Charles hajj - GSAPP portfolio

ABOUT ARCHITECTURE

Conversatoin at GSAPP

CHARLES HAJJ

Conversation This book is an archive of a series of lectures and events that helped to discuss the Architectural field at GSAPP. These moments are important in developing architectural knowledge. They can take the form of a Studio, History class, Lecture, Technical workshop, Exhibition, or any other kind of event that produces dialogue. Through discussing architecture we are able to criticize and produce a better understanding of the field and its context. For this reason I consider the journey at GSAPP as a sort of conversation that takes different physical forms.

GSAPP - AAD 2015 - 2016 Adv. Studio

Seminar / History

Visual Studies

Lecture Series

Exhibition

SUMMER Adv. Studio - TPC Typological Correction Metropolis

Arguments

FALL 08

Adv. Studio - FAT The FAT Theory

SPRING 32

Adv. Studio - ICE COLOR STUDIO

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After Belonging 98

Echoing Borders 108

Adolf Loos 06

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The Contemporary

Ultra Real

Lecture Series

Buckminster Fuller

Lecture Series

Les Levines Rifaat Chadirji

ARCHITECTURAL DIALOGUE Adolf Loos

The world of Architecture is one of the largest places that a mind could ever acquire.

Architecture is a field that relates to many other different disciplines. Since its existence until now, it has always been linked to either context, program, social crisis or many other circumstances. Sometimes it is direct to one specific subject such as program or typology, whereas often times it is part of more than one. It establishes meaning through engaging with these other disciplines, yet at the same time gives them significance and add value for taking part of the architectural process.

Although there might be a set of rules for how an architecture should be thought of, architecture thinking is not always direct. Many projects are a translation of the architect’s ideas and life experience.

Discussing Architecture can start from any random point that may or may not be related to the discipline. The way this happens is through the art of memory as Frances Yates puts it in his book. He relates it to a where a memory is considered as a series accumulated of places. Places that describe a building such as forecourt, living room, bedroom, context, objects, and many other elements that adds to the specificity of the place and therefore the building. They are considered as “the images by which the speech is to be remembered, and are then placed in imagination on the places which have been memorized in the building.” as he writes about it in his book. In the end of this process of storing what happens is that “As soon as the memory of the facts requires to be revived, all these places are visited in turn and the various deposits demanded of their custodians”.

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The architecture culture is what makes the architecture as we see it today. Through discussing the different aspects within the field the architecture becomes more relevant and adopted in our everyday life. Most of the recalled ideas are not just the renders and floor plans of the architecture but the ones discussed in conversations with the architects.

If you think now about the word “Architecture�, what do you imagine? Do you think about your favorite building, your own research, a place that you visited? This same first question as simple as it is, opened up at this moment so many parts of your brain and so many other thoughts. The choice you will make will be obvious at first, but then other portions of your memory will come to justify it and maybe make you start thinking again about the question. A conversation has already started in your head. It becomes what I am referring to in this paper as the Architectural Dialog.

We live in a world that is constantly changing. A place where things around us alter, the way we think is in constantly adjusting, the art is changing and also the way we think about the same piece of art changes. In that sense conversation become endless. The same subject will be discussed many times and each time in a different way, a different perspective with different supporting arguments and examples. This alteration is observed by talking about it and examining its circumstances in the first place. Most of the good ideas get full development after talking about them. There will always be something different, there will always be something to think about.

Something to talk about!!

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TPC

Typological Correction Manhattan - New York, USA The selling of Counterfeiting products in Chinatown has become the main source of income for the retailers and the people living in Chinatown. In 2013 Council women Margaret Chin, proposed a law that will also criminalize the buyers of these products with a prison sentence of up to a year. This law will change the retail fabric of Chinatown, therefore the district will need to rely on a new source of production and income.

The MADE IN CHINATOWN project envisions an alternative of new Manufacturing ecologies and residential spaces in the city. The project examines the existing typological conditions of the retail spaces on the ground, second floor and more specifically in the “back room�, where most of these activities happen.

At first the project address the Made in Chinatown, but also provide Manufacturing spaces for outside investors.

