CONSERVING THE HETEROGENEOUS IDENTITY : ACTIVATING SPACES OF COLLECTIVE MEMORY

Abstract

The extensive daily interactions that humans are involved in with the urban built environment facilitate communities to localise memories in places. The city therefore develops as a locus of collective memory, wherein the physical environment translates to a more intangible notion of identity that is rooted in communities. Conservation, within the urban flux of developmental change, seeks to materialise in form this cultural identity that is essentially immaterial. Here, we are able to identify a pendulum relationship between architecture and memory, manifesting itself in a cycle of material-immaterial-material transformations. Yet, the diversity of spatial encounters emerges from the varied user interactions within spaces that evoke different levels of attachment to places and textures of memories. The sense of a place changes for each group of individuals – owners, residents, locals, foreigners, etc. So how do our urban planning models encompass this heterogeneity? Planning systems are examined through the lens of Gidden’s theory of Structuration, which explores the duality of social systems evolving from the interaction of structures (rules and resources) and agents (human action). Through the critical analysis of both positions – state authorities as social structures and communities as active agents, the studies evaluate the relationship between policies and a transpiring collective memory. This dissertation hypothesises that the manicuring of Singapore’s urban environment through its planning objectives stifles the layered realities of collective memory. Using Balestier Road and Haji Lane as case studies, the research expounds the complexities of the metaphysical social patterns that take place in the context of two local streets. Observations of quotidian culture reveal the natural patterns of local customs, juxtaposed against the idealised approach to urban rejuvenation. A ground-up approach is adopted in investigating the pluralities of collective memory through the objectives and roles of various users in society. The studies consequently put forward the vision of a holistic system that incorporates the dualities of history and memory, as well as the heterogeneous qualities of identity.