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The Battle for Home: The Vision of a Young Architect in Syria
An architect’s gripping account of living and working in war-torn Syria, and the role architecture plays in whether a community crumbles or comes together Drawing on the author’s personal experience of living and working as an architect in Syria, this timely and fascinating account offers an eyewitness perspective on the country’s bitter conflict through the lens of architecture, showing how the built environment and its destruction hold up a mirror to the communities that inhabit it.
From Syria’s tolerant past, with churches and mosques built alongside one another in Old Homs and members of different religions living harmoniously together, the book chronicles the recent breakdown of social cohesion in Syria’s cities. With the lack of shared public spaces intensifying divisions within the community, and corrupt officials interfering in town planning for their own gain, these actions are symptomatic of wider abuses of power.
With firsthand accounts of mortar attacks and stories of refugees struggling to find a home, The Battle for Home is a compelling explanation of the personal impact of the conflict and offers hope for how architecture can play a role in rebuilding a sense of identity within a damaged society. 50 black-and-white line drawings
From Syria’s tolerant past, with churches and mosques built alongside one another in Old Homs and members of different religions living harmoniously together, the book chronicles the recent breakdown of social cohesion in Syria’s cities. With the lack of shared public spaces intensifying divisions within the community, and corrupt officials interfering in town planning for their own gain, these actions are symptomatic of wider abuses of power.
With firsthand accounts of mortar attacks and stories of refugees struggling to find a home, The Battle for Home is a compelling explanation of the personal impact of the conflict and offers hope for how architecture can play a role in rebuilding a sense of identity within a damaged society. 50 black-and-white line drawings
208 pages, Hardcover
First published May 16, 2016
49 people are currently reading
1139 people want to read
About the author
Marwa al-Sabouni
3 books18 followersMarwa Al-Sabouni (Arabic: مروة الصابوني) is a Syrian architect and writer. She believes that architecture plays a role in maintaining a city's peace. Her first book, The Battle for Home, was selected by The Guardian as one of the top architectural books of 2016. She was selected as one of the BBC 100 Women in 2019.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 53 reviews
December 8, 2016
I was really taken aback by how beautifully written and sensitive this book was, half-memoir half philosophical treatise on the failings and possibilities of modern urbanism. The author is a native of Homs, a now-destroyed city, and is an architecture PhD who is also a beautiful and thoughtful writer. The book comprises many intimate reflections of the nature of life in Homs and Aleppo before those cities were "wiped from the earth," as she plainly describes it.
Something that is often mentioned in passing is how rural-urban migration helped sow the seeds for Syria's civil conflict. This book goes into great detail on this subject, describing how the haphazard creation of lived environments on the outskirts of ancient cities helped create an almost inevitable ground for such a cataclysm. The "moral aspect of trade" and intertwined identities that characterized traditional cities souks and neighborhoods was encouraged by the way these neighborhoods were constructed. People's self-esteem and sense of identity and shared accomplishment (their "back") were reflected in these city centers and their ancient mosques, churches and monuments. The newcomers were denied any similar inheritance for the most part and developed separate identities that were less rooted. This as the author describes it helped create the basis for the alienation that helped destroy the country.
The book was written from government-held territory and thought it is very critical of local officials and of national governance generally, it takes an even-handed position on the conflict and criticizes the sides only obliquely. In a way this fits with the remarkably equanimous and cultured writing style. I was really struck by the range of her thinking on everything from the constitutive elements of Islamic architecture (explicated beautifully) to the intimate social histories of Syria's marketplaces and old cities, to the global political scene in which the country's conflict has occurred.
There seems like very faint hope for Syria, particularly after what has transpired there in recent months. Many of the old cities described movingly here and the unique cultures they had incubated have been wiped from the earth. But if there is to be any progress it will come from people like Marwa al-Sabouni who maintain a vision for the future that is something better than simply a return to the dehumanizing stagnation that preceded and gave rise to the war in the first place.
Something that is often mentioned in passing is how rural-urban migration helped sow the seeds for Syria's civil conflict. This book goes into great detail on this subject, describing how the haphazard creation of lived environments on the outskirts of ancient cities helped create an almost inevitable ground for such a cataclysm. The "moral aspect of trade" and intertwined identities that characterized traditional cities souks and neighborhoods was encouraged by the way these neighborhoods were constructed. People's self-esteem and sense of identity and shared accomplishment (their "back") were reflected in these city centers and their ancient mosques, churches and monuments. The newcomers were denied any similar inheritance for the most part and developed separate identities that were less rooted. This as the author describes it helped create the basis for the alienation that helped destroy the country.
