Architectural design and the fashionable disdain for domesticity

This article is an exploration of domesticity as the concept exists at the borders of educational theory and architectural design. The core understanding that grounds this brief discussion is that dominant ideology, the socially-created hegemonic value system that constrains discussion, explanations and alternatives, impacts all fields of human endeavor. Consequently we can find expressive and substantive analogs in seemingly disconnected arenas of praxis. For example, Jane Roland Martin, a feminist educational philosopher, argues that the conspicuous absence of domesticity from contemporary schooling is at the heart of many of the educational problems we face as a society. Similarly, Stanley Allen, Dean of Architecture of Princeton University, spoke about the challenges he and his wife faced in converting a recently purchased farm into their home. He spoke of the difficulty in infusing a sense of domesticity into the new design.What role, if any, should domesticity play in the shaping of spaces of learning?

Volume Editors
Marilys R. Nepomechie & Robert Gonzalez

ISBN
0-935502-54-8