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Project perspective mass plan

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Exploded Axon: intervention

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Groundfloor Arcade moments

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Manufacturing Tower

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Section Detail

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Canal Street view

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Section A: The communication between all three blocks

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Section B: The communication within the same block

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Typological Concepts Typology has always been at the top of the cultural debates. As a critical tool posses a huge influence on the Architectural field. It reached a point where it cannot be ignored anymore, and started to become part of the current theoretical scholarly discussions. Living in a perpetual changing world everything around us is subject to variation. Many things will change and transform to adapt and fit with the new context of societies and technologies. Such matters could be our ideas, knowledge, techniques and our daily perception to things. This will eventually affect the typologies, forcing them to transform and alternate to be compatible with the changes of society. In general, we unconsciously put a lot of effort on a daily basis in our understanding of life by organizing and disorganizing commonalities and differences between various phenomena surrounding us. The classification of phenomena is made possible by all logical inferences underlain in the notion of type. It is through them that we are able to group based on similarities and make distinctions. This act of classification enables multiplicity to turn into unity, which at the same time generates reasoning and knowledge.

The notion of type first gained its significance in the eighteenth century known as the Age of Enlightenment. The Enlightenment philosophers, inspired by revolutions in physics and sciences, were convinced that systematic thinking could be applied to all forms of human activity. As such, many encyclopedias covering several disciplines were written aiming to classify rational information. In architecture, the first typological approach was developed out of the rationalist philosophy of the Enlightenment by the French archeologist Quatremere de Quincy in his work “Encyclopedie” (1789). The result of this corpus of work has since been influential and it has become the subject of debate in architectural discourse of the twentieth century. However, with the modernist architectural discourse, the concept of type suffered loss of significance. For instance, in modernism the notion of type was reduced to the notion of stereotype. However, we see a reemergence of the significance of type and typology during the 1950s as reflected in the writings of Aldo Rossi, mainly “The Architecture of the City” (1982)1 In a society that is always searching for a “raison d’etre”, especially during present time, Typology is the key element that helps us stay involved in the Architectural discourse. It is the tool that allows us Architects to define our work and the transformation of our understanding of architecture, to investigate established typologies and accepting the formation of new ones. Thus it acts as the tool that let us define ourselves within the architectural field. It is an indispensible tool in the discourse of critical communities, always used to explain, clarify or deconstruct any type of work. It has the most radical definition among other words used to define the field such as Architectural, Design, etc.

In the quest of understanding the word typology, looking into some examples of Aldo Rossi would be essentially helpful. He is considered as a great theorist, and is still seen today as a main influence in the field especially in the context of typologies. Rossi writes in his book “Architecture and the city” about how architecture gives concrete form to society and is intimately connected with it and with nature, and how it differs fundamentally from every other art and science. Therefore, “The comfort of any building consists of three principal items: its site, its form, and the organization of its parts”. He also mentions that:

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“Ultimately, we can say that type is the very idea of Architecture, that which is closest to its essence. In spite of changes, it has always imposed itself on the feelings and reason” as the principle of architecture and of the city.”

Typology is used as a tool for reading the city, clarifying the process of the urban fabric and its transformation. It helps to decipher and understand more clearly the different agencies that are shaping up the environment. The architecture of the city is composed of mass buildings and mass voids. This tool helps to show the transgression of the type that could become autonomy as a self referenced modular type. It works on all scale since type doesn’t have a scale.

It makes it less difficult to discuss architecture by understanding certain organizational intentions, unfolding ideas and experiences, and clarifying a theory of an alteration of a type. At the same time it becomes a theoretical tool to produce design. Even though most of the times it is reduced to a classification device it still addresses a morphological category that is more relevant than the first one. 3 For most Architectural projects the use of programmatic concepts and diagrams is essential to explain the design aspect of the project. It could take the form of sketches, diagrams, data analysis, computational methodologies and other kinds of forms. In many discourse it come down to the Typology behind the project. Typologies help with explaining the idea behind the project, unfolding the problems and complexities that it may hold. In that sense they do not just represent formal spaces but also expose the flows and management of these spaces. They take into consideration as well routes, relationships, behaviors and other factors that the architecture might be engaging with. Although the scale, the program and the context can influence and alternate a typology, yet at the same time they can be the cause of producing a specific typology, the type that is extremely autonomous that it becomes an architectural symbol, a sign. Although they start as being abstract and propositional to translate ideas yet they also end up by shaping up the architecture itself. They do not acquire a lot of details but still become key elements on forming the spaces that shape up the building. They are graphically engaging into the composition of the architecture. They can provide notion of size, scale, orientation and position clarifying the idea behind the concept.

