Inhabiting the Image: architecture and social identity in the post-industrial city (Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy)

摘要

The research presented in this thesis is intended to reveal the layers of social andcultural meaning invested in a building conventionally regarded as a work of abstractaesthetic modernism, and one which has been evaluated, within the framework of anational heritage preservation policy, as an architectural landmark of the post-war eraof urban reconstruction. By combining the research methods of architectural history(archival) and of anthropology (ethnographic) I have located and interpreted thearchitecture of the Brunswick within a larger social story that demonstrates how thelived experience of a particular environment exists in parallel with the more objectiveofficial discourse that invests a work of architecture or art with cultural significance.The thesis traces the architectural inception and complex evolution of thebuilding, its critical reception, and the proposals for redevelopment that culminated ina major refurbishment and transformation of the shopping precinct in 2006. It goes onto present an ethnographic account of the Brunswick as a social, as much as anarchitectural space, and an anthropological interpretation of the relationship betweenidentity and place in terms of the specific qualities of the built environment. It showsthat the material environment becomes real and vivid to people as an embodiment ofthe social dimensions of their lives, and that the boundaries between ‘inside’ and‘outside’ – the private space of the home, and the layered sequence of public spacesextending through the building to the city beyond - are not objectively fixed, butsubjectively perceived and negotiated in different ways. Although the Brunswickexerts considerable power as a unique architectural image, its boundaries do notdefine an integrated social space, nor a unified experience of the place as a livingenvironment. Nevertheless, repeated interaction and sensory experience make it atangible architectural framework for everyday and domestic life which evidentlyshapes the view from the inside looking out.The research aims to make a significant contribution to knowledge at ameeting-point between anthropology and architecture, which might help to informfuture understanding of the interaction between people and the built habitat in modernurban societies.