ARCH 251 Architectural History 2

Global Architecture Urban History in the Modern Era

Course  Description

What are the processes which have shaped cities in the past century? How have architects responded? Our departure point is David Harvey’s statement that "to claim some kind of shaping power over the process of urbanization...To understand how we can share that shaping power, we need to understand how cities are made and remade." Six modules are organized chronologically; the topic of each is coupled with focus on certain cities, which have been studied as representative of the process discussed (e.g. Chicago for industrial modernity) and introduces a select number of architects whose works are illustrative of the module theme.

Winter 2015

Ipek Tureli

M 2:35-4:25

F 3:30-­‐5:30 pm

Room 207

  • Module 1 - Industrialization  and  Urbanization

    Keywords: Modernization; modernity  as  experience  of  modernization; modernism as the cultural expression of modernity; urban and social reform; new building types

    Architects in focus:

    Frederick Law Olmsted, Daniel Burnham

    Films:

    Olmsted and America's Urban Parks (2011) by Rebecca Messner

    New York: A Documentary Film by Ric Burns. Episode Two: Order and  Disorder (1825–1865); Episode Three: Sunshine and Shadow (1865–1898); Episode Four: The Power and the People (1898–1918)

    People's Palaces -­ The Golden Age of Civic Architecture: Neo Classical, Gothic (2010) by BBC

    Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927) by F.W. Murnau

    Berlin: Symphony of a Big City (1927) by Walter Ruttmann

    Required  readings:

    Olmsted, Frederick Law. "Public Parks and the Enlargement of Towns (1870)." In The City Reader,   Richard T. Le Gates and Frederic Stout, eds, 337-344. London; New York: Routledge, 2002. (Extract from Public Parks and Enlargement of Towns. Cambridge, Mass: Riverside Press, 1970)

    Howard, Ebenezer. "The Three Magnets (1898)." In The Sustainable Urban Development Reader, In Stephen M. Wheeler and Timothy Beatley, eds, 11-­‐14. London; New York: Routledge, 2004. (Extract from Garden Cities of To-­‐morrow. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1965.)

    Recommended  readings:

    Cronon, William. "Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West." In The Blackwell City Reader, Gary Bridge and Sophie Watson, eds, 171‐182.  Malden: Blackwell, 2002.  (Extract from Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1991.)

    Girouard, Mark. "America and the Birth of Skyscraper,"and "Paris and the Boulevards."  In Cities & People: A Social and Architectural History, 301‐324, 285-­‐300. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985.

    Hall, Peter. "The City of Dreadful Night." In Cities of Tomorrow: An Intellectual History of Urban Planning and Design in the Twentieth Century, 14-­46. Oxford, Malden: Blackwell Publishers, 2002.

    Baudelaire, Charles. “The Eyes of the Poor,” In The Parisian Prowler: Le Spleen De Paris, Petits Poèmes En Prose, 60‐61. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1989.

    Benjamin, Walter. “Paris, the Capital of the Nineteenth Century.” In The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media, edited by Michael W. Jennings, Brigid Doherty and Thomas Y. Levin, 96‐109. Cambridge, Mass; London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008.

    Berman, Marshall. “Preface” and excerpts from “Baudelaire: Modernism in the Streets” and “Petersburg: The Modernism of Underdevelopment” in All that is Solid Melts into Air: The Experience of Modernity, 5-­12, 148-­155, 173-176, 219-­232. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982

  • Module 2 - Empire and the City

    Keywords: Colonial urbanism & architecture; architectural translations; hybrid forms

    Architects in Focus: Edwin Lutyens, Le Corbusier

    Films:

    Make No Little Plans: Daniel Burnham and the American City (2009) by The Archimedia Workshop

    Women and Architecture: Public Space, Public Work (1991). View part on Julia Morgan (1872-­‐ 1957)

    Sir Edwin Lutyens: Architect of the British Empire (2010) by Brad Day

    Eddie Taylor The Battle of Algiers (1966) by Gillo Pontecorvo

    Required  Readings:

    Lutyens, Edwin. "April-­‐June 1912." In The Letters of Edwin Lutyens to his Wife Lady Emily, Clayre Percy, Jane Ridley, eds, 227‐253. London: Collins, 1985.

    Le Corbusier. "Towards a New Architecture: Guiding Principles." In Programs and Manifestoes on 20th Century Architecture, Ulrich Conrads, ed, 59­‐62. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1970. (Le Corbusier and Etchells Frederick. Towards a New Architecture.  London: Architectural Press, 1946.)