The book was written from government-held territory and thought it is very critical of local officials and of national governance generally, it takes an even-handed position on the conflict and criticizes the sides only obliquely. In a way this fits with the remarkably equanimous and cultured writing style. I was really struck by the range of her thinking on everything from the constitutive elements of Islamic architecture (explicated beautifully) to the intimate social histories of Syria's marketplaces and old cities, to the global political scene in which the country's conflict has occurred.
There seems like very faint hope for Syria, particularly after what has transpired there in recent months. Many of the old cities described movingly here and the unique cultures they had incubated have been wiped from the earth. But if there is to be any progress it will come from people like Marwa al-Sabouni who maintain a vision for the future that is something better than simply a return to the dehumanizing stagnation that preceded and gave rise to the war in the first place.
August 1, 2017
This is one of those books that I came across only because I was in a physical bookstore, walking from one section that I normally frequent to another, and in the space in between my eye happened to land upon it. The subtitle, "The Visions of a Young Architect in Syria", was arresting to me. When one thinks of Syria nowadays, constructing new buildings is not what comes to mind. One more example of why going to a physical bookstore to buy your books is important.
Marwa Al-Sabouni is a young female Sunni Muslim with a doctorate in architecture, and a mother, and a lifelong resident of the Syrian city of Homs, and all of those things are interesting. But what comes through in the book more than a particular identity group, is an independent mind that is forever trying to make sense of the world around her, and not necessarily using the ideas she has been taught. She is a thinker with ideas of her own to explain the world around her. This includes what has gone on, and (let's face it) gone wrong with her native country.
It is no surprise that she thinks that the architecture of a city, or a country, can bring either division or peace, given that she has devoted a good portion of her life to studying architecture and its history. I won't attempt to pass judgement on that idea, but it is at the very least symptomatic of a lot of other problems, that the architecture of the West was more or less imposed on Syria wholesale, without much regard for the tradition that came before. One is uneasily reminded of the United States attempting to establish a Jeffersonian democracy in Iraq, or the Soviet Union attempting to establish a Marxist/Leninist communist state in Afghanistan.
There is also something uneasy about reading this book as an American, since Al-Sabouni makes clear (repeatedly) that the post-WWII architecture of Syria created the fault lines that the current war erupted along. It seems to me beyond doubt at this point that the post-WWII architectural history of the U.S.A. is the story of people trying to get away from anyone who thinks or acts differently from themselves, whether it is different ethnicities or different parts of the political spectrum (see "The Big Sort", by Bill Bishop and Robert Cushing, for the story of how this happened here). We have not, thus far, allowed our "stay away from me" architecture and urban planning to push us into a shooting war. But it's not as hard to imagine as it used to be.
There are plenty of line drawings of different parts of Syria, mostly in Homs, throughout the book. Some of them show how the new was plopped into the middle of the old, more or less without regard for what came before it. Many show how some of the new and old together have been scarred by the fighting of the war there. It is an unfortunate fact that what has survived for centuries, is still vulnerable to destruction today, along with the rest.
Al-Sabouni is a good writer, and like the story of anyone else living through a civil war there is plenty of human interest here. But there is also the possibility that we are witnessing the eruption of a big new Thinker with a capital 'T', to shine a bright light on the ways in which the places we live succeed or fail at encouraging us to let live, as well. Al-Sabouni's basic thesis here is that the ways buildings are made, the ways they connect, and the ways they keep apart, set us into modes of behavior and ways of thought about our neighbors and those who are not our neighbors, that can send us down a path towards division or towards community. I cannot say that I know for certain if I believe this idea or not, but reading this book is causing me to think about many current problems in a new and intriguing light, and there is little more that one can ask from any book. I very much hope that we and the world are fortunate enough to hear more from her.
