Research Portfolio Post #7: Qualitative Data Sources

As previously noted, I am proposing to research the reasons behind the deliberate selection of postmodern architectural materials when crafting globally visible buildings because I want to find out how countries’ motivations for using the postmodern style align or differ. This will help my reader understand how architecture is harnessed to evoke a particular identity or message on the world stage. For small-n research design, I have chosen to compare two cases: the Bird’s Nest Olympic Stadium in China and the San Cataldo National Cemetery in Italy. Thus, my research question is: what explains the similarity of the designs of the Bird’s Nest Stadium and the San Cataldo Cemetery? Exploring the causal mechanisms for these striking parallels between the visually similar buildings—in entirely different countries, constructed in entirely different decades—will help me to conclude the similar reasons, employed by both countries, that postmodernism is used. (I have used Kurt Weyland’s research on the Arab Spring and the revolutions of 1848 as a model for this comparison.[1])

I have modified the dependent variable for qualitative research. The dependent variable is now the outcome, or the presence, or selection, of postmodernism as the style for the globally visible landmark. The other outcome, or potential value the dependent variable could take, would be the absence of postmodernism, or the selection of another style. Thus, for these two particular cases, the outcome is the same, and in my research, other variables and their indicators will help me to figure out why.

There are existing bodies of scholarship that have determined what makes a building postmodern, thus leading to the outcome of “present” postmodern style. It is important to note that not all of the features of postmodernism identified are necessary for a building to be considered postmodern, so I have selected the three most distinctive features from scholarship as indicators, which are bulleted below. The existing body of scholarship I have used that has helped me to determine the key features of postmodernism is Robert Venturi’s book Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture, published in 1996.[2] (The publishing year is important because it demonstrates that postmodernism had already gained traction as an architectural movement throughout the 1970s, and this book was a compilation of its most prominent features not in its conception and nascence but in its peak, after it had already been around for two decades.) In this book, Venturi identifies “the manipulation of beams, mostly steel… twisted and contorted,” “odd silhouettes or ground plans straying from the traditional….” and “a noted tension between, and somehow a seamless blending of, a country’s past and present”[3] as the most important features of postmodernism.

I have used the primary source of the images and architectural plans of the Bird’s Nest stadium[4] and San Cataldo cemetery[5] that have been made available since the buildings have finished construction. This primary source helps me to determine whether the following features of postmodernism are present, as operationalized by the existing research I will cover below:

  • The presence or absence of steel cantilevered beams
  • The presence or absence of an asymmetrical silhouette (no clean, square lines; instead, oddly-shaped ceilings and walls to create a whimsical exterior profile)
  • At least one architectural element from the historical period (the element is specific to, and varies depending on, that country—China’s historical architecture does not have the same elements as Italy’s) integrated into the postmodern design

For reference, here is one image of the architectural plan for the San Cataldo cemetery, which helps me to see that there was, indeed, the presence of an asymmetrical and unusual silhouette (a conical, triangular tower surrounded and offset by a cube-shaped ossuary).[6]

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

“Beijing National Stadium, The Bird’s Nest.” DesignBuild Network, Projects, Plans. https://www.designbuild-network.com/projects/national_stadium/

Kurt Weyland, “The Arab Spring: Why the Surprising Similarities with the Revolutionary Wave of 1848?” Perspectives on Politics 10, no. 4 (December 2012): 917–34.

“San Cataldo Cemetery / Aldo Rossi for ArchEyes.” ArchEyes Architectural Plans, December 21, 2016. http://archeyes.com/san-cataldo-cemetery-aldo-rossi/#targetText=The San Cataldo Metropolitan Cemetery.

Venturi, Robert, and Vincent Scully. Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. London: Butterworth Architecture, 1996.

[1] Kurt Weyland, “The Arab Spring: Why the Surprising Similarities with the Revolutionary Wave of 1848?” Perspectives on Politics 10, no. 4 (December 2012): 917–34.

[2] Venturi, Robert, and Vincent Scully. Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. London: Butterworth Architecture, 1996.

