Dear natasha, murali and others
I am writing from Tehran.
Befor I saw this land Iran for me represented the voice of people who
beleieved in thier cultural rights. But the whole tehran architecture is so
completly western, their life style etc.
I began to wonder what are they fighting for?
I raised about the issue of ' Homogenisation of aesthetic sense as the most
important issue to be tackled. All over the world the so called educated talk
the same language, same music, same sense of beauty same food, same art, same
design........
The root cause lies in the complete misunderstanding about how human beings
create knowledge.
This is a cognitive crisis. Fragmented, distorted way of ' BEING '.
In a profound sense, it is a community's sense of beauty that delineates its
culture. When a society or community loses its authentic sense and sense of
beauty or subjugates its sense of beauty to the corruption of alien influences,
it loses its authentic culture.
The educational systems have suceeded in insulating them from rest of the
processess execept the economics.
Most professional have no understanding of the implications of their work with
respect to politics, culture, children, enviornment etc.
I am forwarding a mail came to me last week.
I am pasting one sentence that was so provocative." I think it is a truism to
say that design designs us! Because most design is undertaken within the
framework of arid, one-dimensional modernity, it has produced an arid,
one-dimensional world which has in turn turned us all into arid, one-dimensional
beings. That’s where sameness comes from. And that’s where most of the conflicts
emerge. If you value tradition and religious ideals, but your environment and
everything that surrounds you is not only secular but actually makes fun of your
tradition and values, then you have a right to be upset. I think design is as
much to blame as say political disputes and fundamentalism for most of the
conflicts in the world today. So the future ends up being defutured in two ways.
It ends up just like the present - but more of the same. And it ends up insane
and conflict-ridden where sustainability and sensibility are vanquished. I don’t
see one particular faith or culture as the
counterforce. I think we need a plethora of ways of resistance involving all
cultures.

I thought this fascinating interview with cultural critic and activisit
Ziauddin Sardar by Tony Fry in the Design Philosphy Politics E-Zine might be of
interest.

http://designphilos ophypolitics. informatics. indiana.edu/ ?p=30

In case you are interested further do look at the site www.re-cognition.org
where i have posted few things on the problem of cognition.

Jinan
aep
nid 1988



Jinan,
www.re-cognition.org
www.kumbham.in
http://my.opera.com/jinankb/albums/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/terracotta_murals/sets/72157594503980465/
09447121544
0487 2386723

---------------------------------
Need a vacation? Get great deals to amazing places on Yahoo! Travel.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]