Joutrnal of Cuirriculu n Theorizing, Fall 2004

, Ardbitectureanb tbe Poetics of curriculum

Munir VellaniUniversity of British Columbia

1. Not Just a Wall

In May of 1981, after reviewing 1,421 entries, the eight-member jury ofarchitects and sculptors announced the winner of the national Vietnam VeteransMemorial competition as Maya Ying Lin, a twenty-one-year-old Yale architecturestudent. Her deceptively simple and unconventional extended V-shape designbrought to sharp relief the emotions, pain, frustrations, and hopes of a country tomby the Vietnam legacy, leaving the young student fending for herself in the middleof a maelstrom. Amidst the enraged debates-for some she was Asian American,others saw her as a woman and an amateur, and for many the design did not appearto honour the courageous soldiers-MayaLin resolutely defendedheryision and themetaphors that had driven her design:

I thought about what death is, what a loss is. A sharp pain that lessens with time,but can never quite heal over. A scar. The idea occurred to me there on the site. Takea knife and cut open the earth, and with time the grass would heal it.'

It is often the case that one has to build a work of architecture and have peopleuse or visit it before the symbolic value can be interpreted and understood. With thepassing of years, the storm subsided and what emerged has become, arguably, the"greatest aesthetic achievement in an American public monument in the 20thcentury."2 The memorial Wall that geometrically divides, has now become aunifying force-a national gravestone, an occasion of goodwill, and the country'smost poignant shrine. It seems to serve the needs of a variety of audiencessimultaneously: Casual visitors, tourists, families, and school children who have nopersonal or direct connection to the war; relations who have felt the pain of theVietnam war vicariously; ordinary soldiers, some still inexperienced, bonded in aspecial relationship to their comrades; and the veterans themselves for whom the

7

Architectuire and the Poetics of Curriculum

Wall stands as more than a monument. To each the Wall cashes in surpluses ofmeanings.

The origin of the word, monument, comes from the Latin word monere, whichin addition to meaning, "remind, wam, advise," can also mean to "admonish."3 Themetaphors that Maya Lin worked with seem to bring all four functions of themonument to bear upon the visitors in different ways as they see their reflections onthe polished black granite wall on which more than 58,000 names are inscribed inchronological order. Lin wanted it that way, to remember the passing of time, fromthe firstfatality in 1959 to the last, in 1975. The scale of the collective loss is almostunbearable. Tears flow naturally. The casual visitor bears the brunt of all fourfunctions ofthe monument, but especially the one that reminds-and makes a pleanot to forget. The mere presence of the Wall accomplishes this task. And then as thetourist or a parent brushes with the soldiers and the veterans, the reminders slide intoguilt, perhaps even fear, and a waming creeps in. Questions arise: What was all thisfor? What values matter and are worth defending? What constitutes an enemy? Or,a friend. Who are these men and women-ones who have left us and the ones whohave come to remembertheirfallen comrades? What stories remain untold? Who amI? At the apex of the Wall, all visitors are nearly ten feet below ground. IHere thepower of another hidden metaphor, carefully configured in the architecture, slowlyworks upon the visitors and a feeling ofbeing at nearly the same level as a commongrave gradually admonishes and counsels-Life is fragile!

Maya Lin's edifice is as much a monument as it is a text, an experiential space,and a narrative that communicates a particular story to each who graces the Wall.The metaphor of a knife that cuts open the earth that eventually heals the pain keepsthe metaphoric function alive. The human presence advances the metaphor'spurpose. The Wall speaks many languages and offers many pathways for self-understanding. Lin had somehow captured in her work what was already narrativelyprefigured atthe site and offered itbackto those who needed it: "I didn'twanta staticobject that people would just look at, but something they could relate to as on ajoumey, or passage, that would bring each to his own conclusion."4 As the visitorsslowly make their way up the slope on either side, refigured in some way, carryinga sense of closure, Lin's metaphors do not let go. They persist just as all goodmetaphors are supposed to. There is, yet, more to be understood and more to be felt.Almost as a parting gift for later reflection, the two ends of the Wall, beforedissolvingbackinto the earth, determinedlypoint to the Washington Monument andthe Lincoln Memorial in the distance. The commemoration is not just about deathand the soldiers we lost, but about trusteeship of life-of all life.

2. A Preliminary Hypothesis

My aim in this paper is to explore a preliminary hypothesis: The fields ofarchitecture and curriculum are driven by analogous kinds of discourses and

8

practices. That, however, may be saying too much. To narrow the scope, I will focusmy hypothesis on the less obvious and elusive figurative work within the respectivediscourse andpractice-workthatis donebymetaphorandmimesis. In architecture,the figurativeworkofmetaphors andmimesis is intangible yetpowerfullypresent-in the way architects use these to structure, imagine, and drive concepts and designs;in the way they are used to understand space, time, and nature in terms of humandwelling; and in the way human-made edifices get built, inhabited, and ultimately,interpreted by various users. A similar play of metaphors and mimesis also work inthinking, planning and making curriculum, although the eventual "edifice" or"plan," bears little resemblance to the edifices of architecture. Metaphors, innocentor contrived, often drive curriculum design work and theorizing, and much of whateventually gets called as curriculum-itself a metaphor-is underwritten by moremetaphors and a mimetic process that maps our interpretation and understanding ofthe concept, and subjective experience called, education. 5

A four-fold wager will guide my hypothesis: First, architecture as discourse,and as a preeminent act of human creativity may offer us insights into our ownunderstanding of curriculum, and the work we do as curricularists. Here, botharchitecture and curriculum are understood as interpretive works of human making.By curricularists, I will begin by employing a narrow interpretation to include thoseinvolved in theorizing, planning, and implementing of curriculum. Later, I willpropose a more inclusive interpretation of this term. Second, the insights offered bythe two discourses are propelled by figures of language that do the necessary workofopeningupnewworlds andthrustingforwardoursocial andconceptualimaginaire.Third, the practices of architecture and curriculum involve more thanjust designingand developing drawings, models, and plans. If architects are looked upon as poetsand sculptors of space with human-made edifices as the poetic outcome, thencurricularists mustbe poets and sculptors of humanpraxis with (noble) human deedsas the poetic outcome. Fourth, the plurivocity and inclusivity of interlocutors incurriculum discourse celebrate difference, and must be encouraged; they providesemantic innovations by way ofimetaphoricalutterances andnarrativity that elevateour understanding of curriculum, our practices, and ultimately, education.

The pathways that are followed herein, will from time to time invite thehermeneutical insights of Paul Ricoeur's theories of metaphor and narrative. ForRicoeur, metaphor is more than just the displacement of meanings at the level ofwords. Metaphor, by creating a semantic clash or dissonance at the level of thesentence, invites interpretation at the level of discourse-one that attempts to solvean enigma that the juxtaposition of the two meanings has created for the interlocu-tors. In this sense, metaphoric language is the "soul" of interpretation and is as muchabout the "seeing-as" of something, as it is about the "seeing-as-not." Ricoeurunderstands this aspect of metaphor as one that elevates the level of discourse at theconceptual level by making what is being said as a contingent affair-a dynamictension ofbeing and not-being, which in tum provokes mimesis forward to become

Mutnir Vellani 9

Archtitecture and the Poetics of Crurriculdun

plot and a reference of human action. Metaphorical discourse brings back ourbelonging to a world. It invites us to do hermeneutics.

