Dublin, June 2 - 04, 2016
Deadline: Sep 30, 2015

CHANGING IDENTITIES? PLANNING AND BUILDING IN BORDER REGIONS, A DIFFICULT EUROPEAN HERITAGE

From the very first one the European town has always been the immediate expression of social and political circumstances, its current shape appears as the result of antagonistic and individual interests. This applies as well and especially for the period between 1850, when within nationalism a discussion arose on the expression of national identities in architecture and urbanism, and 1945, when traditional and/or local architectural concepts were marginalized by an international modernism. In the same period, from 1850 to 1945, numerous European cities located in border regions had changed their national affiliation as a result of national conflicts, rooting in the same nationalism. At this point, the border regions Schleswig, Poznan-West Prussia, Alsace-Lorraine, South Tyrol, Trentino and Slovenia should be mentioned.

As impacts of the Industrial Revolution, both new, efficient building materials and construction methods were introduced, furthermore the significant growth of cities in Europe causes the development of urbanism as an independent academic discipline. Irrespective of any national discussion, those phenomena lead to an intensive exchange of ideas and mutual, cross-border interferences. Unfortunately, due to mostly national dominated architectural historiographies, those interferences were ignored so far, only the German-French border region and the Rhine-Meuse region were investigated recently. However, it becomes more and more evident, that mainly the border regions played a key role for those interferences.

Within this session the various mutual transfer phenomenas within the European border regions should be discussed and compared; papers may be concerned with, but are not limited to:

• How does the change of the national affiliation affect the planning and building activities and processes?
• Are those processes in the various European border regions similar or are they all different?
• How does the conquering nation represent itself in its new territory by architecture and urbanism?
• Which kind of administrative, legal and/or staff structures were needed for the realisation of those concepts?
• Which lores and traditions were used for the therefore needed elements and symbols? How were they choosen and (re)interpreted?
• What happens to the existing, traditional and local cultures and identities in a border region after changing the national affiliation?
• How does knowledge, e.g. knowledge on new construction materials and methods travel along Europe? Does border regions play a particular role in those travels?
• How does the European border regions deal today with their often difficult and nationalistically charged heritage?

Aim of the session is to create a deeper knowledge of the various mutual transfer phenomenas within the European border regions, to discuss the appropriate methods and instruments of research and, last but not least, to contribute to a stronger (public) consciousness of this – literally – common European heritage.

Session chairs:
Klaus Tragbar, Leopold-Franzens-University Innsbruck
Volker Ziegler, L’Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’architecture de Strasbourg

Abstracts of no more than 300 words should be submitted directly to the conference website along with applicant’s name, professional affiliation, title of paper or position, a C.V. of no more than five pages, home and work addresses, e-­mail addresses and telephone numbers. Papers may not have been previously published, nor presented in public. Only one submission per author will be accepted.

The complete Call for Papers and Discussion Positions can be downloaded from the meeting website: www.eahn2016conference.wordpress.com and from the EAHN website: www.eahn.org.