ABSTRACT
Socially engaged architecture is a broad and emerging architectural genre that promises to redefine architecture from a market-driven profession to a mix of social business, altruism, and activism that intends to eradicate poverty, resolve social exclusion, and construct an egalitarian global society. The Routledge Companion to Architecture and Social Engagement offers a critical enquiry of socially engaged architecture’s current context characterized by socio-economic inequity, climate change, war, increasing global poverty, microfinance, the evolving notion of professionalism, the changing conception of public, and finally the growing academic interest in re-visioning the social role of architecture. Organized around case studies from the United States, Brazil, Venezuela, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Rwanda, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Nepal, Pakistan, Iran, Thailand, Germany, Australia, Taiwan, and Japan the book documents the most important recent developments in the field. By examining diverse working methods and philosophies of socially engaged architecture, the handbook shows how socially engaged architecture is entangled in the global politics of poverty, reconstruction of the public sphere, changing role of the state, charity, and neoliberal urbanism. The book presents debates around the issue of whether architecture actually empowers the participators and alleviates socio-economic exclusion or if it instead indirectly sustains an exploitive capitalism. Bringing together a range of theories and case studies, this companion offers a platform to facilitate future lines of inquiry in education, research, and practice.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part I|45 pages
Engagement as Discourse
chapter 2|13 pages
Understanding Social Engagement in Architecture
part II|68 pages
Targets of Engagement
chapter 5|15 pages
Retracing the Emergence of a Human Settlements Approach
chapter 7|16 pages
Tracing the History of Socially Engaged Architecture
chapter 9|13 pages
Seeking Appropriate Methods
part III|51 pages
Structures of Engagement
part IV|63 pages
Subjects of Engagement
chapter 14|17 pages
Housing for Spatial Justice
part V|38 pages
Tectonics of Engagement
chapter 18|10 pages
A Comparative History of Live Projects Within the United States and the UK
chapter 19|14 pages
The Do-It-Your(Self)
part VI|53 pages
Environmental Engagement
part VII|73 pages
Mapping Engagement
chapter 26|16 pages
Architecture Before 3.11
chapter 27|14 pages
The Reciprocity Between Architects and Social Change
chapter 28|16 pages
Transforming the Spatial Legacies of Colonialism and Apartheid
part VIII|52 pages
Engagement in Emergency