3. Metaphors We Build by

What do architects make when they do architecture? What do curricularistsmake when they do curriculum? Both questions at first sight offer little in terms ofa viable correspondence. In simple and tangible terms, architects as practitionersmake drawings of functional buildings and landscapes within given spaces and forgiven users. They also philosophize, theorize and every so oftenbrowbeat and scoffat each other as they mediate their ideas between form and function; curricularistsas practitioners, on the other hand, make functional education plans in given spacesand for given users. They are equally not to be out done in their efforts tophilosophize, theorize, and browbeat and scoff at each other as they mediate theirideas between form and function. And no sooner do I say this that an intuition ofconnectionbegins to appear. So let me dig a little deeper. Take, for example, the twoquotes below:

What are the tasks of a theorist of architecture? As is true of all theorists his (sic)task is to lay bare the structure of his being-in-the-world and to articulate thisstructure through the language and the environmental forms that he creates. Hisresponsibility is forthe forms thathe creates anduses, thattheymightbe controlledby him rather than controlling him. It is necessary that he be conscious of the man-made equipment (sic), his language, his environmental forms. To be aware oftheseman-made forms is to be aware of their history, of their sources in human activityand intention, and continually to subj ect them to empirical and social criticism thatthey be not idols but evolving tools. All architects attempt to shape the world;theorists should call attention to the tools used for the shaping in order that theworld being shaped can be more beautiful and just.

How curricularists construct an understanding of the social world and how thatconstruct affects possibilities for practice are pivotal concerns for curricuilaristswho seek to challenge the status quo, construct new social formations and newidentities, and help reconstruct a viable democratic public life in the face ofinexorable forces driving economic growth, destroying global ecology, homog-enizing culture, and privatizing the public realm...The making of curriculum is asocial practice; it is unavoidably an epistemological activity. Thus to makecurriculum is to construct knowledge, to build vision ...to construct consciousnessthrough lived experience.

It is striking that the two quotes draw upon similar kinds of spatial metaphorsto predicate an action of some sort-metaphors such as: "structure," "forms,""formations," "environmental forms," "pivotal," "man-made equipment," "evolv-ing tools," "construct," "creates," "shape," "making," "inexorable forces," "build,"etc. Now, considerthatthe first quote is actuallyby curriculumtheorist and educator,

10

Dwayne Huebner. 6 In order to make my point, I have taken the liberty of replacinghis words, "curriculum theorists" with "theorists of architecture," and the words"all educators" with "all architects." The second quote is by Thomas Dutton andLian Hurst Mann, both architects and theorists of architecture.7 Here, their words"architects" and "architecture" have been replaced by "curricularists" and "cur-riculum" respectively.

It would appear from the quotes that these theorists across the two fields arespeaking the same language, in the sense of discourse-'--discourse that not only has aworldthatis referredto, butalso asharedinterlocutor, an "other" to whichthe languageis addressed. As discourse, it has something to say: It tells of who is speaking, who isspoken to, and what is spoken about. As I read the text, I know and understand that itspeaks of meanings that are part of my own discourse. Furthennore, I also feel the textspeaks to me as more than a curriculum teacher-practitioner - the language of thediscourse addresses me as a human being who has a world that is in need ofinterpretation and care. I notice a rhetorical, persuasive.intention in the choice ofwords. The mostly making metaphors urge me to understand that the concepts"curriculum," "architecture," "democratic," "public," "life," "lived experience" arethemselves symbolic and conceptual edifices which need to be critically interpreted.I notice also that the discourse itself is finding its own bearing by drawing uponcommon utterances. For instance, the discourse in both cases is drawing upon wordsas "figures" of language that provide and provoke both a semantic and conceptualimaginaire that allows all interlocutors affected by the text to displace and escape theimmediacy of a finite horizon. I, too, feel displaced, but inthisI am also openedup andlaid bare as a "person-structure" who is also a being-in-a-world. I

Donald Schon theorized the displacement of concepts using Ernst Cassirer'sterm of "radical metaphors," as a way of shifting one's thought and action from onehorizon of inquiry to another. Displacement of concepts are metaphoric mappingswhich bring the old into the new, and in so doing tell more about the old, just as thenew concept is being given life. Schon termed metaphors "as signs of concepts atvarious stages of displacement." 8 This occurs when we say or propose: "curriculumas-" or "architecture as-." For example, Aoki's, "curriculum as-lived-experience"orPinar and Grumet's, "curriculum as-currere." 9 Or, in the case ofthe pre-eminentFinnish architect, Alvar Aalto, "architecture as-individuality, naturalness, commu-nity."' 0 American architect icon Frank Lloyd Wright played around with themetaphor, architecture as-organic as he embraced nature into his designs; celebratedJapanese architect Kazuo Shinohara creates architecture-as-silence, in the poetictradition ofthe haiku1 ; and the renowned French architect, Jeanneret-Le Corbusieroften favoured architecture as-an aesthetic ordering of space, and saw himself asfacilitator of "free plan"-a form driven design methodology that organized spaceat will and without traditional constraints. On one of his projects in Paris, LeCorbusier used multiple metaphors of architecture "as-the orchestration of spatialexperience" to create a marvelously lyrical promenade."2

Muinir Vellani il1

Architecture and the Poetics of Cuirriculu 7n

Metaphors, as channels of architectural creativity and imagination have beenused, successfully or otherwise, throughout the past century-Join Utzon's, theSydney Opera House; Daniel Libeskind's, the Jewish Museum in Berlin; and FrankGehry's, the new Guggenheim Bilbao Museum have all had metaphoric seeds ofconception. The glass skyscraper, besides the obvious metaphorical coding at theword level, arguably, may also have arisen out of a metaphor of brilliant, free-standing crystals spread out on a landscape' 3 ; and the recent winning design ofDaniel Libeskind for the World Trade Center site in New York City used themetaphor of the "memorial bathtub" to represent "durability of democracy" and"confirmation of life."

The metaphors that underwrite both quotes also point toward similar outcomessuch as: Subjecting "man-made forms" to critical awareness of history; shaping a"beautiful andjust" world; reconstructing a "viable democratic life" achieved withecological mindfulness; and a building of "vision" through conscious lived experi-ence. Some of the primary metaphors working here include: Edifice-as-Human,World-as-aesthetic-Entity, Life-as-Structure; andFuture-as-Building. Furthermore,the metaphors suggest also thatboth fields are articulating outcomes through the taskof making something as something else. That is, when architects and curricularistsdo their field using metaphors, they are involved in the human activity of buildingor shaping structures and figures in space-time. While the tangible outcome of theirwork-an architectural design or model, or a curriculum plan is readily apparent-there is, as well, an intangible and unseen phenomenon of figuration at work.

Let it be hypothesized for now, that neither architecture nor curriculum arereducible to an architect's blueprint ormodel, or a curricularist's plan,respectively.And, let it be said, as well, that the metaphor's task is not just in the service ofostensive and decorative reference, but something akin to proposing a new mannerofreality. Architecture always refers to all that a structure or edifice offers that is notreducible to the building or the design. In various ways, architecture lives in history,constitutes and is constituted by history, and over time becomes a teller of history.And while architecture is a product of human thought and action, it is acted upon by,and increasingly acts upon the environment within which it exists. Architecturebeyond metaphor has the potential to make the body-subject feel and ask: "Whathave I experienced?" just as the body-subject by way of his or her desire makesarchitecture ask: "How can more experience be created?" The hermeneutics ofarchitecture can be dynamic and complex as it mediates meaning and understandingbetween the architect-designer, nature, materials, various builders, owners, users,and a present and future public. The contestation of interpretations between formand function, site and virtuality, resonating symbols and mere signs, to name just afew, can make the hermeneutics of architecture one of suspicion and tension.

Arcihitecture philosopher, Andrew Benjamin, contends that architecture interms of function is also about understanding time, "alterity, (and) the possibility ofothemess," where function and form are in a dialectical relationship.'4 While the

12

Mitnir Vellani

simple repetition of function forms a part of the architectural object, it can alsoforeclose a certain finality ofform. ForBenjamin, it is the possibility,of alterity andothemess that provides an apartness that challenges this foreclosure. Architecturetheorist, Charles Jencks, reflects upon a new paradigm in architecture when he saysthat architecture must be able to ask: "What is architecture to be about?" as itcontemplates "its subject and metaphors" in relation to guiding "its generations".For Jencks, pluralism in architecture is an implicit condition for responding to thisquestion where the interpretive path is "not one zeitgeist and story, as it used to betaught, but aplurality of meanings."'5 Elizabeth Grosz, drawingfromDeleuze, asks:"How to think of architecture beyond complementarity and binarization, beyondsubjectivity and signification?"' 6 In other words, what effects would follow ifarchitecture was seen as rhizomatic-not employing a static physical site, but a siteseen as a destabilizing yet self-supporting movement?

