Archive for the 'Books' Category

One of the best book I red this summer is Daniel Pennac’s “La fée carabine” (The fairy Gunmother), where he depicts the story of Benjamin Malaussène. He is a professional scapegoat, and his brood of eccentric siblings, a very smelly epileptic dog and a gang of adopted grandads who he and his family are trying to wean off smack. Like all crime novels, nasty things happen to people ( a nazi cop gets his face blown off by a little old lady; a serial killer is going around cutting throats) but the main theme of the book is that people are all right really.

One of my favorite quote is this one:

Io che sono piuttosto loquace amo parlare del silenzio. Quando il vero silenzio cala là dove uno non se lo aspetta, si sente che l’uomo riconsidera l’uomo da capo a piedi, ed è bello.

NV Swith. Mutual Knowledge. Academic Press, 1982

This book should contain the discussion that Sperber&Wilson had with Clark about the critics they raised on the Contribution Model and proposing the Relevance Theory. I am looking forward to read it.

Mind in Society: The Development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.

Stuart Hall

Title:
Minimal Selves

Published in:
Black British Cultural Studies: A Reader

Edited by:
Houston A. Baker, Jr., Manthia Diawara, Ruth H. Lindeborg, eds

Place:
Chicago/London

Publisher:
University of Chicago Press

Year:
1996

Synopsis:
Referring to his own experiences as a black migrant in Britain, Stuart Hall tries to define the notion of identity within the postmodern context. He regards the recent movement from ‘nationalism’ to ‘ethnicity’ in Britain as part of a new politics.

The manner in which global trends affect cities and increase the instability in local environments with their own dynamics, is like letting a rising river loose on a house. Global trends create urban flotsam. Urban flotsam and its complex dynamics form a second skin of the earth. How is this second skin visible and how can it be put to use in the quest for new urban planning tools and policies? Who gives it form and sustains its organization? ‘Urban Flotsam’ is a book that attempts to answer these questions through examples, but in doing so it postulates the need for a more consistent way of answering them. The book addresses this need through the formation of an outline for a methodology. This methodology consists of four major parts: 1. How to see manifestations of global influences on local environments? 2. How to model them? 3. How to develop and communicate scenarios on the basis of this knowledge? 4. How to implement scenarios? The book contains a manifesto for a general debate of these issues, a more poetic setting of the theme of the second skin of the earth as urban phenomenon, short theoretical introductions to individual issues, case studies undertaken in urban situations and didactic exercises to demonstrate the need for research in a pedagogical context. The book is the first major publication by Chora architecture and urbanism, an independent research laboratory. Chora has built up a body of knowledge and experience through workshops, commissions, teaching and self-initiated studies which has led to the formulation of the methodology and practice outlined in ‘Urban Flotsam’. Chora postulates that drastic reforms or innovations are necessary within the practice and education of architecture, urban design and urban planning in order to meet the challenges of the second skin and the demands of its inhabitants. Together with the artist Jeanne van Heeswijk it calls for a new practice called ‘urban curation’.

Chora / Raoul Bunschoten, Uitgeverij 010/ 010publishers, 446 p, fl. 137,73
ISBN 90 6450 387 7

Hall, Edward T. The Hidden Dimension. 1969. Anchor Books Editions, 1990.

Hall examines the various cultural concepts of space and how differences among them affect modern society. The Hidden Dimension demonstrates how man’s use of space can affect personal and business relations, cross-cultural exchanges, architecture, city planning, and urban renewal. Illustrated.

Paperback 184 pages (17 April, 1986)
Publisher: Routledge, an imprint of Taylor & Francis Books Ltd; ISBN: 0045260028
Seller: ubdirect
Comments: Good – Publisher: Pelican
Date of Publication: 1974
Binding: paperback

This book conveys some very complex engineering concepts in a way so clear and concise that even my second-graders understood them. It’s not just for the littles, either — it’s excellent for opening up avenues of discussion and exploration for older children as well. This is an excellent companion book to the Architecture And Children program, or any course of study that requires an understanding of the concepts of structure and function.