4. Learn
with metaphors
5. The
metaphor's correlations
6. Metaphor's philosophies and techniques
7. A
teaching alternative
8. Metaphor's role in learning architecture
9. Tradition
and the metaphor
It is hoped
that a compendium of educational views will have a positive affect on the
planning, revision and guidance of architectural curriculums and teaching
approaches. Often planners debate about issues at one level which are best
dealt with at another so this work turns to Jean Piaget, John Locke, Aristotle,
Plato, Jean-Jocques Rousseau, Sybil Maholy-Nage, Edmund Husserl, Martin
Heidegger, and John Dewey. It is their
views of idealism, phenomenology, realism, pragmatism, existentialism,
reconstructionism, behaviorism, perennialism and essentialism that have given
perspective to psychology, cultural tradition, self-realization, mimesis,
functionalism, the bauhous and Ecole de Beaux-arts, behavioral engineering,
linguistic analysis, traditionalism modernism, liberalism, and radicalism. All of these help to analyze the controversial
role that tradition, culture and heritage should play in the basic education of
architects. Education and philosophy
reveals metaphors and metaphors reveals education
and philosophy. The mechanics,
structure, relationships, context, applications, characteristics definitions,
affects and goals of the metaphor are compared and
explained. The reference to education of
architects in Saudi Arabia is only as
a type of beneficiary of educational approaches.
"Idealism
and the working metaphor"
(1.0,
pg.24)Jean Piaget expresses psychology as an Idealist. (1.0)Idealism is
perhaps the oldest systematic philosophy in western culture, dating back at
least as early as (pg.31)Plato (427‑347 B.C.) in
ancient Greece . Generally,
idealists believe that ideas are the only true reality. They hold that the material world is
characterized by change, instability, and uncertainty, while some ideas are
enduring.
(1.0) Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
foundations of education"
Thus, idea‑ism
might be a more correct descriptive term for this philosophy than
idealism. In this way the philosophy
into which the 1metametaphor theorem fits may said to
be idea‑ism. However, in
so far as a metaphor expresses itself it is in (1.0,pg.82‑83)pragmatism
which depends upon induction, human experience, naturalistic humanism, and the
relation between science and the culture of man. John Locke (1632‑1704) best expressed that
ideas are not innate as Plato maintained; rather, they came from experience,
that is, sensation and reflection. The
very things of which metaphors are made. As people are exposed to experiences, they
are impressed on the mind. These
experiences are all imprinted on the mind through one or more of the five
senses. Once they are in the mind they can
be related in a variety of ways through the use of reflection. We can acquire the idea of milk through the
sense of taste; perfume through the sense of smell; velvet through the sense of
touch; and green through sense of sight.
One can create ideas of green milk or perfumed
velvet. These are kinds of metaphors.
Locke
believed that as people have more experience they have more ideas imprinted on
the mind and more to relate. More to
exude, reify
and
translate. These expressions we perceive
as metaphors. The only way
we can verify the correctness of our ideas are in the world of experience. We look to test our metaphors
by perception, use and application. Is it working is the question the artist
must ask even of himself as the first preceptor.
1. meta : used with the discipline
of the metaphor to designate a new but related discipline
designed to deal critically the original metaphor. It is more comprehensive and transcends the
literary metaphor.
(1.0)
Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
foundations of education
"The
metaphor in the ideal educational situation"
(1.0,pg.25)The cardinal
objective of idealism and idealistic education is the ancient
Greek notion to "know thyself". They believe a true education occurs only
within the individual self. The
responsibility of the educator is to provide the materials and activities that
influence learning.
(1.0,
pg.23)It is the response of the learner to these materials and
activities that constitutes education.
This approach has been most adapted to higher education and to the arts
in particular. It is kind of management
by objective rather than by supervision.
(1.0,pg.23)The sources
of the learner's actions are personal and private; therefore, in idealism all
education is self‑education. The project
method used extensively in colleges and schools of architecture might be
concrete examples of self‑activity.
(1.0,pg.24)Jean Piaget
and others have shown that it is not unreasonable to expect students to
demonstrate some critical regard for the material they are
exposed to at various stages of development.
It is in this way that a learner makes choices, discriminates,
emphasizes, de‑emphasizes and corrects these things which are unfamiliar to
those familiar. It is in his technique
and content where one encourages the other.
The greater the need and acknowledged emptiness in content the more one exercises a technique to get the content.
(1.0)
Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
foundations of education"
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| Riyadh |
"Repertoire of metaphors with mental schemas:
(2.0)For Piaget learning is
a kind of trial and error activity culminating in a successful solution to a
pursued goal. The process encountered in
the pursuit are remembered by the learner as a kind of program, what Piaget
calls a mental schema. Now
when this same person applies this same mental schema to solve
another problem Piaget says the problem has been assimilated by
the existing schema.