Similarly, curriculum always refers to something other than itself once it getsdistinguished from the plan. Curriculum, as well, is a historical product that invarious ways constitutes, and is constituted by historical actors whose intentionsmay vary. The weight of historicism, a single zeitgeist, and anthropocentrism arealways bearing down upon both fields, and it is through a similar question: "Whatis curriculum to be about?" as it considers its subject (children, education, life, allbeings, Nature, etc.) and metaphors in relation to its generations that the weight ofhistoricism and anthropocentrism can be mitigated. And like architecture, theconstituent structure of curriculum-the meanings contained in its materials-affects the environment, just as the environment is able to influence curriculum'sconstituent structure. Altematively, using Shinohara's interpretation of architec-tural space and texture, we can ask: Is curriculum empty, porous, and silent spacethrough which multivalent expressions mediate? Or, is it a hermetically sealedstructure in which the measure of all things is the human?

The hermeneutics of curriculum through metaphors, as in architecture, has alsoenjoyed a dynamism and tension that has sought to expand the horizons of meaningandcontext: JohnDewey, for eample, approaches curriculum interms ofa dialecticaltension ofpractical andtemporal interactionbetween organism and environment seenas a continuity of experience.' 7 For Ralph Tyler, curriculum is a "program ofinstruction as a functioning instrumentofeducation," that is wonby clearrationale andobjectives. At one pointhe uses the metaphors, "school-wide attack," "partial attack,""initial point attack," and "improved by attacks", all on one page as he considers thebuilding of an education program.'8 For Huebner, curriculum is also always aboutstrivingforthenobility ofhumanpraxis, about shaping a "just" world, and facilitating"the journey of the soul."'9 Madeleine Grumet brought into curriculum "women'sexperience ofreproductionandnurturance," drawingonmultiplemetaphorsto elevatethe discourse." 0 Additionally, for Grumet, curriculum is for a some-body, a one, astudent with a story.2" Schubert et al contend-that expanding our horizons will allowus "to see curriculum as whatever brings us insight, meaning, and contributory

13

Architecture and the Poetics of Curriculum

action." Of the list of ten questions to ponder that they offer with respect tocurriculum, the first one reads: "What can be done to increase meaning, goodness,and happiness in the lives of young persons-of us all?"22

In short, curriculum's meanings emerge notjust in the plan or the document, butas in music and architecture, inthe counterpoint-in this case, the physical andhumansurroundings, the sensations abodyfeels, the lightpouring intothe classroom, the calmor agitated movements within differences, and in the interpretation of life, be it seenas abattle ground, to be won one objective at atime; or, aseascape or skyscape offusinghorizons with all their unpredictable and unintended consequences. Here the place ofcurriculum metaphors becomes one of evoking vividness of imagination, provokingconceptual thought to think more, bringing sensuous experiences to bear upon thebody, and preventing the concrete to melt away into the abstract. Metaphors in thissense animate and incite "aliveness," while proposing to us a path of action.

4. La Metaphor Vive

Beyond a metaphor's persuasive orrhetorical use atthe word level is the notionofalivingrmetaphor orlametaphorvive atthe discourse level-avivifyingprinciplethat provides the "spark of imagination" to "force conceptual thought to thinkmore."23 The discourse that both Huebner, and Dutton and Mann, use is vivifiedthrough metaphorical utterance and is grounded upon how humans live and whatthey should strive for in their projects. The discourse is making a plea to first "laybare" the interlocutors' structures ofbeing-in-the-world, and in a sense make goodtheir works and their deeds.

Ricoeur's contention is that metaphors initiate interpretation by semanticdeviance thatboth reveal and hide meanings. They say one thing while also pointingto something unsaid. Every time a group of live metaphors propel the architect orcurricularist toward a design or plan, in terms of "architecture-as" or "curriculum-as," they also at once speculate the "as-not." More precisely, the speculative "as-not" is suspended or preserved within the metaphoric "as," both entangled in atensional relationship at the level of discourse. In this sense, live metaphors offer uspolysemic fissures by which practitioners of these fields can enter and interpret"surpluses ofmeaning." Ricoeur calls these surpluses the residues of literal interpre-tation where a new and expanded mode of being is offered.24 As living figures oflanguage and discourse, metaphors act as conceptual bridge-builders or as "produc-tive inventions" that thrust us toward a renewed understanding of the plurality ofbodies, voices, and meanings. In short, metaphors invite us back (or inwards), overand over, to the concept, to our body, and to a world.

In this sense, live metaphors are only valuable to the practitioners and users ifthey force an interpretation that elevates and enlivens the discourse in terns of ouractions in the world. Ricoeur calls lively expression as "that which expressesexistence as alive."25 A live metaphor's usefulness lays in its ability to invite the

14

various users into the circle of hermeneutics-itself an important part of themetaphoric process. In hermeneutics, to be an interpretive being is to be alive. ForRicoeur, the interpretive work involved in understanding live metaphors or newlycoined metaphors is not merely an emotive act, but a knowledge creating activitywhere the objective facts ofthe world meetthe subjective interpretations of a some-body doing the interpretation,2 6

In architecture, for example, Daniel Libeskind's metaphors of the "memorialbathtub," "durability ofdemocracy," and "confirmation of life" for the new buildingson the twin towers' site inNew York City invite us to interpret what a memorial sitestands for, inwhatways enduring edifices represent ourhopes and intentions, andwhatcommon values play a part in determining our external forms of representations.Additionally, the metaphors demand aone-on-one encounterwitheach ofus-andlikeMaya Lin's Wall, they remind, warn, advise, and admonish. In this, metaphoricarticulations can also open us to multiple understanding of our present or historicalmisdeeds, our hubris, and how we (mis)interpret our worlds and our cosmologies.Furthermore, Libeskind's winning design will keep on inviting interpretations fromvarious other sources: engineers, the landlord/owner, city planners, financiers, build-ing suppliers, critics, the public, future tenants, and otherusers. And, it may well be thatovertime, andin spite ofLibeskind's efforts and optimism, the guiding metaphors willlose or change their initial vivifying principles and orientation.

In curriculum, Aoki's contention of both teachers and students as users whodwell in tension between the horizons of"curriculum-as-plan" and "curriculum-as-lived-experience" reveals the hermeneutical space that metaphors invite.27 Accord-ing to Aoki, dwelling in tension (all metaphors) confronts the users to understandwhat it means to dwell in a deeply human way. But Aoki is saying more than that.By summoning the metaphor, "as-lived-experience," he is at once sliding into adynamic metaphoric (he would argue, metonymic) space by inviting the experienc-ing body itself as the primary builder of the concept called curriculum. Livedexperience is always lived out of a body/subject, and it is always lived within life.Hence, lived-experience always seeks to express more than what it has undergone. 28

In other words, Aoki's metaphor both denotes and predicates. While he appears tobe saying that curriculum is the sign for diverse experiencing body/subjects withinlife, he seems also to be predicating that curriculum cannotbe pinned down to life-the later is too dynamic and complex. In other words, curriculum also resonates asymbolic quality. The poetic possibilities that "as-lived-experiences" offer in termsof surpluses of meanings makes Aoki's use of the metaphor highly alive. To put itin Schon's terms, Aoki seems to have presented a riddle: Find the old (curriculum)inthe new (curriculum-as-lived experiences), knowing thatthere are indefinite waysof finding the old in the new.29

One can say the same about Pinar and Grumet's vivifying metaphor, curricu-lum-as-currere, where the verb-word currere draws from the Latin lexicon toremind us that curriculum is the existential experience of the actual "running" of an

