Architectural Resistance. On the Perspective of a Practice-Theoretical, Pragmatist Sociology of Architecture

Abstract

How deep is the impact of architecture in social practices and how can this be analyzed? In this contribution, the methodological question of reconstructing practical knowledge in dealing with the built environment in everyday life is the central focus. By combining practice-theoretical and pragmatic approaches, a proposal is made to summarize this theoretically. Based on an ethnographic study of architectural experience in everyday working life, two dimensions of experience are revealed as the essential basis for a practical knowledge of architecture: first, the situational dynamization of work processes through irritations or disturbances (the obstructed view, the drowning out acoustics), which requires an adaptation of practiced sequences of action; second, it is the uniform and routine affect of everyday practice that appears in the casually pleasant or casually unpleasant in everyday work. This is an empirical contribution to a practical-theoretical discussion of architecture in the workplace.