Griffiths, Sam; Quick, Tom; (2005) How the individual, society and space become structurally coupled over time. In: Van Nes, Akkelies, (ed.) Proceedings of the 5th International Space Syntax Symposium. (pp. pp. 447-458). Techne Press: Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

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Abstract

How are we to understand the ambiguous nature of a space: the simultaneous possibility of standing still, moving around it or moving through it? To answer this question requires ‘seeing’ the configuration through the eyes of the human subject. Taking the phenomenological formulation of the subjective ‘lifeworld’ and bringing to it our knowledge of spatial properties identified by space syntax techniques, it becomes possible to conceive of an individual’s interpretative horizon as possessing an identifiable morphology, developed historically through situated social practices, which brings forth reality for the embodied subject. Space syntax theory rejects the man-environment paradigm, positing instead an emergent socio-spatial configuration that generates the co-presence and movement necessary for social existence. However, the question of precisely how the human subject engages in re-embodying the spatial configuration remains opaque. One reason for this is the absence of a clear understanding of what it is meant by ‘embodiment’ in space. Consequently, the generative, ‘bottom-up’ nature of the spatial configuration appears absent from analyses more concerned with its top-down functioning. In effect this privileges the structural and generic over the historical and contingent aspects of the space-society relation. This paper reasserts the role of the individual actor embodied in space. We present an empirically grounded definition of ‘embodiment’ based on information theory and structural coupling to provide a bottom-up account of the emergent congruence between space, the individual and society. Embodiment, so defined, implies that human subjects’ relation with their ‘environment’ is multi-faceted; that the emergence of a relational socio-spatial system consists of agents coupling with the environment and with each other, developing relationships through the transformation of their internal structures.

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