China: Designing the Future, Venerating the Past

Abstract

Architectural history in China is neither an independent scholarly discipline nor a subfield of some broader intellectual discourse.1 Nor is it the passion of educated laymen's spare time. In the Chinese educational system, architecture most often is separate from history. Buildings from earlier times and the methods or principles by which they were constructed are investigated primarily by students of architectural design or structural engineering. Decoration on buildings, especially exterior ornament, is studied to a certain extent, as are styles of Chinese architecture, especially imperial on the one hand and regional on the other, mainly for the purpose of historic preservation. Architectural history is usually part of an architect's training. The study of buildings or cities as a means of understanding historical trends, social movements, or human experience-the kinds of issues that have led to the rise of urban studies programs in history departments in North America-are not part of the mainstream Chinese educational process. Architectural history usually is a requirement of architecture students from the B.Arch. through the Ph.D. level in China, but its mastery is optional in terms of a student's success.2 In the Chinese higher educational process, architectural history is perhaps well-characterized as a Western construct, for beginning only in the twentieth century can one find a Chinese equivalent for the words in this combination. Jianzhu is the word used in China today for architecture. This modern word is formed from the characterjian, which may mean to build, construct, erect, or establish, and zhu, which may also mean to build, but in its purer meaning refers to beating or ramming hard, a technique common in Chinese wall construction since the Neolithic period. Premodern Chinese (before around the mid-nineteenth century) employs the wordyingzao for what is best translated as construct. The first character (ying) takes as its primary meaning to regulate or manage, and zao can mean to build, but also may mean to institute.3 In premodern China, the government regulated important institutional and religious construction, and the books in which these regulations are preserved were commissioned by the court and written by scholar-officials.4 Inherent in the meaning ofyingzao, then, is the fundamental link between Chinese officialdom and architecture. History, translated as lishi (li meaning to calculate, pass through, or successive, and shi meaning chronicles or annals), is not a new concept in China: the Chinese are among the oldest cord-keeping civilizations. However, the word used for chitectural history in China today can be simplyjianzhu, architecture. University courses on architectural history a e dentifiable by the characters that precede the wordjianzhu. A course on Chinese architectural history is calle Zh ngguoJianzhu as often as ZhongguoJianzhu Shi, and one on Western architecture, XifangJianzhu, one on modern (ca. 1840-1949) architecture, Jindai Jianzhu, and one on contemporary architecture, Xiandai Jianzhu, as often as Xifang Jianzhu Shi, Jindai Jianzhu Shi, or Xiandai Jianzhu Shi. The intent here is not philological digression. The names, I uggest, are precise and therefore very significant. A university course n Chinese architecture, Western architecture, or mode n architecture is primarily a look at the buildings of China, the West, or moder times. The subject matter is buildings first, in particular, how they are put together, with some attention given to the evolution of technology and stylistic features. The next directions of investigation, which, as we shall see below, are also reflected in co se titles, are ways that structures relate to environmental, geographic, or climatic issues. Historical background and its inte pretation are not systematically provided and not essential to the successful completion of this kind of course. Courses called Zhongguo Jianzhu, in every program discussed below, are taught chronologically. The logic of the presentation sequence is development of form and style, and the justifications are the need to know how to evaluate a newly identified old building, how to restore it or others in need of preservation, and, occasionally, how to design a building for which an evocation of premoder architecture is sought. So far, topics such as Building in the Age of the Huizong Emperor or Architecture in the Period of Dynastic Disunion have not been taught in China. Even courses onjianzhu, buildings alone, of a time frame as specific as the Song dynasty (960-1279), in which the Huizong emperor reigned, or the period of Northern and Southern Dynasties (ca. the third through sixth centuries), when more than