Passionate Pedagogy
the act of pedagogical stewardship
Passionate Pedagogy the act of pedagogical stewardship (first draft 140430)
Abstract Engaged learning environments should be places of generosity and reparative acts of love, not institutional testing grounds for various forms of oppression.1 In the background, is a school of architecture, part of an educational institution of power, formulating a document that attempts to describe “the ABC’s of an architectural critique”, based on a culture that maintains a lineage of an (perhaps) antiquated form of evaluation.2 In the foreground, is a flirtatious performative seminar series, arranged and enacted collectively.3 This is an attempt to re-examine and re-invent the practice of critique, through pedagogical stewardship and the art of choreographing critical positions in an architectural conversation, formerly known as critique. What are the spaces of YOUR dreams that support creativity and learning in the best possible way? In the recounting of five dream sequels, from an afternoon nap in the summer sunwhere the ‘rules of play’ are different to that of waking hours, a group makes these places come to life, with the help of theoretical oracles and the work of passionate pedagogy.
Intro "I love you honey. I love your money. I love your automobile. I love you baby. I don’t mean maybe. You’re the sweetest thing on wheels. I love your kisses. I wouldn’t miss it. No matter how I feel. I love you honey. I love your money. Most of all I love your automobile."4 As the Patsy Cline tune fades into the background, a serious voice announces the time and weather before the next program begins, with its familiar “Summer! Summer! Summer!” on the Swedish radio station P1. This daily program, a tradition and favorite pass-time for many on lazy summer days, features one new voice a day from June- August, current newsworthy, noteworthy or otherwise relevant personalities who tell stories across the airwaves and play music of their choice. Today’s guest is Liv Strömquist, Swedish cartoonist and author of political and feminist satire. Liv is speaking about her experiences as a creative person, more specifically a creative menstruating person, and how conditions for creativity are gendered.5
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She describes her current art collective in Malmö, comparing them to the spirit found within the group of Scandinavian artists from the late 1800’s called ‘Skagenmålarna’, as they don’t compete or try to be unique, but rather encourage and share ideas with each other in order to support everyone in their efforts. The sun is warm on my skin, the scent of freshly cut grass lingers in the breeze, mixed with the slightly murky smell of the small inland lake, as I drift off into a pleasant afternoon slumber. The last thing I hear Liv say is this: “Encouragement from others, especially women and female friendship, has been absolutely crucial for me to be able to create in my life… When I watch popular TV programs like ‘Idol’, I think about this, about what conditions that I needed myself, to develop a creative practice… Then I think, that I really, REALLY don’t believe that creativity and a creative practice can grow under these forms of competition, elimination and a jury that sits and judges you. Most people, especially young girls, already have a horribly critical jury within them that sits there and criticizes all of the ideas they have and everything they can think up. I, myself, absolutely have one of those ‘inner critics’ that tell me that my ideas are shit, that I suck, that I’m boring, that I should just quit, etc.. I have certainly needed situations that are characterized by mutual support instead of sharp elbows, and love instead of critique, to be able to create at all.”6 Sequel One: The Golden Emergency "I love you honey. I love your money. Most of all I love your automobile." Patsy Cline chimes in again, as the giant disco ball spins, scattering golden specks of light on the sterile white walls and clean surfaces, cloaked in gold. There is a woman, named Jane, wandering around the room reciting the same five words over and over with authority, “Collectivity, Interiority, Alterity, Performativity, Materiality”.7 Everyone is wearing a white lab coat, as they file in to what appears to be an emergency room disco-tech? I’m caught up in the stream of lab coats and find myself in one of two groups, as someone shoves a package into my hand. The group I’m in seems to be much more at ease, like they belong to the space, while the other group looks slightly uncomfortable and almost as surprised as I am. As ‘the patient’ is revealed before us, a state of urgency ensues, architecture is in dire need of resuscitation and we are its only hope! I realize that this gathering is an initiation of sorts, as a sign flashes up on one of the walls “An Army of Lovers Will Never Lose”, and I look into the small white package marked FLIRT
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AID KIT.8 Inside, I find a plastic ziplock bag containing stardust, one golden animal figurine and to my surprise, my own personal horoscope! How did they know? There is also a slip of paper with instructions for use: IN CASE OF ARCHITECTURAL EMERGENCIES, 1) A PINCH OF JOY, 2) A DASH OF COMPASSION, 3) A HANDFUL OF SPIRIT, APPLY GENEROUSLY. IF CONDITION PERSISTS, REPEAT. Now, there’s another figure beside Jane (I couldn’t catch the name), proposing and demonstrating tactics for the entire group, in the form of dance steps! Unfortunately, this is not any sexy dance like salsa, nor a sophisticated dance like tango, not even a proud dance like flamenco. NO, this is more of a flirtatious, parodic ‘Donna Summer’ disco!9 But they seem to take it very seriously. Everyone takes out the glitter pouch, so I follow suit. The leader instructs us on possible techniques for scattering the glitter in tact to the music and in sync with the gyration of our hips. Although the training isn’t very physically demanding, I notice that some of the members of the other group drop out at this point.10 In a true demonstration of skill and simultaneous capacity, Jane explains (while boogying down) “this is the matter at hand and that the modes of working characteristic to a feminist approach… are highly appropriate for tackling the three stranded collapse of ecology, energy and economy,” which she diagnoses as the most critical symptoms of our patient.11 In this unorthodox call to action, alliances are formed, strategies forged, and the two groups are given their tasks. Let the healing begin! Sequel Two: Speed Dating for Three We rush out of the room in an excited frenzy and suddenly, I’m in another nightclub space, similar to the last but not the same. The mood is flirtatious, the lighting is much lower and there is a long golden table set with candlelight, a line of vases holding a single rose and pairs of chairs, facing each other across the table. I recognize the same people from the two groups in the emergency training session, but there’s something different about them. Even I feel more elegant and smarter than usual! There are three new leaders this time, and they introduce themselves as Susan, Gavin and Eve.12 The trio ask everyone to find a place at the table and explain that we will have three minutes to get to know each other, before we switch partners.13 The first person I talk to is Gavin, another Gavin, and he insists on calling me Susan. The noise of all of the simultaneous conversations is palpable. He begins to tell me about an interesting renovation project he’s recently visited in Bergamo, Italy, of all places! But then the time is up and I move on to the next person.