[3] Venturi, Robert, and Vincent Scully. Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. London: Butterworth Architecture, 1996, 45-46.

[4] “Beijing National Stadium, The Bird’s Nest.” DesignBuild Network, Projects, Plans. https://www.designbuild-network.com/projects/national_stadium/

[5] “San Cataldo Cemetery / Aldo Rossi for ArchEyes.” ArchEyes Architectural Plans, December 21, 2016. http://archeyes.com/san-cataldo-cemetery-aldo-rossi/#targetText=The San Cataldo Metropolitan Cemetery.

[6] Ibid.

Research Portfolio Post #6: Quantitative Data Sources

I am proposing to research the reasons behind the deliberate selection of postmodern architectural materials when crafting cultural landmarks because I want to find out how they are used as a diplomatic tool of soft power. This will help my reader understand how architecture is harnessed to evoke a national identity on the world stage. Thus, my research question is: what explains variation in the use of postmodern architectural materials when crafting globally visible buildings?

It would be most useful to create my own dataset for this research question. The dependent variable is architectural material, which would be operationalized as the frequency with which the material appears in a large number of buildings. The buildings are the cases. One option is to measure how much of the building is composed of a particular postmodern material (buildings that are 95% steel, an industrial material, and 5% colored glass, a postmodern material, for example, probably wouldn’t tell us much about postmodern influence, so it may be prudent to make the distinction), but because data of this sort is scarce, it makes more sense to simply measure how often these materials appear across many architectural structures. The dependent variable could take the form of stone, colored glass, ceramics, or cantilevered beams, and the level of measurement would be the percent of buildings composed partially or fully of this material–thus, the level of measurement would be nominal. I could also–I believe–group certain buildings into categories of percentages (0-25% postmodern material, 26-50%, etc.), to make it an interval level of measurement.

What I am hoping to do is consider all of these materials- glass, ceramics, etcetera- as mere variations on one dependent variable (postmodern material), rather than multiple dependent variables, although I am unsure if this is possible.

One existing dataset I would use to compile this information would be the Historic American Buildings Landscape dataset, which I accessed through ICPSR, which gathered information from blueprints, photographs, and written descriptions of American architectural spaces to evaluate the color choice and material choice used in each.[1] This would not be sufficient on its own, of course—I would, ideally, like to find similar data sets for multiple regions of the world.

The dataset uses 40,000 buildings and structures, and, among other information, lists the materials of which they are composed, measured qualitatively in large groupings like “glass,” “concrete,” “steel,” and “wood.”[2] I would operationalize these by measuring, once again, the frequency with which the materials—specifically the materials identified by scholars as postmodern—appear, and then transform those into percentages. For example, I would determine a way to measure all of the times that “glass” appears as a material, and begin to ask questions such as, “Glass appears 40% of the time in American postmodern spaces. What is alike or different about those spaces (independent variables) that may have caused this choice to be made?”

The dataset is limited both temporally and geographically: it doesn’t cover anything after the year 2000, and although it covers many buildings from the 1500s and onwards, I cannot use most of these, as they would not be classified as ‘postmodern.’ Thus, I am limited to using the data from 1960-2000, which, although still a wealth of data, is not nearly as rich as the 40,000 potential structures covered by the entire data set. The dataset also focuses specifically on American postmodern spaces, and while I may recognize later on that I need to confine my statistical research design to a particular region of the world, I have not settled on one yet, and therefore, I would need more datasets to compile this information. If postmodernism is especially rich in Western Europe, for example, I would rather pivot to that region and search for data collected on postmodern materials there (although I struggled to find this data for this particular post, which tells me it may not be out there). Finally, as aforementioned, the dataset is limited in that it doesn’t provide any information on how much of the building is composed of that particular material, which I would find more helpful and thorough than just knowing that the material is present.

[1] “Historic American Buildings Survey/Historic American Engineering Record.” Washington, D.C., U.S. Dept. of the Interior, National Park Service, Cultural Resources, 1994. 5, 45.

[2] Ibid, 5.