[HN Gopher] Hans Hollein: Everything Is Architecture
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       Hans Hollein: Everything Is Architecture
        
       Author : conanxin
       Score  : 50 points
       Date   : 2024-06-23 04:13 UTC (2 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (designmanifestos.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (designmanifestos.org)
        
       | hhshhhhjjjd wrote:
       | Why must people write using Man instead of Humanity? His instead
       | of Our?
       | 
       | I get that it's "just language" but it's a bit annoying. That's
       | all.
        
         | helmutschmidt wrote:
         | In the original text it is "der Mensch" which translates to
         | "man". It could also be translated to humans but it wouldnt be
         | too accurate of a translation. It also doesnt help that the
         | original is a text from 1967:
         | https://www.hollein.com/ger/Schriften/Texte/Alles-ist-Archit...
        
         | syntaxfree wrote:
         | To me "Man" has more of a "each and every" connotation. Compare
         | 
         | "Man must achieve this."
         | 
         | "Humanity must achieve this."
         | 
         | The latter is more of a collective emergent thing. And in some
         | cases that leaves you with a diffusion of responsibility kind
         | of passive feeling, while the former is a call to action.
         | 
         | Maybe it's just my ear.
        
           | outofpaper wrote:
           | It's more than just your ear. The way we use language to
           | describe individuals versus groups highlights a divide
           | between personal responsibilities and collective rights. All
           | too often individuals use the group as a means to avoid
           | personal responsibility.
        
             | hhshhhhjjjd wrote:
             | Maybe I should re-translate this and replace each "man"
             | with "woman" and each "his" with "her".
             | 
             | "Woman has achieved great things!"
             | 
             | I think it slaps even harder that way!
        
               | outofpaper wrote:
               | You can if you want, but that ignores how one of the
               | accepted definitions of "man" is humanity. If you're just
               | swapping words without understanding their deeper
               | implications, you might miss the point. It's not about
               | the gendered language; it's about the collective
               | achievements and struggles of all people.
               | 
               | So, are we really focusing on inclusion, or are we just
               | playing word games?
        
         | idontknowtech wrote:
         | It's typical for architect "manifestos". Makes them sound more
         | serious and important than they are
        
         | rexpop wrote:
         | We live under a patriarchy.
        
         | rokhayakebe wrote:
         | It's language specific, I believe. I know in our African
         | language we use Humans (niit) or Children of Adam (domu Adama)
         | when referring humans and humanity.
        
         | beacon294 wrote:
         | It's the english language tradition. There are style guides and
         | such, but people are mostly working around them these days.
        
         | fervor wrote:
         | What is annoying is your sensitivity. Let the author express
         | pronouns and the like in their own preference.
        
         | sho wrote:
         | Actually, "man" in this sense ("all humans") is descended from
         | _mann_ , an old english word that didn't specifically indicate
         | male. It evolved to refer to males specifically later, although
         | retaining its old inclusive meaning.
         | 
         | Also interestingly, the "man" in _human_ is not related
         | etymologically to _man_ by itself.
         | 
         | So the author is actually correct, although the usage is a
         | little archaic.
        
           | yzydserd wrote:
           | Yes, "mann" was person. Not related to "human" which derived
           | from Latin Hominem.
           | 
           | A wifmann was a "female person" and a "waeponmann" was a male
           | person. Wifmann contracted to winmann to woman.
        
           | pavlov wrote:
           | This usage persists in Swedish where "man" means both the
           | human male and a generic subject for a passive tense, similar
           | to how "one" or "you" works in English.
           | 
           | Man maste vara fri -> One must be free
        
         | imperialdrive wrote:
         | I dunno man, but I tell ye what, he did just very that indeed.
         | It's from 1968.
        
         | wodenokoto wrote:
         | It's from 1968. I think we can forgive old-time word usage.
        
         | gumby wrote:
         | I agree, though the historic roots make "man" (for humanity)
         | and "man" (male person) simply homonyms. They "sound" different
         | in my head, the same way "homo" (Latin for male person) and
         | "homo" (Greek for "same") feel very different to me.
         | 
         | In this case though it's likely simply an artifact of
         | translation from the German word _Mann_.
        
           | quonn wrote:
           | Perhaps you mean ,,man" in German which means ,,one". ,,Mann"
           | literally refers to a male person which doesn't really make
           | sense here.
           | 
           | Both are pronounced identically.
        
             | gumby wrote:
             | Yeah, I was typing on autopilot on my phone.
        
       | devjab wrote:
       | I recently saw a news story about a Danish inventor who had come
       | up with a coffee lid which uses, and I'm sorry to say I forgot
       | how much less but it was around 25% materials. I was expecting
       | him to be some sort of engineer or designer but he was in fact an
       | architect.
       | 
       | Out of curiosity I looked into it and apparently a lot of our
       | inventors of brilliant stuff like that are architects, so I guess
       | that goes along with what this author is saying.
        
         | robertlagrant wrote:
         | Architect means "master builder", but I think you will get a
         | spectrum of people along that. Some will be people who can
         | still be called master builder, but others will focus more on
         | pure design with some project management and quality control.
        
           | pavlov wrote:
           | One noteworthy thing about architecture is that it's a field
           | of design where execution is extremely expensive and often
           | politically fraught. The majority of architects' designs are
           | either never built, or transformed into something nearly
           | unrecognizable along the way.
           | 
           | For this reason many architects end up seeking smaller design
           | challenges where they can still leverage their understanding
           | of materials and people flows. A coffee pot isn't so far
           | removed from that after all.
        
       | classified wrote:
       | Is that a block of cheese on the cover there? It is definitely
       | fitting, because this text may as well be about the esoteric
       | quantum forces in cheese holes.
        
         | javier123454321 wrote:
         | First time reading writing done by architects? As a former
         | practicioner, this text is actually quite, lacking in jargon.
        
       | drsopp wrote:
       | That article is in sore need of hyphenation.
       | 
       | https://caniuse.com/css-hyphens
        
         | blitzar wrote:
         | > Translated from the original German.
         | 
         | I suspect the hyphens got lost in translation.
        
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