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This time I face Susan. Another Susan, what a coincidence! Besides mentioning the same renovation of an Aldo Rossi row house, she tells me “The whole point of Camp is to dethrone the serious. Camp is playful, anti-serious. More precisely, Camp involves a new, more complex relation to “the serious.” One can be serious about the frivolous, frivolous about the serious.”14 I am just about to ask her what the renovation has to do with Camp, and again, time is up. My next partner is Eve, one of the leaders. Eve is obviously well-read in psychoanalytic and queer literature, because when I mention the previous conversation about Camp and the renovation (which she has also visited), she says “To view camp as, among other things, the communal, historically dense exploration of a variety of reparative practices is to do better justice to many of the defining elements of classic camp performance: the startling, juicy displays of excess erudition, for example; the passionate, often hilarious antiquarianism, the prodigal production of alternative historiographies; the “over”attachment to fragmentary, marginal waste or leftover products; the rich, highly interruptive affective variety; the irrepressible fascination with ventriloquistic experimentation; the disorienting juxtapositions of present with past, and popular with high culture.”15 Time is up. Again I sit to face my new partner and realize that I am across from another Gavin! Then I realize, the room is filled with Susans, Gavins and Eves, cloned into slightly different variations on a theme, like the 1956 movie ‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers’!16 This Gavin tells me that he believes the Rossi renovation is an example of a queer feminist architectural critique in the form of a ‘scholarly flirtation’, as we are served a romantic dinner for two, prepared by the hosts. He continues, “…flirtation stalls the moment of definitive judgement and commitment, and thereby makes space for the entertaining of less familiar possibilities, which, in turn, reduces the constricting hold of the paranoid impulse on the production of scholarly knowledge. What the activity of flirting may offer to writing is a way of playfully exploring contradictory or incommensurate propositions by entertaining the oscillation between them as the very substance of its pleasures.”17 In his enthusiastic description of this subtle balancing act between the push and pull of several stories, I get the feeling that he’s flirting with me and my ideas on “the serious” and the frivolous. Interlude I wake up to a tickling in my ear. One of the cats has made its way down to the dock and is licking my face. I shoo her away and turn down the volume of the radio. A voice drones on in
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an interview with last year’s Eurovision winner Loreen, something about spirituality and vacuuming. I quickly fall back to sleep. Sequel Three: Rituals of Magic I hear the screech of seagulls in the distance, and I notice that I am wearing sandals, a loose linen dress, lots of beads and bracelets, and have my long hair tied up in a ‘watery’ batik turban on my head. The limits of the place I’m in are imperceptible; it is nowhere, limbo. As I’m handed a strange blue drink in a tall glass, our spiritual guides for the evening welcome us and divide us into four elemental groups, according to our zodiac signs.18 Again, I recognize the same faces, but this time three new people are in charge. They instruct us through a ritual to unlock the key to what they call ‘the other realm’, as we work within our elemental groups. Earth and my group, water, begin from opposite sides, toward a center located between us, providing the first part of the key. An eerie, not entirely human voice, echoes through the air and introduces itself as Isabelle.19 “Rituals are modes of gathering, the achievement of which is that it is no longer I, as a subject, as meant to belong to nobody but myself, who thinks and feels… the gathering makes present – and this is what is named magic – something which transforms [your] relation to the stakes [you] have put up.”20 Fire and air take over the task and as the single candle is extinguished, the entire group is enclosed within a round, diffuse space, almost like a giant underwater cave.21 I find a place to sit on one of the soft spots on the ground, as several smaller groups gather in an informal constellation around a cornucopia of goodies. I relax in to an easy, casual conversation about the capitalist market in relation to the current crisis in Greece, effects (and responsibilities) of tourism, the modern-day colonisation of struggling countries by all-inclusive resorts through the buying, selling and building on ‘foreign’ land, and the need for feminist self-critique in order to retain (or reclaim) a relevant position of resistance. We talk about the dangers of all ‘critical’ positions to fall into the use of once effective ‘critical tools’ in a routine manner, perhaps undermining its own critical intent. The echoing, slightly automated voice of Isabelle speaks again. “Here the gesture of taking in hand is not justified by, but both producing and produced by, the relationship of relevance between the situation and the tool. The habit of the tool user may make it plausible to speak about recognition, rather than decision, as if those situations where this or that tool must be used had something in common, a sameness justifying the use of the same tool… But when we deal with ‘tools for thinking’, habit must be resisted… The relevant tools, tools for thinking, are then the ones that address
