Conclusion

Rituals form an intrinsic part of our lives and regardless of their intent or reasoning, they are known to have a positive impact on our body and mind. This thesis capitalizes on that aspect by designing spaces that bring users together through culture, which binds all. The commemoration of the culture is inspired by existing rich, ritualized heritage, history and culture of Madurai.

The host structure built in the midst of culturally vibrant era and town now stands in sans cultural and sans ritualized context. The new adaptive reuse design revitalizes the vibrancy of the building by maintaining its structural and more importantly cultural identity. This project highlights on how the engagement in rituals can be felt beyond the specifics of the activity itself and have a major impact in how we sense and perceive spaces. Architectural experiences can be heightened, and meanings can be provided or revived to contextually lost spaces by incorporating those ritualistic spatial cues which are a marker for what guides the society.

சிறப்பு ஆலோசகர்

Specialist Advisor

Michael I Norton

Michael I. Norton is the Harold M. Brierley Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School, and a member of Harvard’s Behavioral Insights Group. He holds a B.A. in Psychology and English from Williams College and a Ph.D. in Psychology from Princeton University. Prior to joining HBS, Professor Norton was a Fellow at the MIT Media Lab and MIT’s Sloan School of Management. He is a behavioral scientist at HBS and co authored – with Elizabeth Dunn – Happy Money: The Science of Smarter Spending(Simon & Schuster, 2013).

Professor Norton’s research explores the effects of social norms on people’s attitudes and behavior, addressing the key role that social factors play in shaping the preferences of individuals. As part of his research, Michael has been researching the psychological underpinnings of rituals, demonstrating how they can lead to increased immersion in experiences, greater feelings of control, reduced anxiety, and increased liking for teammates.

சிறுகுறிப்பு நூலியல்

Simonowitz, David. n.d. “The Mobile Matrix: The Hijaz Railway as Ritual Space and Generator of Space: Ebscohost.” Accessed October 6, 2020. http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=1&sid=a6165a5a-3558-46fe-9f3a-85d6f0774e38%40sdc-vsessmgr01.

Set in the period of early 20th century, this article looks at Islamic Architecture in the context of the transportation and ritualization. It talks about the ’pious’ as well as the ‘pragmatic’ approach of modernization, coupled with the notion of sacralization.

Geva, Anat. n.d. “Revisiting a Graduate Design Studio on Sacred Architecture: A Mosque Design...: EBSCOhost.” Accessed October 7, 2020. http://web.a.ebscohost. com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=0&sid=bdd67ee4-5f51-4ec8-8a6f24666df07645%40sessionmgr4006. This essay follows the process of a design studio that focused on the design of Sacred Architecture in the historic context of the old town of Yazd in Iran. While the essay takes us through the projects of five students, it shows the problem of dealing with contexts of strong historic and cultural value in a contemporary practice.

R. Sathyanatha Aiyar. 1924. “History Of The Nayaks Of Madura”. http://archive.org/ details/in.ernet.dli.2015.183822.

Shulman, David. 2016. “Tamil :A Biography”.The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

This book is a detailed account of the reign of the Nayaks of Madurai. It takes us through the history of the inception of the dynasty to how and why it ended. The era of each ruler is explained, giving the reader a full understanding of the dynasty.

In this book David Shulman presents a comprehensive cultural history of Tamil. The author talks about the unique features of the language through history, about the poems and the evolution of the language and Sangam within its context and setting.

“Overview Of Madurai City | Madurai City Profile | Madurai City Map.” n.d. Accessed November 28, 2020. http://www.maduraicorporation.co.in/overview-of-madurai-city.html.

Corporation of Madurai website - giving an overview of the history and present functioning and characteristics of the ancient city with has evolved as the cultural hub of the state of Tamil Nadu.

Annotated Bibliography

Legare CH, Nielsen M. 2020 Ritual explained: interdisciplinary answers to Tinbergen’s four questions. Phil. Trans. R. Soc.B 375: 20190419.http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2019.0419 This article is a part of an issue deciphering the value of Rituals in formulating human behavior. This particular article looks at using other field of study such as psychology and biology to break down the deeper meaning of what effects rituals have in our lives and how they create meaning to our behavior.

S Shomeshwaran, Azhagappan Ramesh, S Preethi, G Gopi, R Ashwin, C Vallikannu, Kamakshi Kanmani, Sha Radhakrishna, A Rekha, T Monika, Archi Display Festival 2020 Entry 243, Studio Design Sheets, 2020 Final Year students of Arulmiga Meenakshi Amman College of Engineering documented the Thirumalai Nayakar Palace as part of their Urban Design Studio. The documents by these students was helpful for me to redraft and place myself despite not being able to visit the site.

This 90 page Tamil book has been written by a blogger from Madurai documenting the 22 festivals celebrated within the city of Madurai. Every festival is described elaborately with the author touching upon certain important facts about each festival.

The diagrammatic book by Tschumi represents architecture not in the typically space and form language, but in terms of actions and events. It is a proposal of an architectural interpretation of reality.

Chithiraiveedhikaaran. 2019. "Thiruvizhakkalin thalainagaram(the capital of Festivals)". Green Walk Publications Madurai

Tschumi, Bernard. 1982. "The Manhattan Transcripts". Academy Editions/St. Martine's Press