ALL DONE!!!!!!! published final draft is up for everyone to read on the Finished Product page

new writing up

Posted my organized writing now its time to elaborate extensively and write my intro and conclusions. Ps. New blogger layout is not liked!

Reworked

Reworked my writing and have posted a more cohesive draft.

writing posted

I have posted my writing thus far in all its jumbled glory.

update

Going to get a ton of research and writing done over break. Just uploaded an updated bibliography I have been finding some really neat stuff.

pages added

added a new page which will be for the purpose of posting my drafts as I go. please read it and let me know what you think. Thanks

The bib page

So I beasted some research today and made a fairly decent list of sources which I made a new page for and added to the blog.

I really really need some help finding information on the human- nature dichotomy. I know I have read several authors who talk about it but I cant for the life of me find any sort of starting point to delve into the subject and I really need to.

Working Bib

My bib as of now...

Berger, Peter L., and Thomas Luckmann. The Social Construction of Reality: a treaties in the sociology of knowledge. New York: First Anchor Books, 1966. Print.

Louv, Richard. Last Child in the Woods: saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books, 2005.

Reynolds, Michael. Earthship. 1. New Mexico: Solar Survival Press, 1990. Print.

Harvey, Graham. Animism: Respecting the Living World. New York: Columbia University Press, 2006. Print.

Harvey, Graham. Contemporary Paganism . New York: New York University Press, 1997. Print

Also going to library today to pick up Biophilic Cities by Timothy Beatly and Biophilic Design by Stephen Kellert, Judith Heerwagen, and Martin Mador

Ethical questions

Fortunately for me since I am not going to be ( or at least as of yet have not found any reason to, or propensity for in my study) conducting interviews. This does not mean that my project does not have ethical concerns. I plan to get in contact with the Earthship company and hopefully Mike Reynolds himself in order to let him have access to the material I will be spreading about him. For me, the greatest ethical concern is for plagiarism, making sure that i site things correctly. When it comes to the biophilia concept, studies on architechure and human behavior, studies on human cognition and nature or how nature affects our emotions, these are areas where I have to be careful that the studies I am siting have been conducted in ethical ways. As of any other ethical questions I do not see any as of yet, but if they do arise and I will post them.

My thesis

This is the thesis which I have been able to draft so far.


How might current understandings of how architecture influences emotion/cognitive processing inform a hypothesized ability
for bioarchitecture to reinforce a nature derived spirituality and refurbish the human-nature dichotomy?

Research

Okay so I have been banging out some research and going through old coursework and materials which may be pertinant. At the moment, Mike Reynolds and Earthship is going to be one resource but mainly only for the understanding of sustainable buidling and bioarchitecture principles. I plan to use McLuhan in discussion of medium, Berger and Luckmann in discussion of socialization and cultural intitutionalization of behavioral norms, Graham Harvey and Animism/ Contemporary Paganism for a discussion on nature oriented spirituality, and im looking into the Biophilia concept (the idea that we have and inherent affinity for nature) because I believe that can add something to my piece. This is where I have gotten so far, if anyone has any suggestions on what I might read, or some input into how I am thinking about going about this and which authors I am using I am always open to suggestion.

getting started

so this week has been a big research week, I would assume for all of us, but for me it has consisted of further investigations into Mike Reynolds and his Earthship designs. I feel that I have a handle on his methods and building phisophies to some degree and im working to bring that up further. I have also started studying some spirituality issues in how people recognize spirituality particularly focusing on animistic spiritualism. Think thats about it for me this week.

Project

After much research I have desided to focus on Earthships and their designer Mike Reynolds in an attempt to find the intersections between personal spirituality or a feeling of nature as sacred and sustainable living/ lifestyles. I hope to understand how sustainability can reproduce reifying relationships with nature and cause a greater absorption of sustainable principles and techniques because of the strong presents of a spiritual connection to nature produced by them. I will discuss "bioarchitecture" and its praxis for the considerations it has for "natural development" , self containment, and green spaces.

Religion as a model for sustainability

Im currently in Kockerill's Religion, Sustainability, and Spirituality class and so this idea is a spin off of some of the discourse going on in that class. Luckily for my particular concentration this class near perfectly condenses my course of study. So I was thinking about looking at Religion as a model for sustainability in particular regards and with specific consideration of Religious aspects which harness spirituality or utilize spirituality to institutionalize norms, religious memes, perceptions and understandings, and world-view or outlook.

Architecture as a medium

I have been thinking a lot more about this and since my main reasoning for changing majors was because I felt a severe lack of personalization for sustainable techniques in reference to spirituality. I believe that spirituality can provide the fundamental understanding of the world necessary for its ultimate praise, so I wanted to focus this piece more towards how architecture can be used to re-instill or instill personal, spiritual connections to the world. Im still having a little trouble really focusing what I am trying to say and unfortunately as the topic unfolds before me I keep discovering new avenues for new thoughts and ideas some better than I have previously found and inevitably I lose sight of my ultimate goal and original idea.

Influences on my concentration

I took some time to think about this before posting it so im sorry for the delay but I think the most relevant things I have read have been:

The Senses Still
The Social Construction of Reality
The Chaos of the Disciplines
The Blackwinged Night
Animism
Mycellium Running
Music
Chess
I have read a lot of anthropological studies particularly those regarding issues of praxis and epistemology by people like, Rabinow, Eagleton, Geertz, etc.

Project Ideas

When I first came to App I was attracted to the Sustainable Development department but after spending some time there I came to realize that it was lacking something. What I felt was that it was that it provided a great base understanding of the social and environmental aspect required for sustainable living but it adamantly disregarded culture, religion, and spiritual awareness which I believed key to getting anyone to adhere to any sustainable principle. So I went searching for something more, particularly something more fundamental. What was it about our lives that keeps us from admiring the wonder that is the natural world? What things could we do to restore that?

So I transfered to the IDS department. Much of my course work has focused on institutionalization and the social constructions of the world. One particular interest of study for me was medium and its influences in our lives. Mediums are all around us and discipline our bodies.

This led me to my first idea which is a discussion of architecture as a medium. I would be focusing on sustainable homes in contrast to modern/ conventional housing. I believe that one way to a sustainable future is to build sustainable homes which maintain a constant and reifying relationships with the natural world in their very design in the hopes that these lifestyle choices and behaviors would follow the owner into the world. We have all but weened the natural world from our homes. Vynal siding and linoleum flooring allow for the "cookie cutter" aesthetic we have all been looking for right? Design and flow of a house change the way in which it gets used. As well as its materials change personal perceptions. Natural materials require one to realize that the world outside is responsible for creating the world inside, which shelters us from the cold and the wet and provides us a space to live happily and harmoniously.

Concentration Explaination

I am a self designed IDS major focusing on Sustainable Development, Anthropology, and Religion in specific regards to spirituality. After being in the SD program for awhile I recognized a need for a return of those priciples to a humanitarian based application program rather than a focus on economic prosperity and growth. furthermore I realized that personal subjugations to social influences have created a distancing gap between our personage and nature. This gap which I believe is mostly a spiritual one, is not an outright discource in religion, sustainable development, or anthropology and so it was through the intersections of these subjects that I hoped to piece together where our spiritual connections with the world have gone and why in an attempt to bring them back to light and crate a civil space where such conversations about spirituality can blossom.

Welcome

Welcome to my blog everybody!

Hey everybody. Can't wait to see what we all come up with as topics for our capstone projects