Munir Vellani 15

Architecture and the Poetics of Curriculum

education course.30 The metaphoric entailments of currere describemany aspects oflife as more than just the "race-course" in terms of the readiness of the "'student-runner." They seek to understand the experiences of a particular student-runner,running a particular track, as part of a particular embodied life story, and supportedbymanywho are embodied co-authors themselves ofthatlife story. Grumetsuggeststhe metaphor of a "person's dialoguewith the world ofhis (sic) experience." 3' Othervivifyingmetaphoric articulations in curriculumdiscourse include: DavidJardine'scurriculum-as-integrated, 3 2ElliotEisner's curriculum-as-connoisseur/ship, and evenJacques Daignault's breath taking metaphors, curriculum-as-thinking or curricu-lum-as-composition. 33

Architects, and I suspect curriculum theorizers and planners as well, aregenerous in their extant use of metaphors to thrust forward their own creative andimaginative projects. Note, for example, the generous use of the metaphor, "as-text," inPinar' s intelligent and unyielding book, Understanding Curriculum. Manyofthechapters areunderwrittenuponthismetaphor, expressivelyusedto suggestthemultiplicity of interpretations of the concept called curriculum. William Schubert,as well, in summarizing the curriculum field (note the metaphor, "field") draws uponmetaphors of curriculum as-Content or Subject Matter, as-Program, as-DiscreteTasks, or as-Cultural Reproduction, etc.3 4 In fact, arguably, the best metaphors areoften the ones that remain hidden to the users (or readers), as they perform the"figuration" work outside the users immediate consciousness. Antoniades contendsmetaphors as being an architect's "bedrock ofimagination" and "best little secret."35

All this, however, raises a problematic: Could it be that one-sided metaphoriccreativity, while useful for the designer/planner may become less fulfilling for theuser/participant for whose benefit the edifice or curriculumplan was conceived andproduced in the first place?

Here, two factors become important. First, boththe architect and the curricularistmust possess a keen insight into human actions, an openness of interpretivesensibilities, and a practical pre-understanding of actions (and narratives) alreadyprefigured within the architectural or curricular context they are about to enter. ForMaya Lin, who had no personal experience of the Vietnam War, it must have meanthaving the veterans themselves become a critical reservoirforunderstanding actionsthat signified "sharp pain," "death," "loss of a friend," etc. In Pinar's case, themetaphor as-text is carefully left in suspense, suggesting text as not simply an eventof discourse, but an open work of human actions. In this sense, he allows us, thereader, to be opened up to new references and fresh interpretations of human deeds(virtuous or corrupt). The invitation Pinar grants is to an uninstitutionalized archiveof praxis that has left traces and marks-many violent and unmerciful upon ourworld. Schubert pithily suggests that while all the "extant images" that attempt tounderstand curriculum contribute to its conceptual richness, it might well be thatsome metaphors by which we understand curriculum may rule out others.36

This leads to the second factor: The place of the critic becomes crucial in the

16

curriculum (and architecture) field. In fact, the place of the critic is not accidental,butis itselfconstitutedbythe discourse's needforinterpretation andunderstanding.The critic mirrors the discourse to itself from a distance, but also, in a sense,shepherds orplaces the interlocutors "en route towards the orient" ofthe discourse.3 7

Live ornewly-coinedmetaphorswithincurriculardiscoursefindtheirimportancenot merely as a result of semantic dissonance, or by presenting two juxtaposedmeanings, but in their profound potential to solve an enigma, most likely at theexistential level. This function of live metaphor to be able to propose furtherspeculations about the human condition and our actions make the curricular activityitself a mimetic one-where a coherent understanding of human action is sought. Thehumanactis amultiplicity ofintentions, expectations, plans, andinteractions; itis alsodynamic and temporal. Live metaphors of curriculum, force upon various interlocu-tors yet another task-one of a coherentfiguration of human acts in time; a "synthesisof the heterogeneous" events that make life intelligible. For Ricoeur, metaphors, byvirtue of the semantic shock or aporia, provoke mimesis, as the reference for humanaction, to become muthos, or plot. This is the narrative task of curriculum making.

5. Curriculum: Life in Quest of a Narrative

"TheVietnamMemorialis aplacewhere somethinghappens withintheviewer. It'slike reading a book. I purposely had the names etched ragged, right on each panelto look like apage from a book," saidMaya Lin, as she explained her design. "I alsowanted remembering the past relevant to the present...It's like a thread of life."38

Architects and curricularists, while clear about their work as leading tosomething tangible, foimal, and apparent-an edifice, a blueprint, a model, or aplan-oftenunderestimate the interpretive andtemporal character ofintangible andelusive processes they are involved in. Both architecture and curriculum, as practiceandproduct, I wish to hypothesize, are about expressions ofhuman making in searchof self-understanding. In this sense; they are also about a gathering together ofmeanings derived out of human actions in space and time-in Maya Lin's case,meanings that are more and less than the polished black granite stone, the tastefullylandscaped earth, the human visitor, the etched names of lost heroes, or the distantand painful history. In each, is veiled a story.

For Karsten Harris, Nietzche's words, "Stone is more stone than it used to be"impressively articulates a hermeneutics of nature implicit in the way architecturethinks ofmatter, meaning, and mind.39 In terms of Lin's Wall, in denoting a stone as"polished black granite" upon which names of lost soldiers are inscribed and facesof visitors are reflected, the stone itself (before it is called stone), as Earth, no longerspeaks. An anthropomorphic over-codedmeaning ofstone echoes instead. Karsten'sargument is that meaning in architecture must be a dialectical process of interpreta-tions of matter and meaning: Between the over-coded anthropomorphized stone as

Munir Vellani 17

Architecture and the Poetics of Curriculum

material and matter of architecture, and the hidden Earth; the desirous and caringembodied self, and the silent and mute body; and, the highly fragmented quality ofhuman actions, and the desire to configure meaning to actions. In a sense, to play onRicoeur's words, architecture is life in quest of a narrative. 40

Similarly, curriculum is "more curriculumthan itusedto be." In one sense, evenas we assign more meaning to the materials and matter of curriculum (i.e., torationales, objectives, outcomes, activities, and assessment and evaluation meth-ods), the subject of curriculum or the object ofthe metaphor called curriculum-lifeand lived experiences of children, a desiring some-body, Earth, Nature-ceases tospeak. The over coded materials of curriculum instead transcend the visible, thesensible body, the earth upon which we walk and which sustains us, and the storylived by the human dweller amidst other stories of non-human dwellers.

Yet, curriculum, as I mentioned above, and as argued by many curricularistscannot be reduced to the materials of a curriculum plan. The elusive and intangibleprocess that curricularists are involved in, is the bringing together of the temporalquality of human experiences in terms of a general, yet intelligible, kinship. Experi-ences of the physical and natural world; the social and historical world of humanpraxis; the sensual world of body, music and performance; the fictional world ofliterature and art; the organic world of Earth and earth-beings; the cosmic world oftheUniverse; the cultural world ofhuman plurality and multivocity; the spiritual world oftheDivine; and the mental world ofthinking andthought. We can call this experiencingquality, the poetics of curriculum-andbythatIinvokeRicoeur's meaning ofthe termpoetics as that discipline which deals with the laws of composition that are added todiscourse in order to form of it a text that can stand as a narrative. Here, thehermeneutic task ofthe curricularisttakes on that of composing anarrative interms ofahistoricalpresent. By this I mean, composing a livedpresentwhere the subject ofthecurriculum lives and understands dialectically his or her own spaces ofpast experi-ences and horizons of future expectations all in the present. 41

If metaphor as one form of figurative work predicates conceptual thought tothink and imagine more, and the body to feel more, then the hermeneutic task ofnarrative is also afigurative endeavourthatmakes meaning ofthetemporal characterof heterogeneous human actions in terms of past experiences and future expecta-tions. Narrative enunciates and orients curriculum beyond itself. In other words,narrative and curriculum become metaphors for each other.

