ABSTRACT
For Bourdieu, built space and architectural mentalities are allied carriers of meaning that are set within a larger system of shared codes and determining forces. One of the most influential statements in support of a 'structuralist' approach to architecture was drawn up by Aldo van Eyck for the International Congress of Architects in Otterlo in 1959, an event that is seen to mark the emergence of major changes within European architecture of the 1960s. Rossi's approach to architecture and the city embodies the idea that type has a historical and an immediate form. The urban space, or artefact, exists as a type. Rossi's Venice-Dubrovnik 'experiment' might have been set to test the idea that some common meanings have a specific sphere of influence in terms of memory, time, and space. Post-modern architectural mentalities place an emphasis on meaning, but as tailored systems of logic that restrict how meanings are defined.
