Trans-bodies/queering spaces

de Dirk van den Heuvel, Robert Alexander Gorny

This issue of 'Footprint' aims to introduce the latest developments in the field of queer theory into the realm of architecture and urban design, and vice versa, to make architectural and urban design concerns an element of queer studies. Next to uncovering hitherto hidden or repressed histories and practices as part of an agenda of inclusiveness, we consider an introduction of queer theory to architecture as engendering a radical reconceptualisation of the architectural discipline: that is, to upset and replace any conception of architecture as an embodiment of essentialist identities, forms or types, in order to move towards an understanding of architecture as a practice engaged in consistent transformation. Such a reconceptualisation of architecture views difference in terms of process, foregrounds liminal situations, their metamorphosis and transgression. This issue of 'Footprint' aims to introduce the latest developments in the field of queer theory into the realm of architecture and urban design ? and vice versa, to make architectural and urban design concerns an element of queer studies. Next to uncovering hitherto hidden or repressed histories and practices as part of an agenda of inclusiveness, we consider an introduction of queer theory to architecture as engendering a radical reconceptualisation of the architectural discipline: That is, to upset and replace any conception of architecture as an embodiment of essentialist identities, forms or types, in order to move towards an understanding of architecture as a practice engaged in consistent transformation. Such a reconceptualisation of architecture views difference in terms of process, foregrounds liminal situations, their metamorphosis and transgression.