Fuhrmeister, Christian; Hess, Regine ; Platzer, Monika (Eds.), Rassismus in der Architektur / Racism in Architecture, kritische berichte, Zeitschrift für Kunst- und Kulturwissenschaft, Nr. 3, Jg. 49, 2021.
Racisms, ideologies, and power relations have become everyday topics of public debates also in the cultural sphere. Within these discursive processes, racism plays a key role: for European and non-European civil societies and actors, in research and teaching, in curatorial practices, in institutions and organizations, in discussing and writing, and in dealing with the past and the present.
Against this background, this issue gathers contributions that document critical thinking and expand our knowledge and thus can contribute to reflection. By renegotiating historical and current positions, constructs, practices, and narratives, we deliberately engage this debate in the field of architecture and public space: to what extent have racism and structural violence influenced architectural theory? In which areas of architecture and urbanism did and does racism leave its mark? How can architectural history be deconstructed anti-racistically?
By focusing on societies, we ask which forces can influence and shape creative work in architecture. At the same time, we need to address the part that our disciplines, professions, institutions, and organizations play in structural racism in science and society: How do our conscious and unconscious canons contribute to these tensions and injustices? Which mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion do we reflect, and which do we fail to reflect?