EPHEMERAL HISTORIES (ARCHITECTURE & THE CONSTRUCTION SITE)

What is the history of the construction site? The paradox of the construction site lies in the fact that, although the construction site is inescapably essential to the realization of architecture, it must be ephemeral, superseded by the durable forms of the completed building. Such traces that remain, in documents, photographs, or physical marks upon the building, have been of passing interest to architectural history for the information they reveal about the realized object, but the construction site itself—as a place, as an event, as a design—has largely been ignored by an architectural history and theory not inclined toward ephemerality.

This seminar will address the construction site with rigorous historical interpretation and methodological experimentation. Readings and discussions will develop a knowledge of the construction site as a point of organization, material transformation, and intellectual and physical work. These approaches will pursue questions such as the valuation of tools and techniques, the legal armature of contracts and regulations, the social conventions of race, class, and gender, and the cultural appraisal of work and craft. The goal of the seminar will be to develop prototypical approaches to the history of the construction site that explore the possibilities of ephemeral history. Students will carry out detailed and speculative research into selected construction sites; and will use that research in digital mediums of text, sound, and image to model ephemeral histories that expand the historical accounting of a construction site to include information extending from wages to weather reports.

The class is open to doctoral and masters degree students. Enrollment will be limited to 12.

General study of modern architecture as a response to important technological, cultural, environmental, aesthetic, and theoretical challenges after the European Enlightenment. Focus on the theoretical, historiographic, and design approaches to architectural problems encountered in the age of industrial and post-industrial expansion across the globe, with specific attention to the dominance of European modernism in setting the agenda for the discourse of a global modernity at large. Explores modern architectural history through thematic exposition rather than as simple chronological succession of ideas.

The 1970s were the decade when the world fell out of that infantile affliction called modernity and grew into the recognition that it wouldn’t end well.

Bitches’ Brew (the uncool Miles),  real estate barons, Brian Eno, Apocalypse Now, Charles Jencks, Rem Koolhaas, postmodernism, feminism, cyborgs, global consultancies, reflexivity, intertextuality, Carlos the Jackal, Badal Sircar and Third Theatre, Talking Heads, Deng Xiaoping, Business Improvement Districts (BIDs), class action suits, Jesus Christ Superstar, Francis Ford Coppola, Jacques Derrida, trees with standing, Khomeini, Maggie Thatcher, Steve Biko, dollarization, Watergate, queer rights, OPEC crisis, Blade Runner, Earth Day, Weather Report, Yom Kippur War, Pink Floyd, Cultural Revolution, Minimoogs, environment, Vietnam,  Ebola, Apple, Third Cinema, Brian Eno, Pruitt-Igoe, R. D. Burman, Giorno Poetry Systems, Amitabh Bachchan, Punk, Pruitt-Igoe, New Waves (Western pop, Indian film), Cindy Sherman, Transfer of Development Rights (TDRs), Disco, Ant Farm, Star Wars, Sholay, Bruce Lee, Wim Wenders, A Pattern Language,  Milos Forman, Deep Throat, Taxi Driver, the Indian Emergency, Fela Kuti and Africa ’70, Shakti, ethnic studies, The Rumble in the Jungle, Whole Earth Catalog, Transnational Corporations, The School of London, Special Economic Zones, CBDs, Gay Sweatshop, Black Arts Movement, Led Zeppelin, Theatre of the Oppressed, Peter Brooke, the Latin American Boom, Salvador Allende, Angela Davis, Artificial Intelligence, supercomputers, World Trade Center, Apple, regionalism, appropriate technologies, “community”, Small is Beautiful, mega-projects, Foucault and Power, the “modes of production” debates, gritty realism, Blaxploitation, Ritwik Ghatak, Groupe Dziga Vertov, you tell me…  

We will watch, listen, read, analyze, and try to see if it all made sense. or not. (accompanied by film series, and vinyl records.)

Note for MArch students: Serves as a HTC Non-Restricted OR Restricted Elective

4.605 Undergraduate | 4.650 Graduate

Provides an outline of the history of architecture and urbanism from ancient times to the early modern period. Analyzes buildings as the products of culture and in relation to the special problems of architectural design. Stresses the geopolitical context of buildings and in the process familiarizes students with buildings, sites and cities from around the world.

Additional work required of graduate students.

MIT Certificate Protected Syllabus

Required for doctoral students in HTC as a prerequisite for work on the doctoral dissertation. Prior to candidacy, doctoral students are required to write and orally defend a proposal laying out the scope of their thesis, its significance, a survey of existing research and literature, the methods of research to be adopted, a bibliography and plan of work. Work is done in consultation with HTC Faculty, in accordance with the HTC PhD Degree Program guidelines.

Required of doctoral students in HTC as a prerequisite for work on the doctoral dissertation. The Minor Exam focuses on a specific area of specialization through which the student might develop their particular zone of expertise. Work is done in consultation with HTC faculty, in accordance with the HTC PhD Degree Program Guidelines.

Required of doctoral students in HTC as a prerequisite for work on the doctoral dissertation. The Major Exam covers a historically broad area of interest and includes components of history, historiography, and theory. Preparation for the exam will focus on four or five themes agreed upon in advance by the student and the examiner, and are defined by their area of teaching interest. Work is done in consultation with HTC faculty, in accordance with the HTC PhD Degree Program Guidelines.