Inducing this kind of association of the familiar (2.0)mental
schema for the unfamiliar is the work of (3.1)William
J.Gordon. If the (2.0)mental
schema does not work and the learner evolves the original
(2.0)mental‑schema to cope with the new problem Piaget
says it has been accommodated to the problem. This is the transforming characteristic
of the metaphor and the metaphoric process.
(2.0) Gelernter, M., "Teaching design
innovation through design traditions from 1988, ACSA Proceedings of
Seventy Sixth Annual Meeting. (School of Architecture University of Colorado Denver .)
(3.1) "Synectics: The metaphorical Way
of Knowing"
(3.2)The metaphoric
process is based on a literary term which means "carrying‑over";
it associates meanings and emotions which would otherwise not have been related.
Essences known to have a preferential or primary use (the original (2.0)mental
Schema) in one context are explicitly employed in another. Piaget claims that once the new schema
has been developed it is retained as a repertoire of possible
solutions to problems. These mental (2.0)repertoire
include not only material solutions to physical problems but to problems of
comprehension as well. Their is then a
repertoire of solutions that provides the individual with competence to act in
the world. Examples are plenty in
architecture. Formulas, for stair's
risers and tread relationships; furniture sizes; drafting techniques; indexes
to information; prices; quantities; estimating tools; engineering techniques;
heating, ventilating and air conditioning technologies; manufacturing sources;
consultants, etc. This list goes on and
on of the many facts, figures and concepts remembered and brought to bear by
the practicing architect and before, to a lesser extent, by the learning
architect. In any approach to creative
work or learning the individual in process of creation encounters problems for
which he either already has an existing
(2.0)schema or evolves a new one.
Creativity
though is not always a "problem-solving"
event. It may be a creative one which
uses the past, present and vision of the future (in the form of analysis of
program) to create a work. It is an inclusive "information gathering"
perceiving and reifying process.
(3.2) Weiss, P., "The metaphorical
process"
(2.0) Gelernter, M., "Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
Which
concretises and forms by juxtaposing the conditions, operations, ideals and
goals (C.O.I.G.) of a project. It is the
synapse, transformation and interrelationships of these (C.O.I.G.) which
creates the composition we call metaphor. The content of the work of architecture is
the experience with these program elements that are brought about by the (4.1)technique
of creativity. "Technique reveals
what content itself cannot". These
are the remembered mental schema where a prior experience is
accumulated nurtured and encouraged.
"Learn
with Metaphors":
Architects
learn to learn; and, learn to research, program, analyze, develop sources and
resources, dimension, scale, volume, limits, boundaries, scope, depth,
movement, context, etc where none existed before. The maker of architectural metaphors
sees in an "open-ended" seamless situation very specific parameters
where the inexperienced fails. It is in
the phenomena of his 1a prior; holistic experience with (4.1)techniques
of making that the individual with all the elements is able to take a new
content into yet another metaphor. A new metaphor which never did
exist before yet is based upon every known experience of architects, his or
her's profession, the school they attended the way they learned and knowledge
they accumulated. Each is unique yet
well related by the commonality of the uniformity of the information, the
contexts, etc. experiences, contexts,
teaching foundation, schools of philosophy, family and social.
(4.1) Dodds,
G., "On the place of architectural speculation"
1.
a priori: from the former, deductive; relating to
or derived by reasoning from self-evident propositions; presupposed
by experience; being without examination or analysis. Formed or conceived beforehand. Presumptive as compared do a posteriori
: from the latter, inductive, relating to or derived by reading from observed
facts.
The exercise prepares future architects
to be in their own time, with their own history, venues and contexts and yet be
able to originate works of architecture which are both peculiar, particular,
tailor-made, and indigenous. Such
transcends but adapts well to culture, tradition and heritage.
(4.1)It is the metaphor
that reveals the content. It is the metaphor
that was composed of the content that has all the cues, limits, bonds, and
sense stimulants so organized on the basis of the program that, when perceived,
recalls the content to users. This
remaking is a restoration of knowledge that does not resemble the original so
much as it leads to the essential condition of the 1referent. The 1referent may
include every experience of the architect, the process of creating this very
project, and all the elements which form the building. Indeed the process is 2heuristic
as a restoration or remaking of a condition that is no longer present. The metaphor too reveals
whatever does not bring itself forth.
This is the mission of the composer which is endued in the residue of
his experience: the metaphor.
