Just Space: Material and Phenomenal Alternatives to Cruel and Unfortunately-usual Architecture

Abstract

Phenomena, such as light and sound, are often weaponized in putative systems. Either through overwhelming the body with stimuli or through sensory deprivation. Phenomena also make place and create indelible connections, and will act as an integral component in restorative justice. Materiality is typically used in putative carceral landscapes to erase and control human experience, so I will use materiality as the conduit for connection between the individual and their environment and will illustrate how that connection contributes to rehabilitation and justice. Research has shown that the greatest increase in incarceration since the 1970s has been with women in rural areas. As the majority of scholarship and design have been oriented toward urban men, special considerations must be made to provide justice for rural women. For people from non-urban places, bioregional identity is embodied. Knowledge of their home is shared through the air, soil, plants, and seasonal changes. As such, justice should be framed bioregionally, influenced by the following factors: Use of receptive caring approach to create normative user experience; utilization of soft, approachable, durable, changeable, unique materials; emphasizing connection to place-making phenomena; design with community, respond to their needs. My project serves as an exercise in applying emerging, holistic design methods in a culturally relevant manner to model an intuitive, humane, connected justice campus.