do you remember why did ethnological and anthropological studies started anyway?
hi janez, thanks for searching that out quote out
of the archive. i found the book after hunting for
it in my archive boxes. some quotes on the section
The Arab World will follow if i am able to type it
out before my carpal tunnel hands give way...
fascinating questions. i know a bit about the
archaeological, yet did some searching online and
offline only to remember more about these areas.
there is some overlap in posts/ideas here, so i
will only mention that it relates to ideas of
archaeology and history and architecture that
i was going to bring up in another response...
issues of 'culture' are paramount here too, and
most everything revolves around this idea, if it
is architecture, war, psychology, technology...
culture
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture
in any case, upon reading about anthropology (in
a great book, A Dictionary of the Social Sciences,
published by the .UN, the free press, c.1964) it
was stated that in the .US that archaeology is
a subset of this study, which i'd forgotten yet
it makes total sense as to how things relate or
do not relate to one another in the culture...
Anthropology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropology
Archaeology
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeology
archaeology has a lot to offer architecture in
terms of understanding material culture and ways
of relating ideas, past present and future. in
the middle east it seems people live more in this
present, where it is a historical understanding of
the present or a historical identification with
a place in an eternal and historical present, or
something that is totally unlike the .US which
is almost amnesic in its total disregard for a
larger historical connection in daily living.
this is changing and art and architecture are
areas of culture which intersect with this view
and approach to understanding cultural patterns.
the origin of archaeology as taught in history
classes for architecture, is french enlightenment
and the age of reason, to understand a relation
to the past, the classical origins and mythic
origin stories, and how to relate to such ideas.
the architects were nearly archaeologists with
respect to the role of ancient artifacts and a
new (future) view of the world, relationships,
designed in some harmony of cultural awareness.
Sir John Soane http://www.soane.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Soane
this is not just a western view, it is universal
as a situation/condition yet how it is resolved
or ignored is telling. in the .US there is no
past. some places there is only a past, and no
future. ideas are chained to ideologies which
all but insure this to be the only way to live,
i.e. ~ a lifestyle that will never change, etc.
Lifestyle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lifestyle
(that lifestyles are branded commercialized events
in the control of automated business forces is even
more telling as to a predictable, ultimate outcome.)
so the 18th century is, in my estimate, where a
lot of today's architectural ideas are stuck in
how they relate to cultural patterns, the past
present future and how they are related together
or not (modernism dismisses the past as a blank
slate upon which to bulldoze and rebuild anew,
there is no memory, no history, just land and
nature to be exploited for pure economic profit).
it is equivalent to a type of commercial communism
in which 'lifestyle' defines culture, by forces
that have harnessed culture yet are apart from
its genesis, origins, questions, values. and as
such is a misrepresentation of the values, goals,
aims, truth, beauty, a culture is to represent.
it is instead the commodification of culture as
a means for business to pursue vastly other ends.
in the name of culture, today, there is unending war.
in the name of culture, today, there is no change.
in the name of culture, today, there is no world.
etc. etc. etc.
apparently the study of humanity, arose from the
same era as archaeology. (the WTC memorial images
directly reference ideas of this era, in our day.)
this all amounts to what is cultural illiteracy.
here are some Edward T. Hall resources i located:
Edward T. Hall
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_T._Hall
[haven't read this though it looks worthwhile...]
The Grip of Culture: Edward T. Hall (.pdf)
http://www.ishkbooks.com/hall.pdf
my thoughts are all over the place as there are
so many threads/patterns overlapping in exchanges
which is great yet hard to cohere into coherent
threads so this is a sampling of some aspects...
brian