David
Thanks for this delightful discussion. My point with my
initial post here was indeed sanguine about the need to be heard by people out
there. I’m addressing exactly the reasons why so many feel they can afford to
ignore contributions of configurational theories – analytical approaches that
have been showing space as an active feature in social life and
experience. Even most importantly, I’m wondering about how we can make concepts
able to bring to the forefront this lively presence of space, emanating from
its very structure, known and able to make a difference.
It seems to me that we may do so in many ways.
One of them is increasing the potential of contribution of a theory; a
second one is reassuring its longevity.
This second problem – the continuity of a theory –
relates to a number of things. A theory shows clear signs of vitality if its
achievements are absorbed by those working in the field (and I mean here the
field of urban studies, or however we call it), and if there are evident
efforts to expand it and connect it to other substantive problems and
theories. I speak in general terms here. If a theory remains adamant,
untouched, that may be a sign it is simply not evolving. If it does not
expand itself to include other problems, allow connections to other theories or
allow new insights inside itself, well, those may be signs that it's found
restrictions in its own framework, or its practitioners found restrictions in
it. (Your work interestingly expands space syntax to the phenomenological
position of the body in space, and that illustrates my point. We need more
expansions like this).
In order to expansions of a spatial theory come
into being, especially considering an internally cohesive theory like space
syntax, there are some possibilities: one is to deal with the concept of
syntactic space in order to render it ready for connections to other
substantive problems and theoretical approaches. Another way is addressing and
proposing changes to core concepts (such as that of space) that would more
easily allow the expansion of its object domain. That demands some level of
“deconstruction” of the theory itself – and a form of active positioning of a
researcher regarding the theory or theories, in order to reach problems and explanations
beyond its current domain (but then we would need to acknowledge that theories
do have object domains which go hand in hand with their epistemological
limits).
Those are also forms of increasing the potential to
contribution – and, furthermore, increasing communication between different
approaches! (One of the most extraordinary problems we face is the fact that
urban researchers from different backgrounds simply do not understand one
another. I mean a deep misunderstanding, an inability to read the epistemological
premises behind another position. This is both fascinating and worrying.)
So it seems to me that contribution is about not
being conservative about your own theory. Once you become conservative about
your theory, you contribute less than you could.
The connection with phenomenology that you propose
(I’m not familiar with your work, David, my apologies, I promise to study it) is
surprising to me! And it makes sense, in the terms you frame this relation. That
is the kind of thing I’m suggesting here. Let me quickly discuss it to
illustrate the need for further work. One may indeed connect the syntactic
concept of space to phenomenology in order to show that such a conception of
space, stripped bare of all other layers of human/social constructions, reaches
some kind of ultimate level of the experience of space – an experience of space
non-mediated by concepts – and thus an ‘ultimate space.’ That’ is a nice
insight indeed (and I'm not attempting to reduce any idea or claim it that these words are yours). However, we could not equalize this "ultimate space" with the
truth about space, or with a “true space” and even less so as the "only space", the space that matters (and of course you’re not doing that). For humans relate to space more than
through the ultimate senses of physicality and corporeality and all that they
imply. What I meant when I mentioned Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty relates to the
fact that, beyond ideas of “being with” or “being-alongside” places and spaces,
the former allows the possibility of relating to the hermeneutic dimension of
experience. Space plays a role there too. We are immersed in thoughts, in
interpretation, in meanings, and in communication. And all those ontological
properties and possibilities are right there, pulsing in space itself. How nice
it would be to uncover them. And do so not forgetting the strength of the
physical materiality of space. So we still have a lot to do… Doing that
may be a way of making our active concepts of space actually known in other
approaches.
Vini
_________________________________________
Vinicius M. Netto
Núcleo de Estudos e Projetos Habitacionais e Urbanos (NEPHU)
Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF)
Rua Almirante Teffé 637
24030-080 Niterói - Rio de Janeiro
Fone: +55 (21) 9727-1512
Visite www.urbanismo.arq.br
________________________________
From: David Seamon <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Tue, 25 May, 2010 13:47:30
Subject: [SPACESYNTAX] more sanguine than I?
Vini,
You are much more sanguine than I am regarding the
possibility that other modes of space/society interpretation will open
themselves to space syntax. Look at some of the recent texts in urban design—for
example Carmona et al.’s PUBLIC PLACES, URBAN SPACES (2003), which at
least in the States is a well-used intro text. These authors mention space
syntax only once, and that in passing! And this is one of the best overviews
currently in terms of urban design! Or take Michael Southworth’s fine
book on the history of street design—not one mention of space syntax! Or
attend an annual EDRAmeeting and discover very little
interest in space syntax work, other than a few explict space-syntax
researchers organizing special sessions.
Part of the dilemma, I think, is the fact that too many
researchers see space syntax as a new kind of environmental determinism. As a
phenomenologist, I find that concern laughable. To me, space syntax is a
radical new way of seeing the people/place relationship because it provides a
way of seeing that gets beyond the conventional objectivist/subjectivist
lenses. True, most of the space syntax work so far has been analytic (Laura
Vaughn’s wonderful work is one exception) and is thus more toward the “objectivist”
side. But, as I have argued in earlier posts and in my keynote address at the 2007 Istanbulspace syntax conference, there is a place for
phenomenological investigation, esp. in-depth descriptive studies of the sorts
of place-based lifeworlds indicated by the various space syntax measures and
cartographic representations (what, for example, is the daily lifeworld like of
the most integrated pathways in a particular neighborhood or town? This topic
cries out for a film version!).
In short, I welcome the new space syntax journal and wish it
gobs and gobs of success. Let it be a beacon to “convert”
outsiders. But as far as bringing space syntax to other styles of conceiving
and analyzing, I am much more doubtful than you because space syntax is so
radically different in the way it holds people/world together through space and
place—in short, it identifies one dimension of Heidegger’s
being-in-the-world as well as Merleau-Ponty’s body-subject and
environmental embodiment as extending invisibly into lived space and time and helping
foster (or not) robust places.
David Seamon
Dr. David Seamon
Architecture Department, KansasState
University
211 Seaton Hall
Manhattan, KS66506-2901
785-532-1121
[log in to unmask]
www.arch.ksu.edu/seamon/