The use of this tool is to illustrate events movement and processes representing objects and architectural ideas. How much do they contribute is explaining the architecture instead of forming it? How much does it influence the shape of the architecture and its composition? Where are the boundaries between the concept and its diagram? When is typology though of? How much is it adding to the understanding of the project?

And how much is it being constraint by the agencies of the project?

Saying that I find that the way we start to discuss architecture and the field of design is based on our reflections of thoughts where many elements take part mainly typology. There is no right answer to this and no proper way to address the notions behind typologies. It can only be interpreted many times and every couple of years so it brings new challenges and ideas to the discussion table, making room for re-evaluating our work and the work of others in order to grasp upon a more profound understanding of the Architectural field.

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FAT

Fat Theory San francisco - USA Starting with the idea that every Architect must have a theory of Fat. The most infamous advocate for the necessity of Fat is Phillip Johnson, who (along with Paul Rudolph) stated that “Architecture is the Art of Wasting Space”. Others have subconsciously internalized their appetite for Fat so that it is barely identifiable in their architectural diet, transforming spatial excesses into essential ingredients of their organizational or spatial languages.

The project analyzes and differentiates excess and efficiency, as well as what is Fat and can be considered as Big. Starting with Aldo Rossi’s’ work to understand his Fat theory and then translated into a house for three strangers. The theory of Fat is tested in three sequences where Fat is lean, regular or excess. The result is what we get out of this experimental approach.

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LEAN FAT

Small Scale Fat: HOUSE 34

REGULAR

FAT

EXCESS FAT

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COSMOPOLITANISM

DIFFERENT BEHAVIORS THAT CREATES THE RELATIONSHIPS

RE-ARTICULATE / RE-ASSOCIATE RELATIONSHIPS OF CERTAIN SOCIETY THE NEW WAY OF LIVING

Medium Scale Fat: INCUBATOR 42

PRIVATE

PRIVATE

PUBLIC

TRANSITION

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TYPICAL HOTEL PROGRAM ORGANIZATION

PUBLIC

TRANSITION

- IRREGULAR -

PRIVATE

COSMOPOLITAN PROGRAM ORGANIZATION

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DIFFERENT SETS OF RELASHIONSHIPS

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DIFFERENT SETS OF OUTCOMES

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FLOOR PLAN +13.00 m

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FLOOR PLAN +25.00 m

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SECTION 1 Section passing through different programs

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SECTION 2

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FACADE / SUNLIGHT CONTROL

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INFRASTRUCTURE / CIRCULATION

PROGRAM

FAT

INCUBATOR

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PROGRAM INTERACTION - UPPER FLOOR

PROGRAM INTERACTION - GROUND FLOOR

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FAT

Fat Theory San francisco - USA On a larger scale the theory of Fat is also envisioned on a scale of an Incubator and later on a Convention center.

When living, working and leisure come together, the challenging notions of temporality, scale, program, interiority, exchange, collectivity comes along and the idea of a cosmopolitan architecture takes place.

The concept of Fat in this case is seen through two main elements: infrastructure and the in-between spaces of the different programs. The infrastructure provides a platform of external and internal exchange between: Context - Site, Site - program, & Program – Program. This platform generates an understanding of the in-between spaces where they are seen as active spaces that helps communicate different parts of the project, creating new instances of collective spaces.

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Conceptual Collage showing the relation of FAT in a Cosmopolitan society

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URBAN READING

LARGE Scale Fat: CONVENTION CENTER 56

Site plan - Public prolifiration

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Floor plan conceptual approach

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Ground Floor Plan

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Public expansion Moments on different floors

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Fourth Floor Plan

Top Floor Plan

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Residential

Residential

Multi-use Event Space

Exterior public space

Office

Multi-use Event Space

Multi-use Event Space

Public interaction crossing the diffe

Section: Showing the communication between different parts and programs

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Office

Residential

Multi-use Event Space

Exterior public space

Residential

Office

Gallery

erent parts of the project

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ICE

Arctic Research Facility Greenland - Arctic Using color as study platform, color studies aim to understand and identify strategies on how to engage Architectural projects in the Arctic. The Arctic being a place with extreme weather and light conditions.

A major color constraint is derived from three monochromatic arctic ecosystems undergoing rapid transformation: The Arctic Ocean, the Boreal Forest, and the Cryosphere.