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and actualise this power of the situation, that make it a matter of particular concern, in other words, make us think and not recognise.”22 One of the guides gives me a small candy to place on my tongue and instantly I’m transported to the middle of a forest. Sequel Four: Tweetlets at The Beastlet Birds are chirping all around me and I can hear the distant sound of a gurgling brook. It is quite dark here with the dense foliage and it smells of earth and moss, but I see a clearing up ahead. I walk in that direction and arrive at a structure made of two thick, braided cables stretched between the treetops. Hanging from these taught lines are large, billowing golden textiles, shimmering in the breeze. I see some of my original group gathering, as I continue around to the other side and a detail in one of the textiles catches my eye. It looks like a giant fly in a pair of boxer briefs! And on another is the stitching of a seam on an enormous mesh tank top. This is a giant clothesline for golden underwear! There are two of each in slightly different sizes, but there’s no time to ask, since the activities seem to be starting soon. The groups are now mixed and we all find a place to sit within three small clusters, arranged in front of the giant outdoor screen. I notice that some of my ‘friends’ have rather hairy arms and I’m startled as one of their tails(!) accidently brushes up against my leg. Speaking of tales, I look down to find that I now have hoofs where my feet used to be. As my thighs are also covered in fur, from the waist down to be precise, I have no pockets. Another creature from my group hands me a mobile phone, already logged in to Twitter as Gizelle Gazelle. On the screen, a live Twitter chat session begins in the list ‘Beastlet 2.0’, inviting the humanimal residents of The Beastlet to a community discussion with the architects involved in proposed renovations and additions to this mythical sanctuary.23 The gathering has a sense of anticipation, as there were many conflicts and misunderstandings with the previous architects who worked on the original sanctuary proposal. For this reason, the ‘Tweet’ format is intended to keep the arguments concise and tempers in check, while allowing everyone involved to contribute from the comfort of their own habitats. Likewise, the anonymity of the Twitter accounts encourages a step away from the oppositional character of two distinct sides in a debate, allowing for less categorically aligned arguments. The topic for the evening is ‘the architect’ and its formation, as questions were raised about possible deficiencies in the previous architects’ training. Some of the Beastlings’ experienced problems in the way they were treated and represented. I gladly take my complimentary yogurt and wild berries snack from the platypus at the refreshment grove, and watch as the silent texting begins.24
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Vulverine @Woolverinna Mar 12 #FirstTopic "the teacher is the learner and the learner is the teacher" #teacherandstudent Gen. Hathi Senior @HathiElephant Mar 12 A lot of teachers are know-‐it-‐alls. #beastlet20 Frolic @Gaambool Mar 11 I heard: I'm not here to teach. You're here to learn. (it was said in a bad way) #beastlet20 Cuff the magic dragon @makingofanArchitect May 3 Crit = hazing? #beastlet2025 Gaby Gorilla Baby @GabyGorillaBaby Mar 11 Becoming an established diva doesn't come easy, but it's less intricate than earning fully fledged-‐architect status. #cuff #beastlet20 heavy_with_wings @corichards Mar 12 #beastlet20 I go with the teacher who agrees with me #FirstTopic Thousands of fairies fly down from the treetops and swarm in front of the screen. As they hover in place, they give off a strange sound, like the tinkling of tiny bells. They manage to block the light of the screen in a formation that allows these words to appear: "When we all take risks, we participate mutually in the work of creating a learning community."26 After about 20 seconds, they’re gone.
Harper Hippo @hippopmania Mar 12 We are discussing being vulnerable together. #beastlet20 Cuff the magic dragon @makingofanArchitect May 3 Implicit assumptions about gender? Charette = designer boot camp? #beastlet2027 Elephantom @Elephantomia Mar 12 Is competition bad? #beastlet20 Harper Hippo @hippopmania Mar 11 Us hippos never abandon our herd. Label me feminist. Label me architect. Think about it and we'll take it from there. #beastlet20 Vulverine @Woolverinna Mar 12 #secondTopic #figureofthearchitect RT: “@thedeardeerdear: What is the most important aspect of being an architect? #beastlet20”
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Lisa Deer @thedeardeerdear Mar 12 We need to talk about the unspoken rules of learning #beastlet20 Cuff the magic dragon @makingofanArchitect May 3 Fostering w vague criteria, tacit decisions, unchallenged senior architects. System perpetuates itself. #beastlet2028
Ippeas @IppeasHorse Mar 12 Study nature, love nature, stay close to nature. It will never fail you. –Frank Lloyd Wright #beastlet20
ChorusOfFrogs @Vatrachoi Mar 12 @IppeasHorse he took it quite literally:Move the table-‐his response to a client who complained of rain leaking onto the dining table.