It all is an extension of his identity and the vehicle by which he is
(manifests, asserts, confirms, tests, and again becomes) the architect.
(4.1) Dodds, G., "On the place of
architectural speculation"
1. referent: the "thing"
that a symbol stands for.
2. heuristic: to discover;
as an aid to learning, discovery, or problem-solving by experimental and
especially trial and error methods. It
is exploratory self-educating, and improves performance.
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| Jeddah |
Can a metaphor
composed by one be read by another? If
both have been similarly cultured by the same experiences the reader and
composer may communicate through the work.
No two people, even in identical situations perceive and retain in the
same way.
Mark
Gelernter explains that (2.0)the individual culture gives
explicit guidance about which solutions work and which solutions other members
of the culture will understand.
Certainly this is true for the standard expectations any society values
its' neighborhoods, building types and styles.
These become the measures by which an individual values his or her
success and accomplishments, and by which he or she can compare him or herself
to others in society. It is a primary
function of any metaphor and the metaphors in a society
which cue us toward our relative positions.
This is a function of both art, architecture and all other metaphors.
It enters the culture's general repertoire.
(2.0)Cultural traditions provide rapid competence when
recurring and familiar problems are faced, and when new problems emerge they
provide the essential base of knowledge from which new ideas are derived.
Indeed
there are many published standards for graphics, layouts, detailing, design
organization, specifications, contracting, management and construction. These are never meant to be copied, but along
with manufacturer, context, site, program and personal specific information metaphorically
1created to produce the appropriate and relevant metaphor. They can be emulated.
(2.0) Gelernter, M., "Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
1. create: to bring into
existence; to invest with a new form using imaginative skill as design and
invention.
This
approach accepts the realist view that reality, knowledge, and
value exist independent of the human mind.
It is Aristotle that (1.0)argued that the form
of things and the universal properties of objects remain constant and never
changes whereas particular components do change. A major problem, according to the realist, is
a general cultural malaise caused by a lack of commitment to fundamental
values. This is shown in the breakdown
of discipline and disregard for basic traditions. (1.0 pg.56)Perhaps the best
illustrations of this fact is that schools of architecture have drifted away
from a concentration of the essentials of techniques, engineering design, and
character development.
(1.0)Perhaps the
crowning evidence of the failure of "discovery" and
"open" approaches, realist argue, is the embarrassing
number of (architectural) graduates who are functionally illiterate. They can not operate within a professional
office as either apprentices or on their own.
(1.0, pg 59)Realists therefore support the lecture and
other formal ways of teaching. Self‑realization they argue, best occurs when
students are knowledgeable about the external world. Just compare this to Dewey's "consummatory
experience" where the learner's own experience is internalized
providing unity and completion.
Is making metaphors a
culturally accepted activity and how much of a change does an
architectural student undergo from his or her natural familiar or social
setting? The answer is usually that
there is a rift in this way of thinking from settings to which the student may
reside..
(1.0) Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
foundations of education"
Most
business, professional, social, cultural and tradition-bond societies
emulation, reification translation and application particularly interested in
self‑destruction, becoming obsolete or being replaced by something more
relevant. To enter into real time with
these prodigious practitioners one must (5.0)claim, sometime
hostilely, this new time and place. This
was recognized by the founders of the so-called modern movement in philosophy, art
and education. Not equipping graduates
with this metaphor is setting one's society on a track of a
possible momentary success followed by fatal obsolescence.
(2.0)The classic
apprenticeship system, after all, trained students to design buildings exactly
as any culture trains its' members to speak its' language. The apprentices mimicked the design of a
master already skilled in design. This
according to Plato is the (4.1)bad mimesis : the imitation of things
‑ illusions of things, rather than the things themselves. The primary concern of the "imitator"
is one of imitation and appearance not the pursuit of truth and good. It is in the mimesis of speculation,
transforming nature in which man reenacts the first creation,
ultimately revealing truth and beauty.
Today,
schools of architecture encourage students to experience many masters not only
its' own faculty. They often encourage
both mimesis and conditions, cost estimates, construction realities and laws of
physics.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
(4.1) Dodds, G., "On the place of
Architectural Speculation".
(5.0)
Al‑Saati, A., "Mondrian : Neo‑plasticism and
its influences in architecture"
(6.0)
But it is not until a student graduates and experiences
the realism of application, production and schedules including real clients,
contract terms of process and produces.
According to
Gelernter up to the (2.0)"twentieth century former students
learned to design by first studying and even copying the traditional, design
ideas in their culture. They would first work on their master's current
designs, then produce simple designs of their own based on the master's
concepts. They would then proceed to
develop personal varieties of those acquired ideas". This was followed by the "Ecole de
Beaux‑arts". The principles
were presented "as embodied in particular buildings. Students still worked within the stylistic
framework of the atelier master".