Marwa Al-Sabouni is a young female Sunni Muslim with a doctorate in architecture, and a mother, and a lifelong resident of the Syrian city of Homs, and all of those things are interesting. But what comes through in the book more than a particular identity group, is an independent mind that is forever trying to make sense of the world around her, and not necessarily using the ideas she has been taught. She is a thinker with ideas of her own to explain the world around her. This includes what has gone on, and (let's face it) gone wrong with her native country.
It is no surprise that she thinks that the architecture of a city, or a country, can bring either division or peace, given that she has devoted a good portion of her life to studying architecture and its history. I won't attempt to pass judgement on that idea, but it is at the very least symptomatic of a lot of other problems, that the architecture of the West was more or less imposed on Syria wholesale, without much regard for the tradition that came before. One is uneasily reminded of the United States attempting to establish a Jeffersonian democracy in Iraq, or the Soviet Union attempting to establish a Marxist/Leninist communist state in Afghanistan.
There is also something uneasy about reading this book as an American, since Al-Sabouni makes clear (repeatedly) that the post-WWII architecture of Syria created the fault lines that the current war erupted along. It seems to me beyond doubt at this point that the post-WWII architectural history of the U.S.A. is the story of people trying to get away from anyone who thinks or acts differently from themselves, whether it is different ethnicities or different parts of the political spectrum (see "The Big Sort", by Bill Bishop and Robert Cushing, for the story of how this happened here). We have not, thus far, allowed our "stay away from me" architecture and urban planning to push us into a shooting war. But it's not as hard to imagine as it used to be.
There are plenty of line drawings of different parts of Syria, mostly in Homs, throughout the book. Some of them show how the new was plopped into the middle of the old, more or less without regard for what came before it. Many show how some of the new and old together have been scarred by the fighting of the war there. It is an unfortunate fact that what has survived for centuries, is still vulnerable to destruction today, along with the rest.
Al-Sabouni is a good writer, and like the story of anyone else living through a civil war there is plenty of human interest here. But there is also the possibility that we are witnessing the eruption of a big new Thinker with a capital 'T', to shine a bright light on the ways in which the places we live succeed or fail at encouraging us to let live, as well. Al-Sabouni's basic thesis here is that the ways buildings are made, the ways they connect, and the ways they keep apart, set us into modes of behavior and ways of thought about our neighbors and those who are not our neighbors, that can send us down a path towards division or towards community. I cannot say that I know for certain if I believe this idea or not, but reading this book is causing me to think about many current problems in a new and intriguing light, and there is little more that one can ask from any book. I very much hope that we and the world are fortunate enough to hear more from her.
July 4, 2016
The author is an architect who express her views on her country, the war, the reconstruction of Syria in a very beautiful way.
Through our sketches and drawings, you can witness how she sees the damages done to cities and her optimism. It's a touching, interesting book.
Was impressed by the honesty of her work.
Great book.
Lucie
http://newbooksonmyselves.blogspot.fr...
Through our sketches and drawings, you can witness how she sees the damages done to cities and her optimism. It's a touching, interesting book.
Was impressed by the honesty of her work.
Great book.
Lucie
http://newbooksonmyselves.blogspot.fr...
July 20, 2016
So great to read about Syria *from* a Syrian, not a foreign reporter. And from the totally fascinating (to me) perspective of city planning and architecture.
September 1, 2020
The author poses an interesting theory that architecture can bring a community together in harmony or create strife and division.
She asserts that before the government decided to tear down traditional, historical buildings and demolish neighborhoods, Christians and Muslims lived together in peace and with respect. After different government leaders decided to glorify themselves by destroying these buildings, and create horrible, lifeless, soul-less structures, it divided people and ushered in the war that has now ravished Syria.
She does not make it that simplistic, but that is the gist. Our living space does matter in affecting how we think and live our lives.
I get that, but I also think that Isis and the government had other reasons for fighting each other. I think the destruction of the architecture was a symptom of a corrupt government that maintains power through terror. Isis are religious radicals who believe they have a God-given right to oust the leaders of Syria. The problem is their motives aren't to provide the people with liberty and opportunity, but to impose radical Islam on the country.
The people of Syria of caught in the cross fire. I wonder how it will conclude? After all of Syria is lying in ashes?
She asserts that before the government decided to tear down traditional, historical buildings and demolish neighborhoods, Christians and Muslims lived together in peace and with respect. After different government leaders decided to glorify themselves by destroying these buildings, and create horrible, lifeless, soul-less structures, it divided people and ushered in the war that has now ravished Syria.