The project seeks to show how architects use color or light to represent their ideas in drawings, sketches or models. Color also being black and white. It is located in Greenland in the Arctic, and is composed of mainly of an ice core research facility with all its necessary equipment. Greenland provide a site with old age ice that dates from the Emian period becomes and interesting site for drilling ice cores. It will help scientist to understand the history of the earth as well as decode the complexities in the weather and the consequences of climate change.

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SUN

WIND

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DARKNESS

LANDSCAPE

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Temperature Analysis Color as a measurement tool

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Greenland - Arctic The process used engages with color and light to study the efficiency of the building in the arctic context.

Color therefore show the alteration in temperature for each area of the project. It also examines the sources of light and the propagation of light towards the interior. The project in these conditions adapts by locating some of its programs, that needs to stay cold, imbedded within the ice, whereas the ones that needs heat are elevated to a level higher than the ground floor. It also orientates based on wind circulation, to reduce wind in some areas, and use the high wind to accumulate snow in other areas.

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Light Tower Observation Tower - Arctic Landscape

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LOST IDENTITIES AFTER BELONGING FALL 2015 During the time of transit and migration, people move, objects are displaced, and also territories are redefined.

Even during these transit trajectories there is always some sort of character that sticks with a person shaping a specific identity representing him/her. In his book The mass ornament, Siegfried Kracauer when talking about the hotel lobby starts with elaborating on the aesthetic meaning of things: The aesthetic rendering of such a life bereft of reality, a life that has lost the power of self-observation, may be able to restore to it a sort of language‌ The unity of the aesthetic construct, the manner in which it distributes the emphases and consolidates the event, gives a voice to the inexpressive world, gives meaning to the themes broached within it.1 In this perspective representation can take form in a specific place or through an object, in a room or on a surface. What are the limitations of these kinds of representations? How much can they extend beyond the borders beyond the walls or surfaces that contain them, in order to project a sense of belonging?

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One example is the flood of migrants to Greece. Due to the civil war in Syria a lot of migrants where forced to leave their homeland. Every day since it started a lot of people go to Lesbos, Greece, in order to get to the European union from there. Traveling to Lesbos requires the migrants to travel through the Mediterranean Sea. They first go from Syria to Turkey and make their way from there to the Greek island. They cross a small part of the Sea using small not well-maintained boats, therefore making this trip really dangerous for them. In many cases there were a lot of death reports. Because of the windy weather and the bad conditions of the boat, people drown at sea. The numbers of death reported by the UNHCR increase year after year. While the Greek coast guards are able to find many dead bodies, a lot of them remain missing at Sea. Media images seek to bring this subject too personnel and emotional, it might be aiming to economical provocations or humanitarian ones.

Nevertheless some images show strong evidences of ways of adaptation and reconstruction of identities especially in severe cases where the dead person is still unrecognized. These sorts of evidences show different moments, and describe step by step these events. They start with the life jackets on the seashores of Lesbos, along with the boat that migrants use to travel from Turkey. After that some other pictures show how bodies are found at sea and brought to the island, they are kept in fridges for 15 days to hold the body temperature while trying to identify the body. After this time limit they are buried on the island known or unknown. The Greek law in this particular case considers the death of a refugee as the death of a foreigner in Greek lands. Every death should therefore be followed by a report. This report should state the name, age and gender of the dead person, the cause of death, the name of the place graveyard where the person is buried, and in the case of an unknown person a full description of the body that contain all its particularities for later identifications. The Greek municipality in collaboration with the Greek Orthodox churches manages all the funeral ceremony preparations. The bodies are taken and buried in the graveyards of these churches.

Jahn and Wihelm Solomon talk about the meaning of burial in the book Bones in the wrong soil: Reburial becomes a mirror reflecting social dynamics and contestations over authority to land in the aftermath of displacement, while simultaneously reconstituting a sense of belonging.

These identities are formed with specific surfaces or boundaries and in specific spaces that allows identifying this distorted condition of belonging. Mainly trying to understand how spaces become graveyards? What are the policies? How is Design relevant in a similar situation?

How can an unknown or lost person belong to a graveyard?

The graveyards in Lesbos are different in terms of shape and texture due to people’s different religions, different culture or unknown identities.

