Probing the Terrain: Architectures of Control and Uncertainty in the Occupied Palestinian Territories
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Book chapter › Research › peer-review
Whether manifest in built structures or invisible infrastructures, architectures of control in the occupied Palestinian West Bank is structurally defined by endemic uncertainty. Shifting lines and frontiers are recorded on the terrain, creating elastic zones of uncertainty necessitating navigational agility in everyday life conduct. The essay presents the case of the covert building of a chicken farm and house-to-become, where Palestinian landowner HH speculates in the territorial uncertainty and potential flexibility of the line dividing Area B from Area C, crossing his plot. HH’s disguised building efforts illustrates how different architectures of control come together to inform a practice of navigating unstable conditions by deploying the mental attitude of mētis, akin to but not identical with Henri Lefebvre’s notion of tactics. By giving an account of how flexibility adheres to the territory through its lines and laws, and how the very structure of the occupation has changed over the years, I seek to make visible the ways in which architectures of uncertainty compensate for the fleeting terrain that HH is probing.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Architecture and Control |
Editors | Annie Ring, Henriette Steiner, Kristin Eva Albrechtsen Veel |
Number of pages | 21 |
Place of Publication | Leiden |
Publisher | Brill |
Publication date | Jan 2018 |
Pages | 87-107 |
ISBN (Print) | 978-90-04-35560-6 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 978-90-04-35562-0 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Jan 2018 |
Series | Architectural Intelligences |
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Volume | 1 |
ISSN | 2452-2481 |
ID: 162325171