Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”

This paper attempts to coin a term “displayness” to emphasis the internal form of spatiotemporal display. In contemporary Asia, its displayness is argued to be the critical dynamics. Noticeably, this displayness implies a postcolonial perspective to question contemporary Asia’s complicated built het...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Francis Chia Hui Lin
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Taylor & Francis Group 2023-03-01
Series:Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering
Subjects:
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13467581.2022.2046000
_version_ 1811154943798673408
author Francis Chia Hui Lin
author_facet Francis Chia Hui Lin
author_sort Francis Chia Hui Lin
collection DOAJ
description This paper attempts to coin a term “displayness” to emphasis the internal form of spatiotemporal display. In contemporary Asia, its displayness is argued to be the critical dynamics. Noticeably, this displayness implies a postcolonial perspective to question contemporary Asia’s complicated built heteroglossia. In other words, due to the inescapable marriage between the external cultural politics and the local essence, the Asian built environment showcases not only a binary identification of these two forces but also an emergent new identity in between, which, arguably, is identifiable of being urban Asian. The commercial exhibitions temporarily built along or within major shopping centres are the examples. This paper intends to face and analyse these temporary and seemingly superficial built objects as representations of the registered historicity of contemporary Asia. This paper analyses selected cases of temporary commercial exhibitions in Singapore and Taiwan which reflect the economic-political intervention into the Asian built environment, both as architectural landmarks and from the collective sense of urbanism. As a methodology, the architectural manifestations delivered as a form of understanding are analysed from the assistance of these temporal exhibitions’ ephemeral character, and this form is argued as a display of contemporary Asia’s postcoloniality reflected through its built historicity.
first_indexed 2024-04-10T04:24:39Z
format Article
id doaj.art-12e077c0629f4ed8943fb6e845cc56fb
institution Directory Open Access Journal
issn 1347-2852
language English
last_indexed 2024-04-10T04:24:39Z
publishDate 2023-03-01
publisher Taylor & Francis Group
record_format Article
series Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering
spelling doaj.art-12e077c0629f4ed8943fb6e845cc56fb2023-03-10T15:09:07ZengTaylor & Francis GroupJournal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering1347-28522023-03-0122239040110.1080/13467581.2022.20460002046000Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”Francis Chia Hui Lin0National Taiwan UniversityThis paper attempts to coin a term “displayness” to emphasis the internal form of spatiotemporal display. In contemporary Asia, its displayness is argued to be the critical dynamics. Noticeably, this displayness implies a postcolonial perspective to question contemporary Asia’s complicated built heteroglossia. In other words, due to the inescapable marriage between the external cultural politics and the local essence, the Asian built environment showcases not only a binary identification of these two forces but also an emergent new identity in between, which, arguably, is identifiable of being urban Asian. The commercial exhibitions temporarily built along or within major shopping centres are the examples. This paper intends to face and analyse these temporary and seemingly superficial built objects as representations of the registered historicity of contemporary Asia. This paper analyses selected cases of temporary commercial exhibitions in Singapore and Taiwan which reflect the economic-political intervention into the Asian built environment, both as architectural landmarks and from the collective sense of urbanism. As a methodology, the architectural manifestations delivered as a form of understanding are analysed from the assistance of these temporal exhibitions’ ephemeral character, and this form is argued as a display of contemporary Asia’s postcoloniality reflected through its built historicity.http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13467581.2022.2046000displaynessurban asiacommercial exhibitionspostcolonialityhistoricity
spellingShingle Francis Chia Hui Lin
Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
Journal of Asian Architecture and Building Engineering
displayness
urban asia
commercial exhibitions
postcoloniality
historicity
title Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
title_full Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
title_fullStr Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
title_full_unstemmed Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
title_short Unfolding the form from within: East and Southeast urban Asia, its postcolonial condition, and its ephemeral architectural “displayness”
title_sort unfolding the form from within east and southeast urban asia its postcolonial condition and its ephemeral architectural displayness
topic displayness
urban asia
commercial exhibitions
postcoloniality
historicity
url http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13467581.2022.2046000
work_keys_str_mv AT francischiahuilin unfoldingtheformfromwithineastandsoutheasturbanasiaitspostcolonialconditionanditsephemeralarchitecturaldisplayness