Nonetheless they are all buried in the same soil, in the graveyards of the churches. The pictures of these graveyards show clearly how they have become. Just by analyzing how the different surfaces constitute the graves one can identify different people. If you are a Christian person buried in these cemeteries, the tomb is probably made out of marble in most cases with a big cross at the front another one on the tomb and with an inscription that says the name of the person and the time of death. If it is a Muslim the tomb is a rectangle shorter in height delimited by stones with also a stone in the middle that indicates the name and date of death. In the case of an unknown person, in most cases as the media images shows, the bodies are buried in the soil. Many don’t have tombs, the body is wrapped with a white tissue, after that the space is dug up and the body is put there. On top of the burial space some flowers and a stone that indicates in this case the number and the day of death. Recently Lesbos is suffering from the lack of space on the island to burry the non-stop arriving dead. The news as well as the Greeks are concerned of what to do in this situation.

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Due to the long distance and lack of money these people known or unknown cannot be sent back to their homeland to be buried especially with the ongoing crisis in Syria. The island becomes a host for the living and the dead. While it acts as a transit place for the living migrants, it is still uncertain how to think about the status of the graves of these unknown people. In his book The deep Time of the Dead, Thomas Laqueur talks about architecture and cemeteries, he says: Architecture thus translated into affect: new kinds of places were thought to, and quite probably did, produce new ways of being with and among the dead. Just as cemeteries could mean almost anything, they could belong to anyone.

The establishment of a proper funeral is essential in a death scenario. Human nature respects the dead and tries to give respect to them by burying them. There is a relationship with the dead relatives and friends, and this relationship occurs in a specific space that corresponds to a graveyard or a memorial. Graveyards are different because of geographical location, culture, religion, and other circumstances. They take new forms and shape new identities. In this specific case Lost Identities. Again Thomas Laqueur talks about the importance of a dead body: The dead body matters everywhere and across time; and even in the absence of any particular belief about a soul or an afterlife or a God. It matters because almost always, the living need the dead more than the dead need the living.

Through the surfaces and materiality that form the graveyard, us humans establish a relation with the dead. Known or unknown we seek to provide a proper ceremony in order to give our respect. This relationship happens in a specific place, the graveyard. It contains elements such as flowers, religious elements, names, dates and other things. They either help the dead to form a sense of belonging or help the living identify themselves through their dead. Again in his book The mass ornament, Siegfried Kracauer talks about the attachment to reality when he say: Nevertheless, the weaving of these concepts into a system confirms that people do not want to abandon the reality that has been lost; yet, of course, they will not get hold of it precisely because they are seeking it by means of a kind of thinking which has repudiated all attachment to that reality.

The video attached to this paper tries in a way to put the idea of belonging in times of death on the table. The idea of identifying these lost identities. The media images used in order to show that they are the most revealing of both information about policies and the management of the dead bodies, as well as a sort of sentimentalism through the pictures of the dead bodies. For each images an analysis of all the surfaces that constitute the context of the dead is done. First these layers are fragmented and projected each alone to than show them all together with the image source. This helps to understand the boundaries, the structure, the objects, and all other surfaces that shape the different scenarios that a dead body goes through after time of death. It helps reconstruct a final image of the topic of unknown death and ask the question of belonging. It might be a reconstruction of the dead or as Laqueur implies a reconstruction of the living through the analysis the dead. The video is not an answer put a way of rethinking design in terms of surfaces and elements as well as objectives and implications in everyday life events.

It also makes us think about temporary and permanent state of belonging and how it is shaped and reconstructed.

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STATELESS BODIES ECHOING BORDERS FALL 2015 The Political orientation of nations during crisis is also seen and understood through the death of a refugee. How much can we understand of these deaths and graveyards that are taking place in different countries and under different circumstances? In his book The deep times of the dead, Thomas Laqueur speaks about the importance of the dead body: The dead body mattered and matters everywhere and across time; in particular times and particular places. In the presence and absence of religion and God. It matters because almost always, the living need the dead more than the dead need the living.1 In this sense the graveyards becomes the place where not only the living gives respect to their loved ones but also the place where they identify themselves through their dead.

The paper deals with death and stateless bodies. More specifically looks into the formal and informal graveyards in Jordan and Greece asking how they are thought, where and why are they established. Considering as well the causes of death and the importance and meaning behind burying a body in the context of asylum seekers, the Middle East culture and religion.