In Ricoeur's monumental work, Timne and Narrative,42 the figurative work ofemploting (putting-into-the-form-of-a-plot) human actions and experiences into nar-rative is given a threefold understanding of mimesis. For example, in the conception,design and construction, and the eventual use of MayaLin's Wall, three mimetic tasksmust have been present: First, "the innovative force" of her architecture "is groundedin a pre-understanding of the world of action, its meaningful structures, its symbolicresources, and its temporal character." 43 These aspects of the practical world of actionwould have already beenprefigured with a basic competence of what human action

18

consists of to allow Lin to even begin to imagine and understand what the monumentwould eventually mean to the intended users in tenns of motives, agents, conflicts,intentions, hostility, closure, etc. The architect cannot underestimate this stage, for itallows a creative thrust, just as metaphor instantiates productive innovation. To thisprefigurative stage, Ricoeur gives the name- Mimesis,.

In curriculum making, a similarprefiguration activity is present amidst a densecultural context of actions and expectations. Otherwise, curriculum as a processwould be incomprehensible to the practitioner if the symbolic, structural, andtemporal features were absent oftheir meanings. In my own case, over a three-yearassignmentto develop ahigh school economics curriculum in aregion ofTajikistan,Central Asia, it meant first becoming steeped in the region's culture, tradition,economic and social history, environment, education system, and local and nationalpolitics. It also meant living with the people; leaming the language; understandingtheir daily struggles with basic necessities like electricity, water, and food; usingtheir town markets; and feeling the physical impact of the harsh geography of amountainous region.

Mimesis, is hence a projective condition of curriculum and architecturaldesign-by first presenting the richness of prefigured "readability," it pushesforward the practitioner into the next stage.

Mimesis2 is the second stage where Lin would have attempted to bring into anintelligible whole, the "as-if' possibilities of the Wall. Here, the actual design andconstruction (emploting) activity draws upon and brings together avariety of actionsof disparate users and builders, materials, and an aesthetic andpractical understand-ing of the immediate and distant site. For Ricoeur, emploting is a dynamicconfiguration process which "opens the kingdom of the as if." It involves amediation (often conflicting)betweenindividual events and a storytaken as awhole,"a grasping together" ofthe heterogeneous factors into a meaningful figure or shape,and a temporal sense of beginning and end.

This is suggestive ofLin's words: "I also wanted remembering the pastrelevantto the present...It's like a thread of life." Time, as an historical present, is felt as apassing and a flowing, as well as somethingthatendures andpersists. In curriculum,the configuration activity undergoes a sinmilar process w&hereby many users andactors are brought into collaboration to configure the ideas, materials, and theoverall orient (plot) of the curriculum plan. In this sense, configuration is a multi-leveled activity. At one level it brings worlds of various actors together (local andnational govemment officials, curriculum designers, school administrators, teach-ers, students, parents, text-bookpublishers, various interest groups, etc.); at anotherlevel, it brings text as discourse into existence, proposing modes of being; and yetat another level, a curriculum's manifold constituent materials and activities. Bothcurricularists and architects are most famuiliar and focused upon mimesis2, theconfiguration part of the threefold narrative process.

To complete the henneneutics implicit in the narrative task of the curriculum

Muniir Vellani 19

Architfecture and the Poetics of Curriculumn

and the architecture process, the last mimetic stage is also important. Mimesis3

refigures the visitor or the user. This is the stage when the actual edifice or plan isgiven over to the world. It "marks the intersection of the world of the text and theworld of the hearer or reader." 45 At a practical level, the third stage completes thecircle ofmimesis and hermeneutics as it attempts to force an interpretation upon theuser or dweller of the edifice, or plan. In the case of the Wall, visitors gain anunderstanding, however diverse, of their lives, their world, and hopefully the largerquestions ofthe human condition. Tears flow amongthevisitors, butitbecomes hardto pinpoint exactly what is triggering the emotion a history of a past event that isbeing remembered and understood in the present; or, expectations offuture actionsrebounding with thepast, that are also brought and understoodin the present. In otherwords, mimesis3 proposes possible worlds. With this understanding the world ofthevisitor is once again acted upon. In my case, it meant being present in the classroomto understand how the Tajik students and teachers were "reading" their own livesalong with what the economics curriculum was designed to accomplish. Thestudents, teachers, and school administrators had all become a valuable reservoir ofinterpretation, which in turn informed mimesis, and mimesis2 .

Anthony Paul Kerby sums up Ricoeur's threefold process of figuration asfollows:

Emplotment, in histories and fictions, takes a prefigured world of events andactions and draws out or proposes a configuration that serves to organize worldlyevents into meaningful sequences andpurposes. This textual structure is in turn themediating cause of the reader refiguring his or her own world in light of thepossibilities offered by experiencing the world of the text (work).46

I wish to extend Ricoeur's threefold mimesis into curriculum discourse tohypothesize that curriculum making is a narrativeprocess ofpoetic composition. Andas such it serves to tell us more about what gets marked (prefigured), organized(configured), and clarified (refigured) as a historical present. The figural qualitiesinvited into the composing process, whether ofcurriculum form orhuman actions andexperiences, is vital in terms of what gets described as curriculum. In this sense,curriculum begs and demands interpretation at all three mimetic levels: What are thepersistent figurative structures being invited into discourse? What is getting de-scribed? What is being referred to? To what extent are the references anthropocentric,abstract, anthropomorphic, embodied, symbolic, mechanistic, etc? To be sure, thestandard of interpretation of a curriculum cannot be simply at the level of theorizer ordesigner, but also the teacher and students (and otherusers), all ofwhom complete theinterpretive process. In fact, the curriculum remains suspended in its interpretiveprocess until the poetic composition finds its completion through the resources ofmultiplenarrativemeanings ofvarious activepartners-whatRicoeur calls,plurivocite,but also silent partners such as Earth. In other words, without inclusivity of disparatevoices, curriculum as concept risks becoming a cliche, even moribund.

20

6. The Poetics of Inclusivity

According to Antoniades, architecture's broader expectations and aspirationsare met by the poetics of inclusivity. Poetics in architecture addresses a plurality ofhuman needs and expectations-needs that are both practical and spiritual. In thissense, poetics in architecture is "highly contemplative; rigorous; and mentally,spiritually, and scientifically demanding."Additionally, it seeks to understand whatit means to live in peace amidst both a local and global identity; what constitutes"good" and "virtuous" in architecture; how communities develop an ethic of civilityand harmony; and what kind of architecture strikes an aesthetic chord, both visuallyand spiritually. 47 Inclusivity in architecture means the attitude that seeks to exploremultiple ideas and voices as a tradition of argument as what constitutes as "good"and "virtuous" in terms of architectural creativity. Inclusivity seeks diverse pointsof contemplation by understanding itself as an entangled narrative process, deplor-ing a single orthodoxy, and welcoming and respecting the idea of cosmogenesis-where the universe, and not the human, is the measure of all things.

Ultimately, the plurivocity and historicity that poetics of inclusivity bring tocurriculum (and architecture) discourse in terms of figurative work, energizes seman-tic innovation and can assist in completing the interpretive process at a higher level ofconceptualmeaning. However, the interpretiveprocess needs to have ahermneneuticaldesire towards a fullness of language, a "pouring back into the universe," and ofwhat-Huebner calls, a shaping of a beautiful and just world. Hence, Pinar's call forinclusivity into the curriculumprojectby diverse users is both an invitationto "fill"thecurriculum language, and a way offorestalling a discretionary and arbitrary closure ofinterpretation of the curriculum discourse. 48 Multiple narratives become the naturalextension ofthis inclusivityby which life and its actions permeate into curriculum. Themetaphoric "curriculum-as-" and the speculative "curriculum-as-not" fuse horizonswith the users to keep the tension healthy and living.

