More on big things: building events and feelings

Rose, Gillian; Degen, Monica and Basdas, Begum (2010). More on big things: building events and feelings. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 35(3), pp. 334–349.

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DOI (Digital Object Identifier) Link:	http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.1111/j.1475-5661.2010.00388.x
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Abstract

This paper begins by reviewing a range of recent work by geographers conceptualising buildings less as solid objects and more as performances. Buildings, it is argued, are not given but produced, as various materials are held together in specific assemblages by work of various kinds. This has led to a range of studies looking at the diverse sorts of work that make buildings cohere: the political institutions they are embedded in, the material affordances of their non-human components, the discourses surrounding particular kinds of buildings, and, in particular, the experiencing of buildings by their human inhabitants, users and visitors. However, this experiencing has been poorly theorised. Those geographers inspired by actor network approaches to buildings acknowledge human experiences, but in very limited ways; while those geographers inspired more by affect theory evoke the 'feelings' that buildings may provoke but evacuate human subjectivity from their accounts of buildings' performances. Through a case study of two buildings, this paper argues that both approaches are flawed in their uninterest in the human, and proposes that more attention be paid to (at least) three aspects of human feeling: the feel of buildings, feelings in buildings, and feelings about buildings.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Copyright Holders:	2010 The Authors
ISSN:	0020-2754
Keywords:	Milton Keynes; walk-alongs; architecture; affect; experience; practice
Academic Unit/Department:	Social Sciences Social Sciences > Geography
Interdisciplinary Research Centre:	OpenSpace Research Centre (OSRC) Centre for Citizenship, Identities and Governance (CCIG)
Item ID:	22495
Depositing User:	Gillian Rose
Date Deposited:	30 Jul 2010 15:22
Last Modified:	31 Oct 2012 21:26
URI:	http://oro.open.ac.uk/id/eprint/22495

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