    -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐. "Principles of Town Planning ." In Programs and Manifestoes on 20th Century Architecture, Ulrich Conrads, ed, 89-­‐94. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1970. (Le Corbusier. "Principles of Town Planning ." In Collection de l’Esprit Nouveau. 1925)

    Recommended  Readings:

    Çelik, Zeynep. "Le Corbusier, Orientalism, Colonialism." Assemblage, No.17, 1992: 58-­77.

    Mitchell, Timothy. "Egypt at the Exhibition." In Colonizing Egypt, 1-­32. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

    Ridley, Jane. "Edwin Lutyens, New Delhi, and the Architecture of Imperialism." The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, Vol. 26, No. 2, 1998: 67‐83.

    Bhabha, Homi K. “Signs Taken for Wonders: Questions of Ambivalence and Authority under a Tree Outside Delhi, May 1817.” In The Location of Culture, 102-­113 (an excerpt from the chapter). London; New York: Routledge, 1994.

    Roy, Ananya. “Traditions of the Modern: A Corrupt View.” Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review

    12, no. 2 (2001): 7-­19.

  • Module 3 - Nation State and the City

    Keywords: Nationalism; planning of capital cities; architectural modernism

    Architects in focus: Oscar Niemeyer, Constantinos Doxiadis

    Films:

    Brasilia—A Utopia of Modernity (2007) by Christoph Schaub

    My Architect (2003) by Nathaniel Kahn

    The Dessau Bauhaus (2001) by Frédéric Compain

    Eileen Gray: Designer and Architect (2007) by Jörg Bundschuh

    Required  Readings:

    Doxiadis, Constantinos. "Ecumenopolis, World City of Tomorrow." In The City Reader, Richard T. Le  Gates and Frederic Stout, eds, 458‐467. London; New York: Routledge, 2002. (Original publication Doxiadis, Constantinos. Ecumenopolis: Tomorrow's City. 1968 Britannica Book of the Year, University of Chicago. Chicago: 1968, 16‐38.)

    -­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐-­‐. "Islamabad: The Creation of a New Capital." The Town Planning Review 36, no.1 (1965): 28-­38. Kahn, Louis. "Monumentality," and "The Nature of Nature." In Twombly, Robert, ed. Louis Kahn

    Essential Texts, 21-­30, 119-­122. New York: W. W. Norton, 2003.

    Recommended  Readings:

    Vale, Lawrence J. “Capital and Capitol: An Introduction.” In Architecture, Power, and National Identity, 3-­16 (an excerpt from the introduction chapter). New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.

    Anderson, Benedict. “Introduction” and “Cultural Roots” in Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, 11-­40. London: Verso, 1991 edition.

    Bozdoğan, Sibel. “Inkilap Mimarisi: Architecture of Revolution.” In Modernism and Nation Building:

    Turkish Architectural Culture in the Early Republic, 56-­105. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2001.

    Mahsud, Ahmed Zaib K. “Representing the State: Symbolism and Ideology in Doxiadis´ Plan for Islamabad.” In The Politics of Making: Theory, Practice, Product, edited by Mark Swenarton, 61-­75. London and New York: Routledge, 2007.

  • Module 4 - Divided Cities and Reconstruction

    Keywords: Spatial segregation by income status, race, ethnicity, religion; slums; reunification and rebuilding after wars and disasters; memorials and museums

    Architects in focus: Norman Foster, Daniel Libeskind

    Films:

    New York: A Documentary Film by Ric Burns. Episode Seven: The City and the World (1945-­‐2000)

    The Pruitt-­‐Igoe Myth: An Urban History (2011) by Chad Friedrichs

    La Haine (1995) by Mathieu Kassovitz

    Bombay: Our City (1985) by Anand Patwardhan

    City of God (2002) by Fernando Meirelles, Kátia Lund Megacities (2006) by Films for the Humanities. On Sao Paulo. Jerusalem: East Side Story (2007) by Mohammed Alatar

    Required   Readings:

    “Hendrik Verwoerd explains apartheid (1950),” In Africa and the West: From Colonialism to  Independence, 1875 to the present, edited by William H. Worger, Nancy L. Clark, Edward A. Alpers, 101-­‐106. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.

    Foster, Norman. "Introduction." In Rebuilding the Reichstag, 11-­36. Woodstock: Overlook Press, 2000.

    Recommended  Readings:

    Kate Bristol, “The Pruitt-­‐Igoe. Myth,” Journal of Architectural Education 44 (May 1991): 163-­171.

    Kostof, Spiro. "Disasters and Their Aftermaths." In The City Assembled: The Elements of Urban Form Through History, 251-­305. Boston: Little; Brown, 1992.

