The social meaning of domestic space : notes on a suitable research methodology for southern African architectural studies

Mills, Glen Trevor

The social meaning of domestic space : notes on a suitable research methodology for southern African architectural studies

Doctoral Thesis

1986

Abstract

The thesis is primarily a proposal for a research methodology. Its concern is with the analysis of southern African domestic architecture, which, it is argued, has become separated from the study of social systems and human behaviour. It is suggested that architectural research needs to be grounded in a coherent theoretical framework of a sociological nature if the meaning of buildings in society is to be adequately understood. By combing Bill Hillier et al.' s theory of ' space syntax' with Anthony Giddens ' theory of ' structuration' , a set of concepts and techniques for the study of domestic architecture is formulated. This model is demonstrated using two dwellings in the Cape Town metropolitan area. The emphasis throughout is with understanding systematically how spatial design is integrated with the wider aspects of domestic social life. To reach this understanding, a major theme in southern African architectural studies is examined. This relates to a persistent categorisation, based on formal and functional criteria, of African architecture as 'traditional' , against which is counterposed the more modern or 'designed' architecture of western cultures. As such, two approaches to the study of African architecture on the sub-continent are identified. On the one hand there are those writings that study aspects of built form by focusing on stylistic and technological details. On the other, the emphasis is on the function of buildings, focusing mostly on the non-physical principles of social organisation. Both approaches have as their objective the explication of the social meaning of built form, and each generally excludes the subject and approach of the other. The view adopted in this investigation is that each form of analysis on its own is inadequate. Theories of form and theories of function must, it is argued, necessarily incorporate each other if a rounded and systematic analysis of meaning is to take place. The problem for research is thus one of establishing an adequate methodological basis for understanding in theory that which is materially realised in built form already, namely the integration of society and space. The concern ill this dissertation is consequently with an attempt to answer two seemingly simple questions: How do buildings affect behaviour and activity patterns? and, how do interactions among people affect the form of buildings? By integrating the methodological and descriptive procedures in space syntax with the interpretive framework for social system analysis in structuration theory, an attempt is made to provide sane answers to these questions and thereby to contribute towards a non-functionalist theory of architecture. The conclusions are firstly that the pervasive distinction between 'traditional' and 'modern' architecture is unnecessary and misleading. Secondly, theoretical aspects of both syntax and structuration are identified that may be useful to the development of both.