Decolonizing Architecture: a Theory in the Making
« Unlike the attacks directed at related domains, such as the artistic system, visual production, or museum institutions (to name only a few), architecture has not yet been subjected to a critique of its role in global colonization. »
This quote, taken from the latest book by the Italian anthropologist and architect Francesco La Cecla, Addomesticare l’architettura. L’Occidente e la distruzione dell’abitare (Domesticating Architecture. The West and the Destruction of Dwelling), highlights our inability to acknowledge the colonial and postcolonial dimension of the architectural practice.
As a reminder:
Racial theories applied to architecture intensified during the imperialist era, that is, from the nineteenth century onwards. These theories served to justify the domination of the West over colonized peoples. Westerners presented themselves as a modern and advanced civilization, the makers of “the” “true” architecture. (For more detail, see my article The Imperial Roots of Architecture Education.)
This hierarchization of architectural practices initiated a global destruction of local architecture and ways of inhabiting, which continues to this day.
This domination manifested itself through the erasure of local architectural cultures, in favor of a standardized “hygienization” and “modernization” based on aesthetic and technical criteria of post-industrial Europe. Concrete, steel, and glass became the symbols of modernity, while raw earth, hay, or other natural materials started to be perceived as archaic or vernacular expressions.
In his book, La Cecla focuses on the modernist movement, condemning the devastation caused on a global scale. The authors calls for a contexualized modernity. However, his book offers neither practical solutions nor a precise case study. It remains deliberately general, and in that regard lies perhaps its core argument: architectural theory lags considerably behind other disciplines, such as art and museology.
There are still very few schools of architecture that question the myth of the archistar or encourage their students to design truly contextual architecture, where the architect’s aesthetic ego gives way to cultural and social responsibility.
This text thus urges us to rethink our ways of conceiving, theorizing, and practicing architecture. While reading it, I was also reminded of the scarcity of publications that question the choices made by the pioneers of modernism—Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Louis Kahn, Frank Lloyd Wright, to name only a few—or by their precursors such as Auguste Perret, Henry van de Velde, or Karl Friedrich Schinkel. Who theorizes architecture, and what impact do these theories have on practice?
Although I find that the book remains largely superficial regarding the concrete implications of architectural colonialism and attempts to recontextualize dwelling, its prose is simple and accessible. It allows us to question what we have been taught and what may require a renewed perspective.
« The architectural monoculture is today a monstrosity that spreads like a cancer throughout the entire global landscape. »
In my upcoming readings, I plan to include Race and Modern Architecture: A Critical History from the Enlightenment to the Present by I. Cheng, C. Davis II, and M. O. Wilson. This book explores in greater depth the Western domination through architecture. I have already partially read it for writing my article Les origines impérialistes de la pédagogie architecturale, and I look forward to delving into it more thoroughly.
Any reading recommendations are most welcome.
This text was translated with the help of AI tools.
