About

This research proposes a methods based approach to exploring how spaces and places can be read paratactically, over the architectural tradition of reading them syntactically, which postulates hierarchical narratives and dominant understandings of space. As such this proposal challenges and subverts dominant cultural and historical narratives of architectural and urban spaces highlighting minority experiences. Understood in this research as a method that explores the multiplicity of non-hierarchical narratives of a place, paratactical methodologies respond to multidisciplinary calls to move beyond grand theories and prevailing histories of space, identifying the multifarious other experiences of place - including the experiences of minorities - and of life seen from the everyday, through practices, performances and embodiment. 

While expanding the architectural discipline’s repertoire of analytical and creative tools for tracing notions and narratives of place, this proposal will address a theoretical problem that remains at the core of the intersections between philosophy and architectural theory and criticism: to create an object-oriented architecture that is ‘grounded’ in material design practices. Contributing to this line of thought, this research will focus on Dawson's Heights Estate, a beacon for debates on social housing and urban histories within London. The research will deploy practice-based and qualitative analysis methods: creative writing, supported by historical-archival investigation and discourse analysis, and the creation of experimental ethnographic films as media for the exploration of the relationships between place and narrative. Beyond contributing to the scholarly works of object-oriented ontology, urban studies and speculative realism, this research would contribute to situated knowledge in the design practice of place-making that can unveil and celebrate non-dominant narratives and histories. Producing methodologies that can be employed as effective tools to redefine how humans situate themselves in city spaces, it highlights minority narratives of these places whilst helping define their cultural significance.