Since this time several things have radically changed in
the developed world, the least of which is a high degree of social, economic
and locational mobility, affluence, break‑down of families, and the disdain for
the master‑apprentice relationship. This
coupled with the cataclysmic attitude of modernist purposed to claim the future
has yielded focus on novelty, invention and innovation as a way to project
oneself into the future while marketing in the present. This is because of the high numbers having
access to education, the enormous competition, and too many careers chasing too
few jobs. So much of the developing
draws from the developed world approaches to education which can be reviewed in
the context of the political, social, and economic designs of the particular
nation. On the other hand the education of individuals within any nation is not
only for use in that nation but focussed on the individual as he or she may
utilize this education elsewhere and surely in some future time.Today's schools
of architecture provide this kind of educational opportunity to students in the
form of work/study programs and project assignments which focus on specific
architects, building types, design
philosophies, etc.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
"Metaphor's
philosophies and techniques"
(2.0)Traditional
forms of education based on precedents were replaced by functionalist
theory claiming that every new design problem consist of unprecedented
requirements including a unique site, functional demands and client
wishes. Modernist's
education wants to teach students how to face these unprecedented problems
without preconception, constraining, or inhibiting their ability to create
architectural forms never seen before.
(1.0,
pg.85)1J.J.Rousseau (1712‑1770) advocated pragmatism
whose greatest social and political enemy is custom and tradition as well as
fear and apathy. "Habitual ways of
behaving developed in the past worked very well in their own time
but have lost their practicality in today's world. 
(1.0) Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
Foundation of Education"
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
1. Jean‑Jacques Rousseau: A pragmatist;
the student should learn from nature; "Social Contract"
and "Emile". Education should follow student's needs. Pragmatism is a philosophy that encourages us
to seek out the processes and do the things that work best to help us achieve
desirable ends. Pragmatism seeks to
examine traditional ways of thinking and doing, and where possible and
desirable, to reconstruct one's approach to life more in line with the human
needs of today".
(1.0,
pg.167)Of the past, existentialists believe that
most philosophies of the past have asked "man" to think deeply about
abstractions that had little or no relationship to life. The individual should be drawn-in
as a participant. One concentrates, not
on scholarly debate, but on creation; that is, one can create ideas relevant to
his or her own needs and interests. It
emphasizes individuality. We must first
understand ourselves.
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| Jeddah suk |
(1.0) Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
Foundation of Education"
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
(2.0)Students
were offered a "universal" language of architectural
form from which, they were told, they could derive any conceivable
architectural ideas. This included
notions of balance, symmetry, proportion, mass and scale" which are
paradoxically both basic to all good design yet "stylistically
neutral". They are so abstract they
do not lead the students to think of any particular architectural styles. Gelernter claims that "the modernist
educational system encourages students to pursue a degree of novelty which
simply does not occur in the real world of building". "Attempting to reinvent the wheel every
time one faces a problem inevitably leads to mistakes and, ultimately, building
failures. Many of these failures
Gelernter continues could be avoided if students designers were less interested
in novelty and more willing to learn the hard won lessons of their
predecessors. But yet students work
often looks surprisingly similar to the works of todays known great masters
because students continue to derive their forms from the best examples of
previous work. However, students are
discouraged from examining their sources explicitly.
The
student's metaphors are the result of their experience studying
the metaphors of others.
In this way experiences are conveyed from one to another through metaphors
and transformed by the student to his particular context. The student learns to see the way a
practicing architects are able to exude not only all the practical needs of his
program but also some philosophical, formal or geometrical idea as well. In this way the students learns how to read,
perceive, experience and compose his or her's own metaphor.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
"A
teaching alternative":
The study of architectural history,
case studies, contextual analysis and architectural precedents strive to induce
a deeper experience of and in architecture.
The
overall result still is (2.0)"neither true innovation nor understood
design tradition, but worse still, for many, is only a partial
and fragmented understanding of the concepts of design. This could be avoided, contends Gelernter by
reorganizing the relationship between cultural traditions and creative
invention.
The architectural student can
optimize his ability to communicate by using exercises that concentrate not on
design but the technique of expressing, researching and concretising. These lessons in drafting, rendering,
painting, model building and diagramming build the architect's "speaking"
and "seeing" skills.
In the study of speech, language, drama, music, etc. a student's early
studies concentrate on listening and learning to listen. Architects who first learn to sense, learn,
perceive and generally absorb will optimize making of metaphors. The student focuses, not on the program, nor
on his process, nor on the product but the process of the original composer,
his ideas, expression, details etc. He
learns about making metaphors
without himself having made one.
