On the question of architecture and identity, in post-apartheid South Africa

Abstract

Considerations as to personal and group identity seem to be everywhere these days, in the national news, in the latest pop/rap video and with respect to the very clothes that we choose to wear. Significantly, in post-apartheid South Africa, topical questions of ‘identity’ are driven from the racial politics of our past, and are mobilised toward our need to symbolise a new inclusive space of belonging. This paper looks at ways of representing and re-imagining collective identities through architectural design – that is design as process and product alike. The paper opens by introducing our political and social context before moving to consider more theoretical questions of subjectivity and of collective identity. Where after, the paper considers how architecture might contribute to questions of identity via three related lines of enquiry: 1) democratic judgement and creative process; 2) public space, both political and architectural; 3) and lastly, tectonic materiality and cultural memory. In so doing, the paper develops its discussion in dialogue with the work – amongst others – of Hannah Arendt, Paul Ricoeur and Couze Venn.

Dit wil voorkom of persoonlike en groepsidentiteit deesdae oral is: in die nasionale nuus, in the nuuste pop/rap videos en in terme van die klere wat ons kies om te dra. Baie belangrik is die aktuele vraag oor ‘identiteit’, wat aangepor word deur die radikale politiek van ons verlede en ingespan word om ons behoefte om ‘n nuwe ruimtelikheid van behoort, te simboliseer. Hierdie artikel kyk na wyses waarop kollektiewe identiteite uitgebeeld en heruitgebeel work deur middel van ontwerp in argitektuur – dit is, terselfdertyd ontwerp as proses en produk. Die artikel spring weg met ‘n inleiding oor ons politieke en sosiale konteks voordat die fokus verskuif word na teoretiese vrae oor subjektiwiteit van die gemeenskaplike. Daarna beskou die artikel hoe argitektuur moontlik ‘n bydrae lewer tot vraestukke oor identiteit deur na drie verwante rigtings van ondersoek te verwys: 1) demokratiese oordeel en die kreatiewe proses; 2) publieke ruimte, beide polities en argitektonies; 3) and laastens, tektoniese materialiteit en kulturele onthou. Deur dit te doen, ontwikkel die artikel ‘n bespreking in dialoog met onder meer die werk van Hannah Arendt, Paul Ricoeur en Couze Venn