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Everyday a huge number of refugees are being displaced, forced to move out of their homes and go somewhere else. From 2011 to 2015 the number of people migrating from Syria has been increasing. They pay a huge amount on money to be smuggled to places. Some move to Jordan while others try to make their way into Europe using different dangerous routes. Although a lot of humanitarian associations are formed and try to help, at the same time everyday a large percentage of migrants die, some at sea others in hosting territories. The UNHCR is one of the organizations that track through specific statistics the number of people dying at sea and land. While in 2010, 700 people died at sea, in September 2015, 3500 people were recorded dead. Also since the start of the war in Syria there are 30000 Syrian refugees buried in Jordan alone. In his book Perpetual Peace, Kant discuss the obligation of humanity at times of war: This is a matter of humanity alone. It is to the praise of Vattel that he did much to popularize among the highest most powerful classes of society, ideas of humanity in warfare, and of the rights and obligations of nations.

During these events hosting nations become responsible for hosting the living as well as the dead. In the scale and context of the Mediterranean Sea countries that are destinations for these asylum seekers, few graveyards were mapped. Between Syria and Italy there are five places found, Catania in Italy, Tomasica in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Lesbos and Kos in Greece, Arsal in Lebanon, and recently Ramtha in Jordan.

It is without doubt important at first for the asylum seekers to ensure a proper burial ceremony to their dead relatives or friends. In the case of the Syrian refugees it mainly reflects the Islamic religion beliefs in which a funeral is essential to take place since it symbolizes respect toward the dead and a bridge to the after life. Migrating from an area where religion and culture represent key aspect on shaping a persons’ identity, it is essential and interesting to understand how graveyards are responding to these need for what have become a nomadic society. For them death is not considered over unless a proper memorial/funeral takes place.

Although that may be understood yet the proximity of Jordan and the distance of European countries to the Syrian borders play a major role in shaping these graveyards in each location. Not only in identifying the places where they are formed but also making a distinction between what is temporary and what becomes permanent. When interviewed by the press, Khetam al Zoubi a 37 years old Syrian refugee talks about burying her mother and says:

We want to bring her back to Syria to bury her, but all the routes where closed. So we buried her here. What could we do? This is our fate.

In all situation of migration the idea of going back to Syria is not possible. The hosting nation gives the choice to the relatives to take the body back to their home country on the persons own expenses. But after selling everything and risking ones life dead or alive the way back seems impossible. Only when the situation of camps became very bad, refugees in Jordan, due to close borders between nations, were seen to go back o Syria and try to go somewhere else. This idea is possible for just the living people that reside in Jordan since Lesbos is too far away, very expensive and even burying a dead in Syria is doubtable.

In the perception of the law, both the Greek and Jordanian laws do not specifically mention the refugee case, but both consider a refugee’s death as a foreign death. That means that some procedures must take place. It is mainly constructed around a detailed report that is done at time of death and includes the name, gender of the dead person, the time of death, location of graveyard, and other additional information that is specific to each person.

These arrangements are operated in both places with the collaboration of the municipality. In the case of Jordan it is also related to the Islamic religion whereas in Greece it follows the Greek Orthodox Church rituals. The government assigns the places that would become cemeteries for the refugees, and after that point municipalities take control and manage these places.

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Even though both Jordan and Lesbos have similarities, they hold a lot of differences mainly in the process of identifying the dead body. In the case of Lesbos, Greece, all refugees cross the Mediterranean Sea from Turkey to get to the Island. They go most of the time if not always though smugglers and cheap boats that result in dangerous routes ending with death at sea. Therefore Greece, which is just a transit place for these migrants, is faced with stateless bodies of unknown people. At the beginning the process starts by finding the body at sea and bringing it to the island where kept in a fridge until identified. After a time of 15 days, as per the law mentions, it is buried even if the person is still unknown. The condition of this transit dead body is in many cases, especially in Italy, in very poor conditions. Because it is hard to go back to Syria due to the war, and the lack of money, all refugees are buried in the graveyards of the churches on the island. Looking closely into the cemeteries of Lesbos, the tombs vary in shape and form. In the same graveyards you could find a Christian, a Muslim and an unknown persons’ grave. Some would have crosses, some would have names, and others would have a stone with a number and a date. At the moment Lesbos is facing problems with hosting dead bodies, as mentioned in many newspapers “There is no place left to die on Greece’s Lesbos for refugees lost at sea”4. The government is not prepared and the island is too small to host the unpredictable number of people.

Graveyards are considered not only as places where the body rests but more importantly it is the place where one can go visit and give respect to his/her loved ones. Understanding that point is highly important since it provides answer to the questions of where these graveyards are located. It is a place where people can have access to at different times of the day.