It must be noted, however, that while the plurality of contesting groups withspecific attitudes in curriculum can excite and elevate the education discourse, theyalso introduce into the arena a cacophony of metaphoric utterances making thediscourse "intensely personal and intensely political."49 Often, the "cacophonous,"as Pinar describes the multitude of curriculumvoices, confronts practitioners in bothfields as metaphoric babble.5 0 While, at times it might appear that the concepts-architecture or curriculum-are being stretched hither and thither, influenced bymetaphors that are new in the discourse, it must be noted that metaphors vivify newconcepts even as old ones get displaced. The potential for semantic shock andproductive innovation that multiple and radical metaphoric voices bring to thediscourse lies in their productive function to destroy and recreate the language. Theprocess seems to be announcing:

"The Curriculum is dead. Long live the Curriculum!"

Munir Vellani 21

In other words, the poetics of inclusivity allows the discourse to "see" itself in

terms of both its heuristic and fictional possibilities.Curriculum discourse's task as discourse is "to refer to a world that it claims to

describe, to express, or to represent." 51 But, there is also the task to extend its

possibilities. A discourse about curriculum which designates a plurality of speakers

articulating new, even quixotic metaphors also rescues itselffrom becoming, what

Schwab described as moribund,5 2 filledwith dead or even misfiredmetaphors which

have become cliches. At one time or another, Dewey's organism and environment,

Huebner' sjourney ofthesoul, andAoki's lived-experience metaphoric articulations

aboutcurriculummayhave seemedquixotic. Today, they addvaluable and energetic

currency in curriculum discourse. As Aoki's former student, and now a teacher, I

find graduate students' interest perking up on the very description of a seminar that

introduces the livednature of curricular experiences as the theme. And, it is unlikely

that Jacques Daignault's "curriculum-is-beyond-words" metaphor will find an easy

translation into a school curriculum design at this time. Yet, itprovokes and expands

conceptual thought sufficiently to make us want to understand what it means to bedoing curriculum work.53

On the architecture front, Antoniades contends that metaphysical metaphors-

those that contemplate designs in terms ofthe unknown or the unseen, for example,

presence/absence, finite/infinite, life/death, etc.-that occasionally drive a John

Hejduk, a Daniel Libeskind, or a Zaha Hadid design that never gets built-are as

importanttothe interpretation of a social andconceptual imaginaire as those designs

that do get built. Quixotic or metaphysical metaphors in either architecture or

curriculum that make a conceptual thought think more or a concept generate

surpluses of meaning, or make a body feel further must be welcomed into the

discourse. Antoniades calls these metaphors in architecture as "channels of the

impossible," while rightfully warning that ultimately an architect's vocation is to

build for the user.5 4 This paradox of the need to articulate speculatively through

metaphysical or quixotic metaphors, and to actually plan and build a functional

building or curriculum is itself a healthy hermeneutical endeavour requiring theembodied voices of various users.

7. The Curriculum Body

What does it mean to say "embodied voices"? Madeline Gins and Arakawa's

book,ArchitecturalBody, makes an interesting assertioninits openingpages: "(We)

needto learn whatmakesthe worldtick", and follows up by saying thatthe moment

someone makes an attempt "to break open the world.. .to find operative hidden

treasures, the world closes ranks as more world."5 5 In other words, we cannot go

beyond world, for beyond world is more world. Ultimately, after all abstract

reflections have reduced our understanding of world, it is to the body we must turn.

Itis out ofthe site ofbody thatwe will leamrto work communally even as we continue

22 Arcizitecture and tize Poedcs o Curriculum

to separate as individual persons. The anthropomorphic metaphor of architecture-as-sentient-body, amidst the potential vivacity of a gendered or racial body, isincreasingly becoming the thrust by which discourse in architecture is criticallyconfronting its traditional notions of space, time, and human body.

Architecture theorist and philosopher David Farell Krell says that at the heartof the word, architecture, should not be the Greek root, tec from techne-tofabricate-but the forgotten root, tic, from the verb tiktein which means,"to love,""to engender," "to reproduce." 56 Krell offers us a new word-concept and a newmetaphor-archeticture. Inviting both Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Luce Irigaray,he introduces architects to the site ofthe corporeal. Merleau-Ponty's famous remarkis a striking case:

One's own body is in the world as the heart is in the organism: it maintainscontinually in life the spectacle ofthe visible, animating and nourishing it from theinside; it forms a system with the visible.

Irigaray counters Merleau-Ponty's views of body and offers architects thefecundity of the matemal-feminine, where the differences themselves are a fecundsite, always challenging to remain open andbare. What can the metaphor, archeticture-as-living-body, offer in terms of an architect's practice? According to Krell, it isnever about "exertions of mastery or technical manipulation; (always about)uncoerced use ofmaterials, fascinatedby themratherthan dominating them; aseriesof crossings and recrossings of flesh, visibility, and tactility; or inversions ofcamality, of delirious eye and feverish caress. One fluid seeping into another fluidby porosity of the membranes between them; celebration of irreducible differ-ence,"5 7 -an endless series of ecstasies!

Embodied voices take many forms. Women architects, for example, have longchallenged architecture's masculine interpretations of form and function. KarenFranck cites several distinct ways of knowing that a woman practitioner brings intoher practice. Many of these are multiple metaphors arising out of lived corporealexperiences. She cites: "Underlying connectedness to others, to objects of knowl-edge, and to the world; a desire for inclusiveness, and a desire to overcome opposingdualities; a responsibility to respond to the need of others by an ethic of care; anacknowledgment ofthe value of everyday life and experience; value of subjectivityand feelings; and an acceptance of change, complexity and flexibility."5 8

Increasingly, as well, contemporary Westem architecture education and prac-tice is being held accountable for being overly govemed and influenced byEurocentric cultural canons. Critics argue that diverse social, cultural, and aestheticcanons -African, Latin, Asian, and Native-in architecture can be used to elevateworld views, understand human values, and expand creative expressions.5 9 To thislist, I will add the rich Islamic architectural traditions. In curriculum discourse, thebroadmetaphoridal articulations driving asimilar challenge include: curriculum-as-Racial-text, Gender-text, Political-text, Intemational-text and Phenomenological-

Munir Vellani 23

text, to name just a few. At the same time, Nel Noddings' metaphor of "caring,"Grumet's metaphors of"reproduction andnurturance," JanetMiller's "shattering of

our silences," and the "border" metaphor working in the curriculum scholarship of

Henry Giroux and PeterMcLaren are also varied orientations ofthe curriculum-as-living-body metaphor. 60 Indigenous educators provide metaphors of complex "eco-logical forces" and "kinship" as teachers of Indigenous peoples. Such entailmentsappear to draw upon a vivifying metaphor of "creation's forces" where constantlyshifting fragile harmonies are holistically maintained through the respectful know-

ing and caring of a heritage of collective wisdom. The site of the body made in thesame tissue as Earth seamlessly mediates this ecological relationship where "no partof the earth is expendable or can be considered as waste."6 1

Much of our subjective understanding of the abstract and intangible concept

called "curriculum," derives its conceptual system of meanings out of tangible andconcrete body metaphors. Lakoff and Johnson's theorizing of metaphors is insight-

ful here.62 Often, when we struggle to conceptualize, reason, and visualize our

subjective experiences about an abstract concept (say, education, curriculum orarchitecture), it is to the domain of our concrete sensorimotor (bodily) experiencesthat we turn to for orientation. The way the two-abstract and concrete domains-

are linked or mapped is through embodied conceptual metaphors. In this sense,metaphors are the building blocks of our conceptual system, allowing us "to

structure ourreasoning, our experiences, and our everyday language."6 3 Perhaps, theborrowed words ofMerleau-Ponty sum up the metaphor best: It maintains continu-ally in life the spectacle of the visible, animating and nourishing itfrom the inside;

itforms asystem with the visible. The living-experiencing-body, hence, becomes thepre-eminent reservoir out of which vivifying metaphoric and metonymic utterancesarise to allow us to explain and understand what it means to be doing curriculum.HoweverDewey, Huebner,Aoki,Pinar, Grumet,Noddings, and othercurricularistsmay have wished to explain and understand curriculum, it is not arbitrary that they

have often resorted to live metaphors ofbody experiences as semantic innovationsto elevate the discourse.