However, this experience does provide him with the standards
he must meet in his experience of making metaphors.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
For
this reason various history of architecture studies require students to fully
reproduce by rendering and model at least one historically modern and
contemporary design. This was the
practice by Sybil Maholy‑Nage (the widow of Laslo Moholy-Nage) at Pratt
Institute during the fifties and sixties of her important teaching career. These exercises recognize student's synaptic
ability of art to connect mind to mouth, hand etc. However, the student who
must condition him or herself to become not only an appreciator,reader and
preceptor but a composer, assembler, organizer and creator. In most other professions and trades the creative
is unacceptable and discouraged. It is
in fields where
precedence,
"route- learning and performance are mandatory. Architecture includes both, and the student's
task is doubly difficult. Architectural metaphors are composed of
an overall metaphor which is unique in that it is comprised of a
series of a prior experiences and finished metaphors
which can be applied and adapted. It
also includes 1a posteriori experiences. It is a mistake to limit the study of
architecture to only (4.1)good or bad mimesis, imitation or
emulation of product or process, tradition, culture or heritage, contemporary
or modern, classic or user-friendly or cost or non‑cost consciousness. The truth is that the practicing metaphor-making architect
is endued with all these.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
(4.1) Dodds, G., "On the place of
Architectural Speculation".
1. a posteriori: inductive,
relating to a derived by reasoning from observed facts. For example, all the architect's analysis of
a project's program, applicable laws and codes, building ordinances,
manufacturers information, etc.
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| Qasim oasis |
(2.0)
Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design innovation
through design traditions"
1.
three-dimensional: where
architects discover spatial functional, structural, mechanical and
constructional realities in well rounded completeness.
"Metaphoric
techniques":
Architecture and the making of
metaphors is a serious subject, not to be taken lightly nor
reduced to one or another of its' variables.
It deals with the whole and substance of much of what constitutes the
treasure, wealth, success and accomplishment of a society, civilization and
individuals.
The school, university, college,
professors, teacher, student, department, etc. which limits its' view of
architecture then becomes and produces that view. What may seem relevant, marketable,
compatible and timely may be circumstantial and as a result of the faculty's
own projections. They are getting what
they asked for. Not unlike most
professions, architecture is self‑professing. If architects say they make metaphors,
are draftsman, builders, project managers, restoration specialist,
traditionalist, etc. that is what they are and those will be the kinds of
architects produced and the demands placed on the facility. Architecture is classic, setting its' own
standards and is standard setting. It is a type and model which
others can add or emulate. If architects become builders or only designers to
whom will the builders look to copy or emulate.
Even those advocating traditional imitations would be at a loss for a
world without full architectural expressions.
This is the environment which has been abdicated by the architect
which is then controlled by the real estate developer, lawyers, accountants,
comptrollers, engineers, builders, constructors, municipality, etc.
Students do wish to abandon a
priori (2.0)"repertoire of mental images"
which
we may call cultural or traditional unless these images can be restored to
value. Students are asked to abandon
their very means of understanding buildings". For most involved in the dialectic
process this is a welcomed and natural event. It fits well to current maturing and when accepted
culturally can induce new experiences.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
One can reside in an environment for
a life time without seeing, perceiving or noticing its' relationships,
structure and connotations. Education
deals with extent reality, its' perspective and context in universal history.
We can apply (2.0)Gelernter's
analogy of learning language skills to learning not architecture but aspects of
architecture related to technique, expression, building, construction, contract
documents, model building, graphics drafting, rendering, writing etc. Those
skills and facts as language that teach the student about words, their
pronunciation, and the methods of combining them used and understood by a considerable
community. These are the architect's
means of communicating ideas and including feelings by the use of
conventionalized signs, symbols, forms, shapes, textures, scale, height, width
or features having understood meanings.
Just as linguists utilize reading, spelling, literature and composition
(the language arts) to develop the student's comprehension and capacity for use
of the written and oral language so do architectural educators use history, two
and three-dimensional design, construction, structures, research, programming,
drafting, drawing, rendering, etc.
In the way mimicking helps students
learn a language, copying draftsmanship enables a draftsman. Neither mimetic activities are the source of
ideas, but rather the very necessary art to express those ideas. It is often the mastery of some technique of
expression which builds the ability of the composer to innovate and
create. But the two, technique and ideas
are not the same. They depend upon each
other and are metaphorically interrelated but they are sovereign
and cannot compete.
