Buildings as Classifying Devices

Abstract

Buildings are primarily social objects. They carry meanings for society in general, and occupants and users in particular, which relate to asymmetries of power. Amongst the control mechanisms used by building owners or sponsors to carry those meanings which reproduce their own power is the use of language. Texts are used both to describe buildings, and to prescribe them; prescriptive texts are today's functional ‘briefs’. Some texts of both the first Industrial Revolution and of today are examined, to show how one of their primary purposes is to create linguistic classifications of objects, people, and activities such that the space of the building ultimately becomes an embodiment of these classification systems. The exemplars include museums, libraries, art galleries, lunatic asylums, and housing.

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