8. A New Paradigm in Curriculum-A Change of Heart

Charles Jencks, inhis book, TheNewParadigm in Architecture, proposes thata new architecture is emerging. Its characteristics drive a broad attempt to temper

much of the disquiet and confusion over our spiritual and public values. In otherwords, new architecture is "committed to pluralism, the heterogeneity of our citiesand global culture": It is participatory, desiring close consultation with the client; itinsists on an inclusive ecological tissue in which buildings are placed; it deploresrepetitiveness, sometimes preferring fractal, self-similar forms that are closer to

nature; and it is willing to take risks in terms offorms and functions, inviting the mute

24 Architeettire and the Poefics of Curriculum

and silent body into the folds of new experiences. In this sense, new architecture isfree to employ non-Euclidean gebmetries-Deleuzian folds, curves, twvists, blobs,and crinkles; it communicates in a dissenting voice, challenging the status quo, andproviding critical feedback; it is weary of arrogant and triumphalist architecture ofconfused symbols that serves the corporate world; it looks upon art, science, andcultural centres as preferred civic expressions ofpride and democracyrather than tocorporate moriuments; it invites apoetics ofinclusivity of diverse voices and canonsof architecture; and, it affirms the creative, complex, and self-organizing universeas the measure of its values and purpose, recognizing that we, humans, are also builtinto the universe's finely balanced laws.6M

This paper has taken a long detour through the symbols, signs, expressions, anddiscourse of architecture to understand more about curriculum making and theextant figurative work implicit in curricular discourse. If the diverse "curriculum-as" metaphors are any sign, then, alas, perhaps, a new paradigm reflecting a risingsense of historicity has also been emerging in curriculum work. And much like newarchitecture, "new curriculum" appears to be reworking its structural metaphors,committed as well, to plurality of voices and a poetics of a participatory universe.Whether we choose to use Teilhard de Chardin's term of "cosmogenesis" or a hostof other metaphors to thrust forward a renewed understanding of what entailscurriculum making, what does become clear is that our inclination itself, to drawupon new and live metaphors seems to be pointing at a challenge in education.HannahArendt, has summarized this challenge pithily:

Education is the point at which we decide whether we love the world enough toassume responsibility for it and by the same token save it from the ruin which, exceptfor renewal, except for the coming of the new and young, would be inevitable. Andeducatidn, too, is where we decide whether we love our children enough not to expelthem from our world and leave them to their own devices, nor to strike from theirhands their chance of undertaking something new, something unforeseen by us, butto prepare them in advance for the task of renewing a common world.65

One of the hermeneutic tasks confronting curri6ularists is in interpreting newmetaphors and mimetic expressions of curriculum form and human actions that allinterlocutors bring into the education discourse; and how these expressions then serveour creative social and conceptual imnaginaire. "What is curriculum to be about?" isthe charging question, as it considers the subject and metaphors of curriculum inrelationto guidingthe generations. Andwhose notions of"world" does it serve? Itmayvery well be that "the new and young" that are the subject and generation of ourcurriculum plans have already arrived prefigured with pathways toward a renewedcommon world. It may be, as well, that with our focus intently upon the materials andmatter ofcurriculum, we maybe seeing "less child than childused to be," in fact, blindto the capacity of the new to show us the way. Ultimately, the text-edifice we create,literally and metaphorically, can only debase or elevate the triadic relationshipbetween educators, our common or diverse worlds, and our children.

Munir Vellani 25

Figuratively, the task of metaphor and mimesis is one of making a more than

literal world-one in which humans can think speculatively of worlds. New

curriculum metaphors permit an understanding of one kind of experience of

education in terms of another. Furthermore, metaphors are not merely instruments

of language orwords exhibiting arhetorical ostentation. They are made inthe service

of our conceptual structures-made by us, however culturally diverse we are, as part

of our conceptual system to "see" new or possible realities. Additionally, new

curriculum metaphors draw upon our sense experiences, both mundane and aesthetic

to make us negotiate andrenegotiate whatwe understand our experiences ofeducation

to be. This also presents to us a metaphor's less innocent side. For, in the grip of

intractable orthodoxies, figurative language can become an instrument of perilous

intentions andhubris ifnotcriticallyinterpreted.However, ifunderstoodforwhattheyare, metaphors are an important source of conceptual innovation and imagination that

allows curriculum discourse itselfto re-describe and eclipse its literal meaning. To useRicoeur's term, the "surpluses of meanings" thus produced also supply the various

interlocutors within the curricular discourse access to the corporeal, metaphoric, and

speculative horizons. Through these horizons, the concept called curriculum is

allowedto think and say more about itself, about education, and about the various acts

ofbeing human in a more-than-human universe.Perhaps, curriculum, in desiring conceptual displacements by way of meta-

phors and mimesis, is hoping for a change of heart.MayaLin's career as architect, twenty-two years later, has movedbeyond the

Vietnam Veterans Memorial. Her metaphors have shifted to a new commemora-

tion, a memorial she has tentatively entitled, The Extinction Project. Playing on

her mind and heart is a monumental collective loss-animals, plants, and habitats

that have vanished. She is working on a memorial for a suffering planet, or as she

says, for the natural environment that "is more beautiful than anything we aspeople or artists can create."66

Andwhat ofthe task ofthe curricularist? DwayneHuebner's words come to mind

and heart: The time has come to shape worlds that "can be more beautiful and just."

Dedication

Dedicated to Professor Tetsuo (Ted) Aoki.

Notes

'As quoted in, Robert Campbell. (1983). An emotive place apart, AIA Journal, May,pg. 151.

2 Robert Howe. (2002). Monumental Achievement, Smithsonian Magazine, November2002. Additional infonnation aboutMaya Lin's workwas drawn fromthe documentary, Maya

Lin:A Strong Clear Vision, 1994, American FilmFoundation, Sanders andMockProductions.

26 Architecture and the Poetics of Curricultim

3Henry Hattemer. (2003). The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, http://www.reorgetownwebdesign.comled/vietnaml .html

4 Sherry Ahrentzen. (1996, pg. 88). The F word in architecture. In Thomas Dutton &Lian Hurst Mann (Eds), Reconstructing architecture: Critical discourses and social prac-tices. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

5Herbert Kliebard emphasized that we think in metaphors and introduced three rootmetaphors found in curriculum work: Curriciculum as-production, as-growth, and as-journey. In Herbert M. Kliebard, (1972), Metaphorical roots ofcurriculum design. TeachersCollege Record, Vol. 72, No.3, pp. 403-404.

6 Dwayne Huebner. (1999, pp. 228). The tasks ofthe curricular theorist. In Vikki Hillis(ed), The lure of the transcendent: Collected essays by Dwayne E.Huebner, pp. 212-230.Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

7 Thomas Dutton & Lian.Hurst Mann. (1996, pg. 1). Reconstructing architecture:Critical discourses and socialpractices. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

I Donald Schon. (1963, pg. 51). Displacement of concepts. London, UK: TavistockPublications. Also by same author, "The architecture studio as an exemplar of educationfor reflection in action." Journal ofA4rchitectural Education, Vol. 38, No. 1 (Fall 1984),pp. 2, 5, 9.

9In William Pinar, William Reynolds, Patrick Slattery, & Peter Taubman. (1995, pp.428, 518-523). Understanding curriculum. New York: Peter Lang.

