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| CCA Announces the 2006-2007 Stirling Lecturer The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA), in collaboration with the Cities Programme of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), announces the winner of the second international competition for the James Stirling Memorial Lectures on the City. The jury has named Israeli architect Eyal Weizman the 2006-2007 Stirling Lecturer for his proposal entitled “Destruction by Design: Military Strategy as Urban Planning.” The bi-annual James Stirling Memorial Lectures on the City competition was launched in 2003 in homage to architect James Stirling, who believed that urban design is integral to the practice of architecture and a vital topic for public debate. Eyal Weizman, was appointed Director of the Centre for Research Architecture at Goldsmiths College (University of London) last year. Weizman's project builds upon an impressive body of research and practice, which initially focused on the relationship between the theory and practice of warfare in the cities and settlement camps of Palestine, where the Israeli military has retooled itself to deal with guerrilla combat in dense urban situations. The Stirling Lecture will focus on the way Israeli, American, and British militaries, as well as NATO forces, are currently conceptualizing and operating within the urban domain. The project delves into themes such as how the ever-expanding urban domain is effectively being redesigned as the field of military operations in response to the development of "lethal" weapons of destruction; how language employed by the military to describe the city to themselves and to the general public reveals an evolving relationship between organized violence and the production of space; how new military tactics irreparably disrupt traditional distinctions between public and private space and the vital flows of goods and services guaranteed by conventional urban infrastructure; the urban and symbolic consequences of removing bombing targets such as historical or religious monuments, the fabric of urban neighbourhoods, and essential infrastructure; and how the replacement of existing systems of circulation with new ones enables military access not only for the protection of the city's inhabitants, but also for the purpose of controlling popular unrest. Weizman will present the Stirling Lecture in autumn 2006 at the CCA in Montréal, and at the London School of Economics in autumn 2007. write your comments about the article :: © 2006 Construction News :: home page |