She does not make it that simplistic, but that is the gist. Our living space does matter in affecting how we think and live our lives.
I get that, but I also think that Isis and the government had other reasons for fighting each other. I think the destruction of the architecture was a symptom of a corrupt government that maintains power through terror. Isis are religious radicals who believe they have a God-given right to oust the leaders of Syria. The problem is their motives aren't to provide the people with liberty and opportunity, but to impose radical Islam on the country.
The people of Syria of caught in the cross fire. I wonder how it will conclude? After all of Syria is lying in ashes?
March 7, 2017
It must took a lot of effort from the author to write such a tragedy in a professional practical way. I cannot even visualize what I'm reading in these pages.
I've seen a lot of photos and videos but I always believed that a book can tell a the tragedy more than a movie or a photo and here's the proof. The only shocking fact that it's not a fiction book.
I've seen a lot of photos and videos but I always believed that a book can tell a the tragedy more than a movie or a photo and here's the proof. The only shocking fact that it's not a fiction book.
December 7, 2024
żałuję, że taka krótka!
January 9, 2017
I was surprised by how this book forced me to think about my own community - the streets I walk on, the buildings I inhabit, the apartment complex I live in - in ways that I'm not used to thinking. This is the story of a frustrated, idealistic young architect in Syria who sees the way poor urban planning choices exacerbate (and sometimes create) tensions that ultimately led to the heartbreaking catastrophe engulfing Syria today. The book's descriptions of the street design, architecture, and demographic makeup of cities like Homs and Damascus required me to stop after every page and think about my own city. What architectural choices, good or bad, have been made to create the tensions in my own country? What choices are being made to alleviate them? The author's woeful description of Syria's social housing and how it fostered feelings of social alienation reminded me of American suburbs. Her nostalgia for the way Syria's cities used to promote social cohesion by forcing people to interact with each other either in business or in religion caused me to think about the worst of American urban planning - the gentrification of old communities that divide people racially and economically, leading to ethnic and socioeconomic homogeneity. She illustrates a better, more livable urban planning scheme for the reconstruction of Syria, although her despair at this plan's feasibility is tangible, considering the ongoing political situation. A beautifully written and illustrated book.
May 25, 2017
To write a dissertation then a memoir when your country is being torn apart by war and your city is almost completely destroyed is beyond impressive. The electricity cuts, the scarcity of ink, the bureaucracy, the bombs, the kidnappings, the trauma...Yet she still manages to write a book in a foreign language. Chapeau bas!
I haven't read anything by a conservative woman in a long time, so to be honest, some of her comments about morality took me by surprise. When discussing refugees, she develops this idea that irreligious people are motivated by 'mere solidarity' and not by a 'transcendental morality' (read religion). According to her, this solidarity soon devolves into self-interest and loses its humanity. There is also a particular adulation of tradition, especially in the beginning of the book, that imagines the old Islamic city and the old European city as sites of harmony, tolerance, and equilibrium. This is as if these cities were not gender-segregated, class-segregated, and even religiously segregated (ghettos et cetera)...
The author also mentions that the bibliography of her PhD thesis only contained ten books and is outraged because one of her professors made an observation about how short it was. I am not really sure what to make of this. I have not read the dissertation, so I can't really judge it of course, but this has definitely made me more suspicious of her arguments about modernity and tradition.
I haven't read anything by a conservative woman in a long time, so to be honest, some of her comments about morality took me by surprise. When discussing refugees, she develops this idea that irreligious people are motivated by 'mere solidarity' and not by a 'transcendental morality' (read religion). According to her, this solidarity soon devolves into self-interest and loses its humanity. There is also a particular adulation of tradition, especially in the beginning of the book, that imagines the old Islamic city and the old European city as sites of harmony, tolerance, and equilibrium. This is as if these cities were not gender-segregated, class-segregated, and even religiously segregated (ghettos et cetera)...
The author also mentions that the bibliography of her PhD thesis only contained ten books and is outraged because one of her professors made an observation about how short it was. I am not really sure what to make of this. I have not read the dissertation, so I can't really judge it of course, but this has definitely made me more suspicious of her arguments about modernity and tradition.
