Negotiating Contested Zones: A Post-Tourist Vision of Famagusta
Open Access
- Author:
- Palate, Savia
- Graduate Program:
- Architecture
- Degree:
- Master of Architecture
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- March 31, 2014
- Committee Members:
- Jawaid Haider, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
- Keywords:
- conflict
contested zones
borders
boundaries
urban design
famagusta - Abstract:
- This thesis focuses on an emergent urbanism, one that negotiates the contradictory and seemingly incompatible environments of military and tourism as they are interpreted in Famagusta, Cyprus. The unique characteristics of Famagusta invite research into an alternative reading of urbanism: On one hand, it represents a so-called ghost town marked by an amalgamation of borders and boundaries, and on the other hand, the persistent image of a cosmopolitan tourist resort seems to be the only common story between the two contested communities. What are the spatial preconditions necessary to reshape resistant and tenacious environments into adaptable and negotiable zones? In exploring this question, this thesis hypothesizes that contested zones require the development of a framework for solutions given the situation’s uncertainty and the unpredictability of human behavior. This suggested design framework is based on a re-interpretation of Richard Sennett’s paradigm on the distinction between borders and boundaries. Space develops as an experimental device examining the effects of incremental changes, a relationship between action and reaction over time, rather than one fixed plan. This thesis was conducted through the layering of three main lenses: (1) the History Lens, which investigates the power of institutional decisions to form, organize, and control spaces; (2) the Border and Boundary Lens, which explores society’s paradoxical tendency to persistently preserve parts of history that cause feelings of hatred, processes of forced displacement, and spatial division; and (3) the Transgression Lens, which examines the way grassroots actors are inspired from the movements of tourists in space and adapt themselves to take advantage of conflict conditions. Tourism and the survival needs of grassroots actors come to soothe the predominant image of space as a conflict zone. Three case studies related to tourist operations a) the Viewpoints, b) the Tours, and c) the Palm Beach Hotel explicitly depict how before breaking the law, there are many shades of legality that architects should observe when leading themselves to creative design processes. This thesis develops a strategy for negotiating space to convert a spatial disadvantage into an advantage by unfolding creative forces hidden behind contested zones. The complex urban conditions of contested zones and fields of tension represent a microcosm of contemporary reality, where borders and boundaries are the inevitable nature of architecture. The insistence of architects to re-design borders in conflict spaces and other impoverished social conditions demands architects to take the role of a co-designer along with institutions and grassroots actors.