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
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| Riyadh Wadi |
Mastering an
idea is not the same as learning to speak a language, yet language is replete
with words which are ideas. We remember
the words, grammar and syntax along with physical means of using them. Both the technical and the cognitive realms
of architectural composition are involved in the same idea(s) but the former
articulates, explains, divides and makes conscious that which is deduced,
inferred, learned, experienced and decided.
Without a language, ideas would not materialize nor be 1thought. Technique of the vehicles which conduct our
thoughts through a system of senses, perceptions, decisions, and recollections
of experiences of both the inner and outer world.
(1.0)For the existentialist
in this kind of experience the teacher and learner are partners in the learning
process. Perennialists
promote a cognitive approach to education : one that stresses 1thinking
and particularly philosophical 1thinking as its' primary goal while essentialist
educational theory has stresses that factual, observable data predominates a
purely rational approach.
(1.0)Behavioral engineers think
of schools as total conditioning units. Though behavioral engineering
faculties and students initiate the kinds of changes necessary to create a new
and better world. Linguistic
analyst maintain that what we need in education is to become aware of
how language can be used to influence both thinking and action.
(1.0) Ozman,
H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical Foundation of Education"
1. Thought : think, cognition,
recognition, reasoning, the power to imagine, conception, a developed
intention, as architectural plans, sections, elevations, axonometric, etc.
think: to know :
to form or have in the mind. To devise
by thinking. To form a mental
picture. To subject to the process of
logical thought. To think implies the
entrance of an idea into one's mind. The
forming and bringing forth a conception.
To think is to form; form forms from forms.
They contend that not
only educational problems, but the social, economic, and political problems of
today could be solved or at least abrogated by a more precise and informed use
of language. It is this philosophy and
theory of education which most aligns with Gelernter's (2.0)"repertoire
of mental schemata" which may provide a repertoire of
solutions that provides the individual with competence to act in the
world", "as the language analogy innovation of new
ideas grows originally out of the old". This verses the existential phenomenological
experience of Husserl, Heidegger and Dewey.
Where new ideas are derived from an intimate experience "with"
existence
and not ideas "about" existence. (1.0)In Husserl's words, "to
go back to the things themselves".
"Metaphor's
role in learning architecture"
The transition from the passive non
responsible ambivalence of youth is changed to a more relevant stage in schools
of Higher Education.
Particularly architecture whose inherent content deals with teaching
people how to learn how to learn and regurgitate, reify, and create from what they have learned to others. Architectural faculty also teach these same
students how to teach. This is the new
world in which these people will reclaim their historical future.
(1.0) Ozman, H.A., and Craver, S.M., "Philosophical
Foundation of Education"
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
It is in
this intimate way that each student starts to become when he knows he is
accountable and takes responsibility for his own thoughts, actions and quality
of performance. Not only what he learns
but to the depth of that learning and to the degree that he can transfer that
to others. This is the promise of architectural
Education, Reification, metamorphosis, metaphoring,
and communication.
For example, Saudi
Arabia faces its' future with a strong
emphasis in education where people are taught to be in touch with themselves
and the perception of that experience.
What do we feel and think about space, proportion, light, dark, shade,
shadow, texture, pattern, geometry, scale, etc.
The intimate experience with these directly impact the fledgling
architect's metaphor. He
or she will always carry‑over these experiences to the new contexts of specific
users and future building types.
In Saudi
Arabia the student architect is first
discovering how to claim this experience and translate this to utility and
utilitarian contemporary building types.
To do this he looks to each context reality and the future. He can do little about the past except for
the past which he himself has experienced.
Saudi Arab history, culture and heritage can be endued into current
building types by educating young Saudi Arab architects to make this heritage a
manifest experience. In this way the new
architect will carry forward these traditions which he has experienced and make
them part of his own personal claim upon his time and place. First he must experience, know and perceive
these realities and test them against relevant contemporary needs and
necessities.
His needs and the necessities of the
twenty‑first century; what he experiences he will manifest into metaphors.Making
metaphors is an artistic skill causing linkage and seeing
relationships : applying old experience to new circumstances. Seeing parallels and
differences. Letting differences conjure
complementarity and letting complementarity conjure yet other
complementarity. One sees new solutions while applying old experiences. It is process that causes a primary
experience which contains the basis of perceiving an essence.
(2.0)One
teaches architecture in terms of other fields and thereby retrains student's metaphorical
thinking. We can ask that the design
studio utilize the lessons learned in engineering, three‑dimensional design,
history of architecture and construction.
