L e c t u r e 3 :

v e r n a c u l a r b u i l t e n v i r o n m e n t
C u l t u r e , P e o p l e a n d t h e V e r n a c u l a r

Built to meet needs: cultural issues in vernacular architecture

Part 1: Defining the Field

Part 2: Cultures and Contexts

Part3: Tradition and Transmission

Part4: Hazards and Dwellings

Part5: Conservation and Continuity

Part6: Suburbs and Self Build

Part7: Meeting the Challenges of 21st century

Culture
"Culture embodies the complexity of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and
emotional features that characterize a society or social group. It includes not only arts
and letters, but also modes of life, fundamental rights of people, their value systems,
traditions and beliefs." In other words, culture is not just about the arts and letters of the
elite society, but it encompasses the ways of ordinary people, how they live, the ways
people feel, the values they hold, and the tradition and beliefs they have. That also
includes the manner in which people build their habitats, and the ways they use the
material and methods within their means, availability and limits.

1982 UNESCO World Conference on Cultural Policies in Mexico


"Traditional architecture is a result of man's elemental needs and his intricate relationship with the
society and the environment he lives in. In other words, it's not only about how people build
dwellings using their own skills and technology but it's also about people's behaviors, customs and
rituals, the way they build in accordance with their beliefs and perhaps with the spirit of the place
and even with the cosmos. To that extent, different cultures or ethnic groups would have their own
ways of building and association with the spiritual world in which they also reside.

Tradition vs. modernity

The simplest definition of tradition is something that has been passed down from one
generation to the other.

Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, in a book called "The Invention of Tradition
"Something becomes traditional when at least it has been passed down among three
generations so that in a sense, once it is in the third generation, it is somewhat displaced
from the first generation that possibly invented it. And it's the invention of tradition
because for anything to become traditional, someone must have thought of it at some
point and time. So in its first occurrence, in its first instance, in its first practice, it was never
tradition, it was in fact an innovation. And it's the innovation that lasts and it's passed
down as expected and is then acquires either value or ascribed with value that becomes
tradition.

We must look
at the vernacular tradition in two distinct aspects:

Tradition as a product
Tradition as a process.

As a product, we see the vernacular buildings; as a process, we see the ways the traditional built
forms are built and handed down from one generation to another.

Challenges and threats to vernacular built environment

Due to the homogenization of culture, and of global socioeconomic
transformation, vernacular structures all around the world are very vulnerable
nowadays, facing serious problems of obsolescence, internal equilibrium and
integration

ICOMOS
International Council On
Monuments And Sites

(1) Unprecedented growth and change i.e. more population concentrating in

cities

"Vernacular building is
the traditional and
natural way by which
communities house
themselves. It is a
c o n t i n u i n g p ro c e s s
including necessary
c h a n g e s a n d
continuous adaptation
as a response to social
and environmental
constraints."

(2) Pressure from competing high value activities i.e. land prices
(3) Impact of major infrastructure programs - that means building more
superhighways, connecting newly developed and urban centers

(4) Environmental pressures i.e. uncontrolled carbon emission and polluted
industrial waste.
(5) Carrying capacity i.e. excessive use of rivers and deforestation for human
habitats.
(6) Human cause - such as war, theft, neglect, illegal trade, public works, and
ignorance.
(7) Natural cause - earthquake, typhoon, flood, tidal wave, humidity, and insects.

Living Traditions
The 20th century great poet T.S. Eliot puts forth a brilliant idea in his book "The Sacred
Wood.
He says, "Tradition...cannot be inherited, and if you want it you must obtain it by great
labor."

Each genera;on must make an eort to reinterpret what that tradi;on means to that genera;on, whose
responsibility is to contribute to sustain the tradi;on.

As the world is geCng more complex and globalized, it seems unlikely to have a more mono-tradi;on in
today's context.

Architectural cri;que William Cur;s adds another dimension to Eliot's thinking and appeals to the modern
architects by saying,
"Tradi;on in the obvious sense of a visible past inheritance can only be partly helpful, for the reality today is
dierent. The architect must nd what is right for the present circumstances and if he is suciently probing
and profound, he will make a valid addi;on to the stock of forms."