Frolic @Gaambool Mar 12 @Vatrachoi I heard: The fear of being powerless -‐ The fear of being impotent Again, the swarm of fairies appears out of nowhere. “Instead of focusing on the commonly held assumption that we are safe when everyone agrees, …if we rather think of safety as knowing how to cope in situations of risk, then we open up the possibility that we can be safe even in situations where there is disagreement and even conflict.”29 Vulverine @Woolverinna Mar 12 #THIRDTOPIC! What do u think the relationship between architect and client should be? #architectandclient
Cuff the magic dragon @makingofanArchitect May 3 Authority of the full-‐fledged architect. FLW intentional megalomania? #architectandclient 30 Vulverine @Woolverinna Mar 12 #architectandclient Could architects have a more non-‐hierarchal approach? A more inclusive, collective way of working? Elephantom @Elephantomia Mar 12 Is it the job of the architect to help the client imagine their desires? #beastlet20 Mr. Ongoose @MrOngoose Mar 12 “Your ideas are great, mine are just better” regards, your architect #ashamedofmyself #beastlet20 Elephantom @Elephantomia Mar 12 @MrOngoose why telling them what they want? We learn the tools to start visualizing AND realizing imaginations, this is our service
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Mr. Ongoose @MrOngoose Mar 12 “Helping the client to realize what they want” ha! Telling them what they want… #architectandclient
The small portion of berries wet my appetite, and I could hear my stomach begin to growl in the midst of this heated (silent) discussion. No sooner did I look toward the refreshment grove, when I heard “Ciao!” and was struck by the scent of freshly brewed espresso. Sequel Five: A Fruitful Killjoy I was finally outside of this Bergamo renovation project I had heard so much about from Gavin, Eve and Susan! The usual gang was arriving, but rather than go inside, they were setting up for a picnic in the garden.31 Two rows of picnic tables stood in the shade of a ring of cypress trees, one bare and one set with a colorful checkered tablecloth and cutlery. The fruit kept piling up, as everyone showed up with their contributions, wearing an apron ready to prepare the food… which would have been fine, if it weren’t for the person who showed up wearing ONLY an apron. This, of course, caused some minor and major trouble in the little Italian neighborhood, where public nudity is, to put it mildly, frowned upon. Although the apron does actually cover everything ‘important’, except for an occasional view of this person’s rear end, authorities were alerted and angry neighbors voiced their dismay, charging our entire group with the attempt to corrupt their children and sully the upstanding good name of the residential area. This kind of attention annoyed some in the group, while most just continued with the food preparations.32 I became curious, so I asked this person, who goes by the name of Zara, whether it was perhaps a simple misunderstanding of the apron dress code listed in the invitation? Or was there another motive behind the obvious drama s/he was causing? According to Zara, “…to refuse the place in which you are placed, is to be seen as causing trouble, as making others uncomfortable. There is a political struggle about how we attribute good and bad feelings, which hesitates around the apparently simple question of who introduces what feelings to whom.”33 S/he explained that by “going against the flow” and “getting in the way” s/he was attributed with killing joy, in merely placing her/is body in the way. Zara also believed that the reaction had a lot to do with the fact that her/is androgynous body did not readily disclose a gender, and that it made it even more provocative for people to face the fact that gender could be so indeterminate, even with ONLY an apron between them. The men who would have otherwise been more than willing to make sexist catcalls and assert their entitlement to
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comment the body of any scantily clad woman, were unable to judge whether a comment, in this case, would land them in a compromising queer situation. Their power of entitlement was taken from them, hence, the indignation and uproar. “This is why being a killjoy can be a knowledge project, a world-making project.”34 The naked killjoy drama, compliments of Zara, gave everyone plenty to discuss over the fruit salad preparations. Now, the main topic of discussion is whether or not Zara is welcome to a place at the table with everyone to eat. I thought about the division within the group and remembered what the fairies had said about ‘situations of risk’ and coping with disagreement and conflict. I asked Zara if s/he had anticipated these difficulties, not only from ‘the outside’, but also from within her/is own group, even though all were explicitly, more or less, struggling in a similar direction? Zara tells me, “It is the experience of “coming up against” that is named by willfulness, which is why willful politics needs to be a collective politics. The collective here is not assumed as a ground. Rather, willfulness is a collecting together, of those struggling for a different ground for existence. You need to be supported when you are not going the way things are flowing. This is why I think of a feminist queer politics as a politics of tables: tables give support to gatherings, and we need support when we live our lives in ways that are experienced by others as stubborn or obstinate.”35 Zara then walks directly over to the table, helps her/imself to a large portion and takes a seat. I realize that I am now in the shade, and the breeze gives me goose bumps as I lie there, while my recent slumber slowly wears off. I see something fluttering in the grass, out of the corner of my eye, and go to pick it up. It’s a paper airplane, sent from someone, like an air born message in a bottle. I open it and read “Without the event, there is no architecture. Not the other way around. Aldo Rossi said that. Kinda.”36 Aldo Rossi made me think of my dream in Bergamo and then, as my stomach is usually not far behind my brain, I had a craving for pizza! As I drive to the pizza place, they play one of my favorite Italian artists, Gianna Nannini, on the radio. “Bello! Bello é impossibile!”37 I park and go in to order, humming to myself along the way. Inside, I have a moment of déjà vu, the room has a familiar golden tint and I recognize all of the faces of the other customers from my dream. Besides eating pizza, they are gathered around one large table, pouring over a set of maps. A little unsure if I’m still dreaming, I cautiously ask if I can join them. One of the original groups from the emergency room has made First Aid maps, suggesting a possible intervention in the care of our patient. Even though the patient’s condition remains critical, I am hopeful that the gathering around