By using the major high-credit-hour design studio to synthesize the
commonalities and differences of support causes both learner and teacher
receive information, skills and concepts to try assimilate them using a
project's program.This requires an active attitude and commitment on the part
of the student to experience and not just learn about
these subjects. It is a tensional
relationship between the various passive support courses to the active
integrative laboratory. It is only when
the student sees the reification of the support do they become relevant and by
becoming relevant induce further curiosity.
This two way characteristics where the metaphor carries‑over,
transforms and changes is no where better experienced than in architectural
education. The student's architectural experience must include for himself what
he or she designs for others; they must
learn to:
1. Claim this time (so that other may
enjoy this claim.)
2. Use (to design for users).
3. Build (so that builders can use his
drawings etc.).
4. Experience (so that users can
experience his metaphors).
5. Compose (so that others might read,
perceive and appreciate)
6. Sense (so that others may sense his
metaphor).
7. Think (to design for the thoughts
of others).(Note: all seven first letters put together from the anagram CUBEC ST
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design
innovation through design traditions"
Tradition
and the metaphor:
The instant our experiences are
reified into a metaphor and can be perceived and utilized they
become potential traditions which can be inherited, established or become
customary patterns of thought, action or behavior (as a religious practice or a
social customs). Metaphor
can be the tradition which hands down information, beliefs, and customs by word
of mouth or by example from one generation to another without written
instruction. The work of architecture
itself is endued by its' three-dimensional limits, bounds, space, factors,
organization and features with social attitudes and institutionalized
ideals. Gelernter's beliefs are those of
traditionalist who are opposed to modernism, liberalism or
radicalism. Traditionalist
are those who wish to imbue educational curriculum with traditions. They look not to the function
but to the form for its solutions to tomorrows problems. Traditions have their roots in the past.
(3.2)When we
think of the past in metaphoric terms, we find it difficult to
perceive how the reciprocal movement, the two‑way relationship of the metaphor,
could be achieved. The past is closed to
us; we cannot affect it... it is gone for ever.
Yet its' metaphor lingers on. It is for us to use,
perceive and negotiate. (3.2)Metaphors
at their best are reciprocal and a metaphor which begins with the
past cannot be a very good one.
(refer to (4.1)G.Dodds, good mimesis).
(3.2)"The
future, however, is different. We cannot
act in the future, but we can make it be.
The present may be said the condition the future, which is continually
being modified by present action and therefore, will not conform to our vision
of it which is abstract and can only embrace the possible. Typically, schools of architecture graduate
skilled and cognitive beginners who are able to work in an architectural office
and in a very short time learn how to (2.0)create sophisticated and
thoroughly detailed building designs.
Architectural educators should see themselves as part of a wider context
than limited only to the school just as the development of the individual must
look at the environment beyond the limits of the family. All and many are the influences that
conditions and educate the architect. In
our current societies, it is a combination of self‑study, schooling work‑place
and mass‑media which educate the student.
In this way the work-place and not the school become that "tradition"
while the school the phenomena which readies and prepares the student to
exploit "tradition"
(3.2) Weiss, P., "The metaphorical process"
(2.0) Gelernter, M.,"Teaching design innovation through
design traditions"
(4.1) Dodds, G., "On the place of Architectural Speculation"
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| Remnant of Christians in Eastern Province |
Teaching
the technique of making architectural metaphors in the
twenty-first century prepares students to both take a stand as a sovereign
professional architect while being able to adopt to new roles and demands of
the economic, political and commercial environments. One which can be characterized as metaphoric,
metamorphic, multi-lingual, multi and inter-national. Like the metaphor it includes,
adapts, and welcomes aliens. Aliens and
family transform and modify each other.
The proposed architect is the one who not only experiences all these
things but interprets them into a three-dimensional habitable environment. One which is composed by limits and
boundaries and yet is in metaphor with its' context.
Bibliographic
references:
1.0. Howard A.
Ozman, and Samuel M.Craver, "Philosophical Foundations of
education", (2nd ed.), Charles E.Merril (1981)
2.0. Mark
Gelernter (School of Architecture University of Colarodo Denver ) "Teaching
design Innovation through Design Tradition", Proceedings of the
1988, Seventy-sixth Annual meeting of the Association of the Collegiate Schools
of Architecture (ACSA)
3.0. "Main
currents in Modern thought" Sept‑Oct 1971 Vol. 28, # 1; Journal of
the Center for Intergrative Education.
3.1. William J.Gordon, "The
metaphorical way of knowing"
3.2. Paul Weiss, "The metaphorical
process"
4.0. Journal
of Architectural Education, Nov.1992, Vol.46, No.2, Journal of the Association
of the Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA).
