Additional Readings on Urbanism and Place-Making

Reading Questions

 

I.                    Mike Davis, City of Quartz: excerpt (HCC Reader, pp. 102-105)

 

  1. According to Mike Davis, what is the “zeitgeist of urban restructuring” in the 1990s in Los Angeles? (“Zeitgeist” means “spirit of the age,” identifying characteristic.) (p. 102)

 

  1. What according to Mike Davis is the fate of street life in Los Angeles in the 1990s?  What are the architectural features of public space? (p. 104)

 

 

 

II.                 Alain de Botton, The Architecture of Happiness: excerpt (HCC Reader, pp. 106-113)

 

  1. What do you think Alain de Botton means when he says that “buildings speak”? (p. 106)
  2. Do glasses also speak?
  3. What does Albert Speer’s German pavilion for the World’s Fair of 1937 communicate?

 

 

III.               William J. Mitchell, “Poison Ivy” (HCC Reader, pp. 114-116)

 

  1. Why does William J. Mitchell prefer Simmons Hall, a new building designed by architect Steven Holl for MIT, to various examples of “Collegiate Gothic”?

 

 

 

IV.              Malcolm Gladwell, “Designs for Working” (HCC Reader, pp. 117-18)

 

  1. According to Malcolm Gladwell, how is a large office environment like a neighborhood?

 

 

Discussion Questions

1. Use one of these short readings to analyze a built environment that you navigate everyday (your dorm; the UCI campus; your home neighborhood; a shopping center; a work environment.) Why did you choose the text you did to analyze this particular space?

 

2. Malcolm Gladwell applies Jane Jacob’s ideas about the successful sidewalk to a very different kind of space: the large office environment. Can you apply Jane Jacobs  to some other environment (your dorm, the UCI student center, a bookstore, a large restaurant or club, etc.)?

 

3. Write a counter-argument to Mike Davis using an example of what you see as a successful public space in Los Angeles.

 

4. Alain de Botton compares buildings to animals and people. Choose a building you either love or hate and write a similar comparison. What vision of happiness or the good life does this building try to communicate?