Sociology of architecture and cultural heritage – a praxeological approach.
Architecture is a basic part of our everyday lives, much more than other cultural manifestations like music and art. Buildings surround us and shape our practices by providing a frame for social interactions. At the same time, architecture shares and reveals characteristics of contemporary society, e.g. a tendency towards grandeur and representation or towards modesty and transparency. In this seminar, Hilmar explores the relationship between architecture and the social and discusses sociological perspectives for analysing this relationship drawing on practice theory. These reflections on the sociology of architecture are part of Hilmar’s postdoc research, in which he looks at the specialized and vernacular practices that construct cultural heritage, especially the notion of “world heritage”. He presents a case study on the restoration of the Neues Museum in Berlin by David Chipperfield Architects.