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this table, as well as the eventual gatherings around different tables of ‘operation’, promises healing situations where the effect of unhealthy habits are reversed. Rewind: Course Framework and Conditions Behind the narrative is the recounting or retelling of a fast-paced, performative text seminar course, consisting of six sessions, each with its own theme, based on and around my own research. Every week, the themes are supported by readings in sets of three, with one text from queer/feminist theory, one from architectural theory and one unpublished paper or writing experiment from my PhD.38 I organized the first and last sessions, while the four remaining sessions were hosted by course participants, in smaller groups. Besides the given texts, there are three existing conditions that all of the groups must work within, 1) the space of a standard seminar room at the architecture school- A1, with its contents and limitations, 2) a time frame of 2-hours and 3) a 500 SEK budget. Another factor that provided an extra dimension to this course, was the fact that I chose to run two different courses parallel, one with Master’s architecture students in an elective worth 3 credits and another with participants from outside of the school, in a continuing education course worth 7.5 credits. Although it was a bit of a juggling act, this allowed the combination of resources, so that we would have a budget to work with, as well as helping to establish a good-sized group, with varied backgrounds and disciplines. Everyone attended the 2-hour seminars around the readings; however, each group had different tasks. Those that were following the 7.5 credit course, were given the task to host one of the seminars in smaller groups; including invitation, dress code, room and scenography, snack, preparatory instructions to the participants, conversation structure, and finally a 5-7 minute digital documentation of their session. Those that were following the 3 credit elective course, were asked to work on a group project to produce a ‘hand-out’ on how an ‘architectural conversation, formerly known as critique’ could take place. The seminars were held once a week and lasted 3 hours. During the last hour, I tutored the hosting group for the upcoming seminar and checked-in with the elective students, while they work-shopped on their group work. Fast Forward: Intentions and Reflections The structure and intent of this performative course was to focus on collective learning, rather than individual performance, through the shift from critique to conversation, something not
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altogether usual in the shared habits of an architectural culture. It not only functioned as a ‘live’ experiment of the pedagogic ideas within my PhD project, but also as a ‘test audience’ where students could read my own writing and provide feedback.39 In presenting the visual material from this course at a symposium recently, I was asked the question about whether/when I decide to just say “fuck it” in relation to the criteria and expectations of an institution for a course like this one, in order to have the freedom to do “something else”. My assumption is that behind this question, lies an implication (based on the photo documentation I presented) that it looks like we’re having way too much fun to be doing any ‘serious’ academic work. My answer to this question was that I am even more careful and certain that this course exceeds every requirement placed on a course of this type, and that it is less challenging, and quite frankly uninteresting, to just do whatever you feel like. It is here, I hear the habits of a culture speaking, not necessarily my colleague. Throughout the dream sequels in the narrative retelling of the course, I try to give a little taste of what the experience of each session was like in structure and atmosphere, along with some of the main topics of discussion and a few fictional twists. The important theoretical ideas from the authors of the key texts take on the form of five distinct oracles; Jane Rendell as the boogeying head of the ER, Isabelle Stengers as the omniscient automated voice, Dana Cuff as the instigating Tweeter, bell hooks as the swarm of fairies, and Sara Ahmed as Zara, the naked killjoy. They offer “theory as liberatory practice” or as bell hooks writes in her article of the same name, “a place where I could imagine possible futures”.40 As most of the hosting groups chose to base the theme of each session on my texts in particular, the order of the narrative (and many of the details) is based on a journey through the critical fictions I’ve written, although not a chronological one. The idea of pedagogical stewardship is partly a reaction to the culture described by Dana Cuff in her portrait of the making of an architect, where stewardship, or what I describe as the art of choreographing critical positions in an architectural conversation, stands in contrast to a more authoritative master/apprentice form of learning. It is also the best alternative I have found to address unequal power hierarchies and my desire for the inclusion of others in my own work, as well as in other forms of teaching. It involves inviting someone in, setting up a framework or structure to act within, taking care of the guest within the framework, and maintaining an openness to allow the guest’s actions to influence and even change the original structure. It is a choreographer’s role, in that it has complete control over the situation, yet it’s