    Walkers, Peter. “Apartheid politics and architecture in South Africa.” Social Identities 10, no. 4 (2004): 537-­547.

    Sarkis, Hashim. “A Vital Void: Reconstructions of Downtown Beirut.” In Two Squares: Martyrs Square Downtown Beirut and Sirkeci Square, Istanbul, Hashim Sarkis, Mark Dwyer and Pars Kibarer, eds, 10-­23. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Design School and Aga Khan Program, 2006.

  • Module 5 - Post-­Industrial City

    Keywords: Neoliberalism; global cities; mega-­‐events; tourist landscapes; repurposing of industrial areas and abandoned infrastructures

    Architects in focus: Frank Gehry; Herzog & de Meuron

    Films:

    Roger and Me (1989) by Michael Moore. On Flint Michigan, shows impact of deindustrialization. The World (2004) by Jia Zhangke.

    On migrant workers at a theme park in a fast developing Beijing. Bird's Nest:­

    Herzog & De Meuron in China (2008) by Christoph Schaub, Michael Schindhelm "Baukunst" Bilbao Guggenheim Museum (2005) by Julien Donada

    England Swings: Discontent in London Over the 2012 Olympics (2012)

    Diller Scofidio + Renfro: Reimagining Lincoln Center and the High Line (2012) by Muffie Dunn & Tom Piper

    How much does your building weigh, Mr. Foster? (2010) by Carlos Carcas, Norberto López Amado

    Required  Readings:

    Gehry, Frank. “From Shiva to Disney: Frozen Motion.” New Perspectives Quarterly 21, no. 1 (2004): 5-­11.

    Herzog, Jacques. “Herzog on Building Beijing's Olympic Stadium: 'Only an Idiot Would Have Said No'.”

    Spiegel Online. July 30, 2008. http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/herzog-on-building-beijing-s-olympic-stadium-only-an-idiot-would-have-said-no-a-569011.html

    Recommended  Readings:

    Harvey, David. “From Managerialism to Entrepreneurialism: The Transformation in Urban Governance in Late Capitalism.” Geografiska Annaler. Series B, Human Geography 71, no. 1 (1989): 3-­17.

    Brenner, N. and Theodore, N. “Cities and the Geographies of ‘Actually Existing Neoliberalism’.” Antipode

    34, no. 3 (2002): 349–379.

    Neil Smith, “New Globalism, New Urbanism: Gentrification as Global Urban Strategy.’ Antipode 34, no. 3 (2002): 427-450.

    Alsayyad, Nezar, and Roy, Ananya. “Medieval Modernity: On Citizenship and Urbanism in a Global Era.”

    Space and Polity 10, no. 1 (April 2006): 1-­20.

    Davis, Mike. “Chapter 4: Fortress L.A.” In City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles, 223-­263.

    London, New York: Verso, 1990.

    Davis, Mike. “Sand, Fear, and Money in Dubai.” In Evil Paradises: Dream Worlds of Neoliberalism, edited by Mike Davis and Daniel Bertrand Monk, 48-­68. New York: New Press: Distributed by W.W. Norton & Co., 2007.

    Broudehoux, Anne-­‐Marie. “Spectacular Beijing: The Conspicuous Construction of an Olympic Metropolis.” Journal of Urban Affairs 29, no. 4 (2007): 383-­399.

    Türeli, Ipek. “Modeling Citizenship in Turkey’s Miniature Park.” Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review 17, no. 11 (2006): 55-­69.

  • Module 6 -The Just City

    Keywords: Global warming; ecological footprint; scarcity of resources; disaster response; social and spatial justice as concerns for architects

    Architects in focus: Teddy Cruz, Architecture for Humanity

    Films:

    Citizen Architect: Samuel Mockbee and the spirit of the Rural Studio (2010) by Sam Wainwright Douglas

    Shigeru Ban: an Architect for Emergencies (2006) by Michel Quinejure

    Urbanized (2011) by Gary Hustwit

    Waste = Food (2006) by Rob van Hattum

    Rebel Architecture (2014) by Ana Naomi de Sousa

    Required  Readings:

    Cruz, Teddy. "Tijuana Case Study Tactics of Invasion: Manufactured Sites." Architectural Design, 75, no. 5 (2005): 32-­37.

    Tureli, Ipek. "‘Small’ Architectures, Walking and Camping in Middle Eastern Cities." International Journal of Islamic Architecture 2, No. 1 (2013): 5-­38

term  

instructor

lectures           

location

At McGill University School of Architecture