In the case of Jordan, the ICRC resource show that there was none unidentified dead case until now. Due to the sharing economy between Jordan and Syria since many years, a lot of Syrians have relatives and friends residing in Jordan some before the war started. These people were responsible in some part in identifying the dead migrants that came to Jordan. The only thing separating these two nations is a border. Migrants travel by land, therefore they pay less but also are subject to danger due to the civil war happening in Syria. They use different routes from different parts of Syria to get to Jordan more specifically to the camp sites. Some people are able to continue to other parts of Jordan if they have relatives living there. Here the development of graveyards, as per the Jordanian regulations, has to respond to specific conditions. The government decides on the site, it has to be outside the camps settlements, somewhere in the desert, and at least 100 meters away from the nearest town. Mainly because the camps are getting denser therefore can cause conflicts and other problems, and also because the numbers of people dying is also high therefore requires a large site. The graveyard site should not be windy, nor have access to water plumbs and outputs or polluted. The site should have a fence of 1.5 meters high and each tomb should mention the name, gender, date and reason of death.

They are separated from the local ones for one main reason, which is the belief that after the war ends; the refugees will go back home taking with them their dead relatives to properly burry them in their homeland. We can therefore understand the temporality of these graveyards and understand why they only include refugees as well as why they are located somewhere near the borders between Jordan and Syria.

In Jordan alone there are so far four graveyards since the beginning of the Syrian war in 2011. It started in Bashabsheh that was a private property, offered and transformed into a graveyard for the refugees. After that there was Leila (West of Jordan), Ramtha (next to Ramtha villag) and most recently Tarkhiss (Jaber road). All these last three are lands appointed by the Jordanian government and taking care by the municipality of the region that holds them.

The cause and location of death here is different than the one in Lesbos. There are different factors that lead to death. The most common one is that people reach Jordan alive but with severe injuries. They are transported to hospitals for treatment but in most cases they don’t make it alive. They are buried in the graveyards in Jordan. Another scenario is that while on the journey to get to Jordan, groups pass by many checkpoints under different parties that occupy Syria, many of which don’t make it alive. In this case if it is not possible to burry them in Syria the bodies are displaced on several occasions to eventually get them to Jordan. Both the Syrian and Jordanian army, as resources in Irbid Jordan spoke, might help with the displacement of the dead body.

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MEDITERRANEAN SEA

SYRIAN REFUGEE

TURKEY

TIMELINE STATUS: DEAD STATUS: ALIVE DEATH ZONE GRAVEYARDS

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GREECE

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The last case is the No Mans Land, NML. This is the place where recently after the Jordan government closed the west borders asylum seekers are being hold in the NML for days, months, and even seasons. The NML is the area in between the two borders of Syria and Jordan. Although some NGOs are trying to help get people out of this deserted place, it does not guarantee all of them. Some don’t survive and therefore are buried there in informal areas different every time since this place is not a settlement but a transit area. There have been 11 cases registered until today. This area is critical because it is a NML, therefore it is not adequate to do a proper ceremony of burial, nor give respect, not even a chance to come back after some time, dig up the body and bury it somewhere else.

Due to political issues Palestinians Syrian cannot access Jordan. Nonetheless they use fake identities to cross the borders. While some are caught other might die or travel under another name making the assumptions of doubtable information found on the Syrians. In her book The Rights of Others, Benhabib mentions Kant’s words on tights and sovereignty: Kant clearly showed the tensions that arise between the moral obligation we owe each human being to grant them sojourn on the one hand, and the prerogative of the republican sovereign on the other not to extend this temporary right of stay to permanent membership.5 When thinking about the rights of human beings in relation to residency in hosting nations, a lot of uncertainty is seen. Through these visualizations the notion and forms of spaces is challenged, especially during times of death. Considering the temporality of the spaces and their size and distance to homeland, graveyards can be addressed as sites of designing for better accommodation. These places formal or informal, are used to identify specific species, none other than human beings. Yet they are established in permanent or transit places, and their status is not clearly identified. As mentioned in the beginning of this paper “The dead body mattered and matters everywhere and across time”6, it is not something that we can avoid and not deal with.

They are the silent borders that most people respect and many people fear. Yet It should be one the subjects that we address more frequently since they shape parts of our identities, part of our societies, and part of our lands.

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