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a creative position that is not static and reacts to what happens during the development of the dance, with all of the different parts. Although practices explicitly using a more ‘participatory’ method, also aim to address similar problems, I suggest ‘stewardship’ as an alternative; however, this is likely better suited for the topic of another paper.41 Also worth mentioning, this seminar course figures under the heading of ‘Architecture and Gender’. It is a recurring course in a series of Architecture and Gender electives that I, together with some colleagues, initiated in 2009. I evaluated this seminar course at the end, and although the responses to the evaluation were in general, very positive, there was one issue that I think is an important one to bring up here. I could rephrase the question like this, “Sure, the discussion of architectural pedagogy is all fine and well, but what does it have to do with gender and architecture? (Which is why I signed up for the course in the first place.)” I hope in briefly responding to this question, this paper can be the missing link that makes up for the lack of time to properly debrief after our seminars and catch these important gaps. I can begin by saying that in order to change a system that perpetuates itself, like the one Dana Cuff describes (although things have changed since then, it is striking how much has remained the same), I would argue that there needs to be a culture shift. In order to bring about that shift, I whole-heartedly believe that the core lies in the way we learn and the way we are fostered to do the things we do as architects. For this reason, I would argue that ‘talking about pedagogy’ is one of the very things we must do, since this is where habits are formed and then carried into professional life, as well as passed down from one generation of ‘new educators’ to the next. While I do believe that the primary responsibility for this shift rests upon the educational institution itself, and those of us who represent it, another important lesson from this course is that we’re all in it together. This shift can and will not happen, without the engagement of students. It can’t be a one-way relationship. The role of ‘the learner’ must also transform, otherwise, the dance doesn’t work. In other words, it has everything to do with gender and architecture, as a culture touches (and regulates) every aspect of the group that is part of that culture, everything from its bodies, to its relationships, to its rituals, to its very purpose. If we go back to Liv Strömquist’s experiences as a creative person, or more specifically a creative menstruating person, and how conditions for creativity are gendered, I believe in a culture shift towards passionate pedagogy, where mutual support reigns over sharp elbows and architectural conversations leave critique in the dust, in a well choreographed dance.
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Acknowledgement A special thank you to everyone who attended the Architecture and Gender Course, Spring 2014: reConstructing a Collective Critical Fiction! You all inspire me! Jonna Blomfeldt, Christina Christodoulou, Malin Heyman, David Jones, Iro Kalogeropoulou, Pernilla Norén, Anne Pürzel, Marie-Louise Richards, Emil Törnsten, Elsa Jannborg, Emma Jarlhäll Borg, Reid Josling, Jasmijn Kok, Astrid Linnér, Andreas Nyström, Lisa Palm, Henni Ruohonen, Kari Svangstu, Olga Charlotta Tengvall. Also, thank you to Julio Cabrera Arias for his invaluable help with the room and technique.
For ideas on the connection between critical thinking, engaged pedagogy and ‘the focus on a love ethic’, see bell hooks, 2010, Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom. NY and London: Routledge. I am also inspired by the collective/performative work of MYCKET (Mariana Alves, Katarina Bonnevier, Thérèse Kristiansson). 2 KTH School of Architecture circulated a preliminary draft of a policy document called ”Kritikens A till Ö” (The ABC’s of Critique), among the faculty during Spring Term 2013. To my knowledge, it was never implemented. The principles outlined in the document closely resemble the ’ritual’ described by Dana Cuff in her chapter ’The Making of an Architect’. Dana Cuff, Architecture: The Story of Practice, Massachussetts: MIT Press, 1991, 109-154. 3 Gavin Butt argues that we have an ’ethical imperative’ to challenge the seriousness of traditional forms of critical writing, and in extension critique. He suggests ’scholarly flirtation’ as a playful, yet more vulnerable, mode to experiment without worrying so much about possible failure. Gavin Butt, ”Scholarly Flirtations: The Serious Scholar”, summit: non-aligned initiatives in education culture in collaboration with Goldsmiths College, London University, 2007, http://summit.kein.org/node/234 (accessed 16 August 2013). 4 Excerpt of lyrics from ”I Love You Honey” by Patsy Cline. 5 See link for brief description of program and to listen to archive on P1. (http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2071&artikel=5573162) 6 Original quote from Liv Strömquist’s summer program on P1 2013: “Uppmuntran från andra, speciellt kvinnor och kvinnligt vänskap har varit helt avgörande för mig för att kunna skapa i mitt liv… När jag tittar på till exempel Idol, så tänker jag på det här, på vilka omständigheter som jag själv behövde för att kunna utveckla ett skapande… Då tänker jag att jag verkligen verkligen inte tror att kreativitet och skapande kan växa under såna formar av konkurrens, utslagning och en jury som sitter och bedömer en. De flesta, speciellt unga tjejer, har redan en fruktansvärt sträng jury inombords som sitter och hackar på alla idéer som man har och allting man kommer på. Jag själv har verkligen en sån inre hjärtans tro ‘Laila Bagge’ som säger till mig att mina idéer är skit, att jag suger, att jag är tråkig, att jag borde lägga ner osv. Precis som andra har inombords, har jag en inre Laila Bagge. Jag har verkligen behövd sammanhang som präglas av inbördes hjälp istället för vassa armbågar, och kärlek istället för kritik för att kunna skapa överhuvudtaget.” 7 These are the categories that Jane Rendell names as the five thematics of current feminist critical spatial practices. Jane Rendell, ‘Critical Spatial Practices: Setting Out a Feminist Approach to some Modes and what Matters in Architecture’ in Lori Brown, ed., Feminist Practices: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Women in Architecture, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2011, pp.17-55. 8 This slogan is used by my colleagues (and one of my important influences/inspirations) in the art and architecture group MYCKET, in several of their Club Scene events, borrowed from the Queer Nations manifest from 1990. MYCKET’s work is one of the main references listed in the course assignment for the FeX group in arranging the seminars. 9 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzxW4eu9heY (I didn’t actually teach dance steps during the introduction to the course, but now I know what to do for the next time!) 10 After the first seminar, there were several participants registered in the FeX group who dropped out of the course, stating that it wasn’t what they expected or that their schedules would no longer allow it. 11 Rendell, 41. 12 The texts we read for the second session are written by Susan Sontag, Gavin Butt and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick. Likewise, the hosts were posing as these authors. 1
