Sensory Synaesthesia: Combined Analyses Based on Space Syntax in African Urban Contexts

Abstract

The organization of past urban space continues to be an important focus of archaeological research in sub-Saharan Africa where the methods of space syntax now offer new interpretations of the built environment. Traditionally, space syntax uses access analysis graphs for buildings and axial maps for towns to represent and analyze the configuration of space as a network. Using perspectives from neuroscience and the social sciences, this paper presents several case studies to illustrate how space syntax can be adapted to provide a multisensory “synaesthetic” perspective on African urban environments while also addressing their cultural contexts. These case studies, which focus on historic towns from East and West Africa, incorporate analyses of visibility and movement as tactile perception to examine house layout, street networks, and the socio-spatial role of urban quarters. This demonstrates how the graphic representation of space syntax analyses can help us better understand spatial partitioning and material dimensions of urban space as cultural heritage that affects sensory perceptions such as vision and kinaesthetics.