4.1. George Dodds, "On the Place of
Architectural Speculation"
5.0. M.
Seuphor (1972 ? n.d.) "Piet Mondrian, Life and Work". H.N. Abrams Inc. New York . Abdulaziz Al‑Saati, "Mondrian: Neo‑Plasticism
and its influences in Architecture" :
6.0. Mehdi
Nakosteen, "The history and philosophy of education". Ronald
Press, New York
(1965).
 |
| Minaret and mosque in oasis |
Barie Fez-Barringten; Associate professor Global University
1. "Architecture the making of metaphors"
©
Main Currents in Modern Thought/Center for
Integrative Education; Sep.-Oct. 1971, Vol. 28 No.1, New Rochelle, New York.
2."Schools and metaphors"
Main Currents in Modern Thought/Center for
Integrative Education Sep.-Oct. 1971, Vol. 28 No.1, New Rochelle, New York.
3."User's metametaphoric phenomena of
architecture and Music":
“METU” (Middle East Technical
University: Ankara, Turkey): May 1995"
Journal of the
Faculty of Architecture
4."Metametaphors and Mondrian:
Neo-plasticism and its' influences
in architecture" 1993 Available on Academia.edu since 2008
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North Cypress, Turkish University. December, 1997
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7."The basis of the metaphor of
Arabia" Unpublished,
1994
8."The conditions of Arabia in
metaphor" Unpublished, 1994
9. "The metametaphor theorem"
Architectural
Scientific Journal, Vol. No. 8; 1994 Beirut Arab University.
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11."The context of Arabia in metaphor" Unpublished, 1995
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“Architecture: University of
Technology in Datutop; February 1995 Finland
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metaphor"
“International Journal for Housing
Science and its applications” Coral Gables, Florida.1993
14."Multi-dimensional metaphoric
thinking"
15."Teaching the techniques of making
architectural metaphors in the twenty-first century.” Journal of King Abdul Aziz University Engg...Sciences; Jeddah: Code:
BAR/223/0615:OCT.2.1421 H. 12TH
EDITION; VOL. I and
“Transactions” of
Cardiff University, UK. April 2010
16. “Word Gram #9” Permafrost: Vol.31 Summer 2009 University of Alaska Fairbanks;
ISSN: 0740-7890; page 197
17. "Metaphors
and Architecture."© ArchNet.org. October, 2009.at MIT
18. “Metaphor as an
inference from sign”;© University of Syracuse
Journal of Enterprise
Architecture; November 2009: and nomnated architect of the year in speical
issue of Journal of Enterprise Architecture.Explainging the unique
relationship between enterprise and classic building architecture.
19. “Framing the art
vs. architecture argument”; Brunel University (West London); BST: Vol. 9
no. 1: Body, Space & Technology Journal:
Perspectives Section
20. “Urban Passion”:
October 2010; Reconstruction &
“Creation”; June 2010; by C. Fez-Barringten;
http://reconstruction.eserver.org/;
21. “An architectural
history of metaphors”: ©AI & Society: (Journal of human-centered and
machine intelligence) Journal of Knowledge, Culture and Communication: Pub:
Springer; London; AI & Society located in University of Brighton, UK;
AI & Society. ISSN
(Print) 1435-5655 - ISSN (Online) 0951-5666 : Published by Springer-Verlag;; 6 May 2010 http://www.springerlink.com/content/j2632623064r5ljk/
Paper copy: AIS Vol. 26.1. Feb. 2011; Online ISSN 1435-5655; Print ISSN
0951-5666;
DOI 10.1007/s00146-010-0280-8; :
Volume 26, Issue 1 (2011), Page
103.
22. “Does
Architecture Create Metaphors?; G.Malek; Cambridge; August 8,2009
Pgs 3-12 (4/24/2010)
23. “Imagery or
Imagination”:the role of metaphor in architecture:Ami Ran (based on
Architecture:the making of metaphors); :and Illustration:”A Metaphor of
Passion”:Architecture oif Israel 82.AI;August2010pgs.83-87.
24. “The soverign
built metaphor” © monograph converted to Power Point for presentation to
Southwest Florida Chapter of the American Institute of Architects. 2011
25.“Architecture:the
making of metaphors”©The Book;
Cambridge
Scholars Publishing
Published:
Feb 2012
12 Back Chapman Street
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE6 2XX
United Kingdom
12 Back Chapman Street
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE6 2XX
United Kingdom
Edited
by
Edward
Richard Hart,
0/2 249 Bearsden Road
Glasgow
G13 1DH
UK
Lecture:
 |
| Shamal approaching Riyadh |
Architecture:the making of metaphors, metaphor, metaphoric theorem and metaphors, Teaching, Techniques,Barie Fez-Barringten,bridge, education, Architectural Education