10 Anthony Antoniades. (1990, pg. 33). Poetics of architecture: Theory of design. NewYork: Van Nostrand.

Anthony Antoniades. (1990, pg. 38). Poetics of architecture.12 Stanford Anderson. (1998, pp. 500-501). Architectural design as a system of research

programs. In Michael Hays (ed),Architecture theory since 1968. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.3 Anthony Antoniades. (1990, pg. 32). Poetics of architecture.

14 Andrew Benjamin. (2000, pp. 5-12). Architectural philosophy. London, UK: TheAthlone Press.

Charles Jencks. (2002, pg. 81 & 138). The new paradigm in architecture. New Haven,CT: Yale University Press.

16 Elizabeth Grosz. (2001, pp. 58-59).Architecturefrom the outside: Essays on virtualand real space. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

17 John Dewey. (1939/1969, pp. 33-34). Experience and education. New York:Macmillan/Collier Books.

18 Ralph Tyler. (1949, pg. 1, 127-128). Basic principles of curriculum and instruction.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press.19 In Vikki Hillis (ed). (1999, pp. 226 & 406). The lure of the transcendent: Collected

essays by Dwvayne E.Huebner. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.20 In William Pinar et al. (1995, pg. 374). Understanding curriculum.21 Grumet, M. (1992, pg. 36). Existential and phenomenological foundations of

autobiographical methods. In William Pinar & William Reynolds (Eds), Understandingcurriculum as phenomenological and deconstructed text. New York: Teachers College,Columbia University.

22 In William Schubert, Anne Lynn Schubert, Thomas P. Thomas, & Wayne Carroll.(2002, pp. 525-526). Curriculum books: First hundred years. New York: Peter Lang.

23Paul Ricoeur. (1977, pg. 303). The rule ofmetaphor: Multi-disciplinarystudies of the

Munir Vellani 27

creation ofmeaning in language, translatedby Robert Czerny withKathleen McLauglin and

John Costello. Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press.

I Paul Ricoeur. (1976, pp. 45-55, 68). Interpretation theory: Discourse and the surplus

of meaning. Fort Worth, TX: Texas Christian University Press.25 Paul Ricoeur. (1977, pg. 43). The rule of metaphor.

I Karl Simms. (2003, pg. 74). Paul Ricoeur. London, UK: Routledge.27 William Pinar et aL (1995, pp. 427-428). Understanding curriculum.28 Paul Ricoeur. (1977, pg. 300). The nrle of metaphor.29 Donald Schon. (1963, pp. 62-63).30 William Pinar et al. (1995, pp. 414-415). Understanding curriculum.

31 In William F. Pinar & Madeleine R. Grumet. (1976, pp. 34-36). Toward a poor

curriculum. Dubuque, IA: Kendal/Hunt Publishing.32 David Jardine. (1998, pg. 69-84). To dwell with a boundless heart. New York: Peter

Lang.33 William Pinar et al. (1995, pp. 480-485, 582). Understanding curriculum.

34 William Schubert. (1986, pp. 25-34). Curriculum: Perspective, paradigm, and

possibility. New York: MacMillan Publishing.35 Anthony Antoniades. (1990, pg. 30). Poetics of architecture.3 6William Schubert. (1986, pg. 34). Curriculum: Perspective, paradigm, andpossibility.

317 Paul Ricoeur. (1991a, pg. 122). From text to action. Essays in hermeneutics, II.

Translated by Kathleen Blamey & John B. Thompson. Evanston, IL: Northwestern Uni-

versity Press.3

S Fernando Quintero. (1995). Architect Maya Lin describes the thoughts behind the

Vietnam Veterans Memorial, http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/1995/0315/lin.html

3 9 Karsten Harries, K. (2000, pp. 10-23). Is stone today "More stone than it used to be"?

In Matter and mind in architecture. Helsinki, Finland: Alvar Aalto Foundation.4 0 Paul Ricoeur. (199lb, pp. 20-33). Life in quest of narrative. In David Wood (ed),

On Paul Ricoeur:Narrative and interpretation. London, UK: Routledge.41 Paul Ricoeur. (199 l a, pg. 3). From text to action. Also see, Bernard P. Dauenhauer,

Ricoeur's contribution to contemporary political thought, in David E. Klemm & William

Schweiker (eds.), Meanings in texts and actions: QuestioningPaulRicoeur, 1993, pp. 157-

175. Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia.I Paul Ricoeur. (1984). Time and narrative, Volume 1. Translated by Kathleen

McLaughlin & David Pellauer. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.4 3 Paul Ricoeur. (1984, pg. 54). Time and narrative, Volumel.

I Paul Ricoeur. (1984, pg. 64). Time and narrative, Volume 1.45 Paul Ricoeur. (1984, pg. 71). Time and narrative, Volume 1.

46 Graham Livesey. (1997, pg. 27). The role of figure in metaphor, narrative and

architecture. In Joy Morny (ed), Paul Ricoeur and narrative: Context and contestation, pp.

25-34. Calgary, Alberta, Canada: University of Calgary Press.47 Anthony Antoniades. (1990, pg. 4). Poetics of architecture.48 William Pinar et al. (1995, pp. 847-868). Understanding curriculum.49 Jo Anne Pagano. (1990, pg. xiv). Exiles and communities: Teaching inthe patriarchal

wilderness. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.50 William Pinar et al. (1995, pg. 867). Understanding curriculum.

28 Arciiitectitre and tiie Poetics of Ctirriculuin

51 Paul Ricoeur. (1991a, pp. 145-150). From text to action.52 Joseph Schwab. (1969). Thepractical: A language forthe curriculum, SchoolReview

78, November, pp. 1-24. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.5 William Pinar et al. (1995, pg. 484). Understanding curriculum.5 Anthony Antoniades. (1991, pp. 54-56). Poetics of architecture.55 Madeline Gins & Arakawa. (2002, pp. xiv-xxii):Architectural body. Tuscaloosa, AL:

The University of Alabama Press.56 David Farrell Krell. (1995, pp. 6-13). Architecture: Ecstasies ofspace, time, and the

human body. New York: State University of New York Press.7 DavidFarrell Krell. (1995, pp. 135-174). Architecture: Ecstasies ofspace, time, and

the human body.58 Karen Franck. (1989, pp. 201-212). A feminist approach to architecture. In Ellen

Perry Berkley & Matilda McQuaid (Eds.), Architecture: A placefor women, pp. 201-216.Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.

59 Bradford C. Grant. (1991). Cultural invisibility: The African American experiencein architectural education. In Thomas A. Dutton (ed), Voices in architectural education, pp.149-164. New York, Bergin & Garvey.

I William Pinar et al (1995). Understanding curriculum.61 Marie Battiste & James Youngblood Henderson. (2000, pp. 10-11). Protecting

indigenous knowledge and heritage: A global challenge. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada:Purich Publishing.

62 George Lakoff & Mark Johnson. (1999, pp. 45-73). Philosophy in the flesh: Theembodiedmindand its challenge to Western thought.NewYork: Basic Books. Also by sameauthors, Metaphors we live by (1980). Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

63 GeorgeLakoff&MarkJohnson (1999, pp. 47).Philosophy in theflesh: The embodiedmind and its challenge to Western thought.

64 Charles Jencks. (2002, pp. 2-6, 263-264). The new paradigm in architecture. NewHaven, CT: YaleUniversityPress.Also seeAnthonyAntoniades (1991,pp. 4-7) fortheterm,"poetics of inclusivity."

65HannahArendt. The crisis in education. In Betweenpast andfuture (1961, pg. 196).New York: The Viking Press.

66RobertHowe. (2002), Monumental achievement, Smithsonian Magazine, November.

Mutnir Vellani 29

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

TITLE: Architecture and the Poetics of CurriculumSOURCE: JCT 20 no3 Fall 2004

WN: 0429707253002

The magazine publisher is the copyright holder of this article and itis reproduced with permission. Further reproduction of this article inviolation of the copyright is prohibited.

Copyright 1982-2004 The H.W. Wilson Company. All rights reserved.