My belief is that in the anthropocene, buildings should be more than sustainable objects, they should be able to communicate/convey important connections (and the importance of connections) between users and global systems. These connections are varied and multifaceted. They are connections between user actions and ecological impacts. Connections between materials and human health. Connections between markets and products and consumption. Connections between politics, ethics, ontology, epistemology, built form, building codes, and so much more. How to convey the connections between users and global systems is first and foremost a design challenge. Determining which connections are important to highlight is a philosophical, ethical, and political challenge.
In his Gifford Lectures Bruno Latour argued for the importance of understanding connections in the anthropocene, and he gave an example of how design can communicate the feeling of connection between individual and environment. Buildings, as designed environments, are suitable for this task, especially since we spend so much time in them, interacting with them and the people and systems inside and outside of (connected to) the space.
Often times we take the idea of dwelling for granted, especially as something good. What is dwelling? Why is it important? Why is the question “how are we to dwell in the anthropocene” so popular? Is dwelling what we need in the anthropocene? Or should we abandon the concept in favor of more nomadic predilections? I think dwelling is important for the anthropocene because it evokes an idea of something more than survival. Of course we want our species and other species to survive in the anthropocene. The anthropocene can be considered descriptive of a time of massive extinction, a time when changing climatic, social, political conditions threaten life as we know it.
But we also want more than to merely survive in the anthropocene. Maybe that’s why we should focus on dwelling in our new epoch. To me, dwelling implies contentment, security, persistence and perseverance. Martin Heidegger argues that dwelling is something humans always need to learn. It’s a process, and a state of mind. Dwelling, Heidegger says, is part and parcel of building. “We do not dwell because we build or have built, but we build and have built because we dwell.” Furthermore, Heidegger claims the feeling of homelessness is abated by dwelling, and additionally feeling homeless is the impetus to build and dwell. That is, as soon as we attempt to address the feeling of homelessness we learn to dwell.
So how can we learn to dwell in the anthropocene?
I believe understanding, feeling, and thinking about the connections between individuals and global systems is a path towards dwelling in the anthropocene. The world in the anthropocene (read: a world of unpredictability and unprecedented challenges such as global climate change, resource scarcity, etc.) may be of our own creation (burning fossil fuels, deforestation, etc.) but it is certainly not of our own design. We may feel homeless in this time of climate change and socio-political upheaval and displacement. Thinking about dwelling in the anthropocene can be spurred through designing our buildings in such ways as to convey the connections between individuals and global systems. This sense of homelessness is tied to changes in global environmental conditions (atmospheric Co2, etc.) that may render Earth inhospitable (or significantly less hospitable), especially because it’s not what our species is used to from the Holocene. However, we can design our immediate environments (houses, schools, office buildings, etc.) in ways that make us think about, feel connected to (and even at home in) these large and changing global systems that may feel alien, foreign, new, frightening, etc. That is the type of thinking and building for dwelling we need to learn in the anthropocene.