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The invitation to this session came as a link to a blog, The Flirt Club, inviting us to a night of speed dating. Subsequently, the blog was updated with all of the documentation from the session and served as the digital presentation. (I’ve since then, asked one of the members of this group to set up a similar blog for all of my PhD material for the RSVP of my 50% seminar.) 14 Susan Sontag, ’Notes On ”Camp”,’ Against Interpretation, New York, London, Toronto, Sydney, Auckland: Anchor Books Doubleday, 1986 (1964), p. 288. 15 Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, ’Paranoid Reading and Reparative Reading, or, You’re So Paranoid, You Probably Think This Essay Is About You,’ Touching Feeling: Affect, Pedagogy, Performativity, Durham & London: Duke University Press, 2003, pp. 149-150. 16 All of the participants were asked to choose one of the 3 authors and to come as that character. Also, everyone was asked to formulate two questions about my own text on the fictional Rossi renovation, from the point of view of their chosen author. 17 Butt, 7. 18 To this session, we were asked to come as our elemental sign and to bring one important quote from the readings. 19 This is a reference to the post human story of Spike Jonze’s latest film ’Her’, where all-pervasive operating systems take on the voices of our modern day Gods and Goddesses. 20 Isabelle Stengers, ’Introductory Notes on an Ecology of Practices’, in Cultural Studies Review, Vol. 11, No. 1, March 2005, p. 195. 21 The hosting group invented a short ’hands-on’ exercise requiring teamwork, similar to an obstacle course, at the beginning of the seminar, in order to gain access to a tranformed state of mind for the discussion. The theme was taken from my own text on watery spaces on Lesvos, Greece. 22 Stengers, 185. 23 The invitation to this session asked everyone to set up a Twitter account as a humanimal character, based on the gold animal figurine they received in the initial Flirt Aid Kit. Everyone was to Tweet a topic of discussion before the session. 24 Note: all Tweet messages are taken directly from the live Twitter discussion of the third seminar on March 12, 2014; however, I have selected and rearranged a few, in order to compose a new conversation and added new Tweets as ’Cuff the magic dragon’ related to specific quotes from the Dana Cuff text. Also, I have made some minor grammatical adjustments or translations from Swedish, to make the text coherent. 25 ”Dinham (1986) attributes three purposes to juries: to criticize individual students’ designs, to provide general instruction, and to initiate scholarly, seminar-like exchange, all of which are intended to further the students’ growth. From the students’ perspective the crit is probably the most grueling and potentially humiliating experience of their education, akin to hazing.” Dana Cuff, ‘The Making of an Architect’, in Architecture: The Story of Practice, Massachussetts: MIT Press, 1991, 126. 26 bell hooks, Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom, NY and London: Routledge, 2010, p.21. 27 ”Female students are faced with implicit assumptions about their lack of physical stamina and commitment when the charrette, and architectural school in general, is likened to a kind of designer boot camp.” Cuff, 128. 28 “To be judged capable of handling responsibility, one must meet the vague criteria of one’s superiors. This fosters a system in which the tacit decisions of senior architects go relatively unchallenged by the rank and file. As individuals move up the ladder, they hoard their new responsibilities- those very responsibilities jealously kept from them by their predecessors. Thus the system perpetuates itself.” Cuff, 148. 29 bell hooks, Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom, NY and London: Routledge, 2010, p.87. 30 caption to image: “Frank Lloyd Wright as an old man, seated at his desk at Taliesin surrounded by objects and furnishings he designed. This portrait embodies the authority of the full-fledged architect. According to Brendan Gill, the visitors’ chairs are intentionally lower than Wright’s own, to keep them in proper perspective.” Cuff, 147. 31 By the time this session was to take place, 2 of the 3 hosts had dropped out of the course, due to personal situations, so we had to rethink. The remaining host and myself, organized the session in a way that everyone pitched in. Each person received a personal invitation with a fruit order and we 13
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made the discussion around preparing the snack. Also, everyone was to write down a personal killjoy story as the base for discussion. 32 Just a note to mention that I’ve taken an artistic liberty in creating Zara’s character and to reassure that everyone in the seminar course was fully dressed at all times. 33 Sara Ahmed, “Feminist Killjoys (And Other Willful Subjects)” in The Scholar and Feminist Online, published by The Barnard Center for Research on Women, Issue 8.3: Summer 2010, Polyphonic Feminisms: Acting in Concert, http://sfonline.barnard.edu/polyphonic/print_ahmed.htm 34 Ahmed, 2010. 35 Ahmed, 2010. 36 Message from one of the paper airplanes, written during our picnic seminar and launched as the finale in a first-year studio. 37 The invitation to the sixth and final seminar came as a youtube link, with a short movie explaining my own impending eviction by the Italian authorities from the Aldo Rossi row house (my PhD project), and invited everyone to an afternoon of activism inside the row house to help build my case. Gianna Nannini serenaded us and we had take-out pizza as a snack. 38 There are, of course, some exceptions where there were additional texts, as it is always so difficult to choose. Also, the narrative does not include all of the texts we read, either for lack of space or because in reading and discussing these texts together, I found them too far from the ’sphere’ of my project. 39 Although most of the seminar forms allowed for discussions in smaller groups, rather than one large one, making it difficult to gather all of the ideas, each of the hosting groups asked the participants to prepare a quick task in relation to the reading, whether it was the formulation of a question, selection of a quote, or a personal story, to bring as the basis of discussion. These tasks are all documented and valuable feedback for my writing. 40 bell hooks, “Theory as Liberatory Practice”, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom, NY and London: Routledge, 1994, p. 61. 41 I have difficulties with many aspects associated to ’participatory practices’, however, I haven’t yet formulated any coherent arguments on this topic.
