Architecturalized Asia

Book excerpt: How did terms like “Asia,” “Eurasia,” “Indochina,” “Pacific Rim” or “Australasia” originate and evolve, and what are their connections to the built environment? In addressing this question,Architecturalized Asia bridges the fields of history and architecture by taking “Asia” as a discursive structure and cultural construct, whose spatial and ideological formation can be examined through the lenses of cartography, built environments, and visual narratives. The first section, on the study of architecture in Asia from the medieval through early modern periods, examines icons and symbols in maps as well as textual descriptions produced in Europe and Asia. The second section explores the establishment of the field of Asian architecture as well as the political and cultural imagining of “Asia” during the long nineteenth century, when “Asia” and its regions were redefined in the making of modern world maps mainly produced in Europe. The third section examines tangible structures produced in the twentieth century as legible documents of these notional constructions of Asia. In exploring the ways in which “Asia” has been drawn and framed both within and without the continent, this volume offers cutting-edge scholarship on architectural history, world history and the history of empires. Written by architectural historians and historians specializing in Asia and European empires, this unique volume addresses the connection between Asia and the world through the lenses of built environments and spatial conceptualizations. Architecturalized Asiawill appeal to readers who are interested in Asian architecture, world architecture, Asian history, history of empires, and world history.