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reConstructing a Collective Critical Fiction
Sessions/Themes Intro:Overview Session 1: Flirtation/ Reparative acts Session 2: Generosity/ Rituals of Community Session 3: Pedagogy/ Practices of Provocation Session 4: Stewardship/ Invitations to Performative Disruptions Outro: Sharing collective critical fictions
Tasks
Framework/Conditions
Elective Students (3 hp): -read selection of texts -attend seminars -contribute to group project
Readings each session: -one text from my own PhD -one feminist/queer theory -one architectural theory
Project: group hand-out on how an ‘architectural conversation’, formerly known as critique, could take place
Room:
FeX Participants (7,5 hp): -read all texts -attend seminars -host and document one session in groups of 3 Project: Invitation, dresscode, room and scenography, snack, preparatory instructions, conversation structure, 5-7 minute digital documentation
A1 Standard
Introduction: Overview
‘Cri%cal Spa%al Prac%ces: Se0ng out a Feminist Approach To some Modes and What Ma>ers in Architecture’ –Jane Rendell
Intro
Separate tables of 4-5 people in a ‘starburst’ formation. Entire group.
‘Notes On Camp’
‘Scholarly Flirta%ons: The Serious Scholar’
‘Paranoid Reading and Repara%ve Reading…’
Flirt Club One long table, with couples facing each other for consecutive 3 minute 1:1 conversations in ‘speed dating’ style.
Welcome. You are now on the threshold between the World of Reality and
The World of the Free Spirit.
Session 2: Generosity/ Rituals of Community
World of Free Spirit Groups of 3-4 people seated on picnic blankets on the floor, within an inner circle of partitions. Entire group performs ritual to ‘enter’ and ‘exit’the world of discussion.
‘Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom’ –bell hooks ‘The Making of an Architect’ –Dana Cuff
Session 3: Pedagogy/ Practices of Provocation
A lot teachers are bessewissers? #beastlet20
any theory that cannot be used in everyday conversation cannot be used to educate the public.#bellhooks
#figureofthearchitect The most important thing is to truly enage oneself.
Is competition bad? #beastlet20
The animals were gathered. The first tweets were about ‘The teacher is the learner and the learner is teacher’’
Tweetlets @ the Beastlet
Three groups of chairs in clusters, separated by golden curtains hanging from a clothesline. Live ‘Twitter session’ with projection and moderator.
‘Feminist Killjoys (And Other Willful Subjects)’ –Sara Ahmed ‘The Split Wall: Domestic Voyeurism’ –Beatriz Colomina
Killjoy Picnic Two parallel long tables. One for group discussions of 3-4 people standing, during food preparation. One for formulating a paper airplane message, while seated and eating together.
http://youtu.be/Qewi5eVH4qA
Conclusion/Sharing Collective Critical Fictions
Outro One centered block of 6 tables. Entire group, presentations of seminar documentations, student group hand-out and course evaluation.
Elective student group, First for architectural critique
Aid Maps
Session 1
Session 2
Session 3
Session 4
Session 5
Session 6
reConstructing a Collective Critical Fiction
Architecture and Gender: Advanced Series of 6 seminars, Spring 2014, KTH
David Jones, Jonna Blomfeldt, Reid Josling, Marie-‐Louise Richards, Olga Charlo>a Tengvall, Lisa Palm, Chris%na Christodoulou, Elsa Jannborg, Malin Heyman, Henni Ruohonen, Pernilla Norén, Andreas Nyström, Anne Pürzel, Iro Kalogeropoulou, Kari Svangstu, Emil Törnsten, Astrid Linnér, Emma Jarlhäll Borg, Jasmijn Kok, with special thanks to Julio Cabrera Arias