September 1, 2017
This book looks at the relationship between the current conflict in Syria, particularly the city of Homs, and its built environment. It discusses how the architecture of place has, over time, resulted in a loss of identity and social fracturing The book has some interesting insights and I feel like I have learned more about the characteristics of 'Islamic Architecture' and the social policies and corruption which have led to the physical manifestations of place. Unfortunately, despite being heartfelt, the book felt a little superficial. Social exclusion is not a uniquely Syrian phenomenon, yet it felt like this how it was presented. With a little more thought and depth this could be a really good book.
March 22, 2018
Marwa Al-Sabouni is indeed a lovely soul. Her love of architecture springs from her love of Homs, its people and communities. In the aftermath of their destruction, she has the courage to dream, to envision a built environment that meets the people’s needs and becomes a place they can call home. While reading this book I began to think more deeply about how architecture can plant the seeds for community or division. While architecture was not the primary cause of the war in Syria, Marwa shows over and over how it played its role in the conflict. This book has me looking around at my own city and wondering who it serves and who it neglects. She writes beautifully and nothing I say will do it justice, so just read this book :)
July 24, 2023
great for my personal statement. oh no!!! woe is me!! child of immigration!! torn identity!! archiecture shapes civilisation! it's a language more than it is the mere environmental landscape in which we live!
sad to see though all these arab authors gotta grab sympathy points in order to write anything interesting but hey ho syria was once the land of knowledge and cultural excellence so i guess we've got that going for us
sad to see though all these arab authors gotta grab sympathy points in order to write anything interesting but hey ho syria was once the land of knowledge and cultural excellence so i guess we've got that going for us
February 5, 2020
This book is very, very good and worthwhile to anyone from the West wanting to understand more about what is happening in Syria on a very broad level.
I enjoyed this book because as one reads it he or she is able to follow an interaction of ideas between Western and Eastern culture and philosophies. Marwa al-Sabouni credits Roger Scruton for his illuminating observations on architecture inhered by aesthetic beauty and cultural morals. She responds by developing these ideas in her Syrian context, its ancient history, religion, and to some extent its ecology.
I have two criticisms of this book. The ideas she writes about in her final chapter is what I expected most of the book to contain; however, they are mainly only presented at the end of the book. I would have liked some of those ideas presented up front so that I could think through them while I read the main body of the book. My second criticism is very petty, but it is that the first five chapters could be condensed into fewer chapters. Then there would be more room to talk more about history, current events, and architecture.
I enjoyed reading this book very much and it has challenged my perceptions more about architecture than most any other book I have read. Marwa credits both Christopher Alexander and Roger Scruton, both who I give immense trust to on the subject. Her book deserves the same credit and attention in offering a serious review of architecture in Syria and the Arab countries, as well as telling her story about living through the on-going war in Syria. I am praying for her.
I enjoyed this book because as one reads it he or she is able to follow an interaction of ideas between Western and Eastern culture and philosophies. Marwa al-Sabouni credits Roger Scruton for his illuminating observations on architecture inhered by aesthetic beauty and cultural morals. She responds by developing these ideas in her Syrian context, its ancient history, religion, and to some extent its ecology.
I have two criticisms of this book. The ideas she writes about in her final chapter is what I expected most of the book to contain; however, they are mainly only presented at the end of the book. I would have liked some of those ideas presented up front so that I could think through them while I read the main body of the book. My second criticism is very petty, but it is that the first five chapters could be condensed into fewer chapters. Then there would be more room to talk more about history, current events, and architecture.
I enjoyed reading this book very much and it has challenged my perceptions more about architecture than most any other book I have read. Marwa credits both Christopher Alexander and Roger Scruton, both who I give immense trust to on the subject. Her book deserves the same credit and attention in offering a serious review of architecture in Syria and the Arab countries, as well as telling her story about living through the on-going war in Syria. I am praying for her.
February 5, 2020
A profound read for a Western Architecture student 🌸
The current Syrian political climate has been hard for me to fully grasp from such a removed perspective... Until reading this book.
Through the lens of Architecture and Urban Planning, Marwa Al-Sabouni delves successfully into the causes and effects of the current social and political climate of Homs, the third largest city in Syria.
Accompanied by informative illustrations and direct writing style, I would recommend this book to any Architecture student as its message is not only true of Syria, but of the built environment as a whole. ⭐️
The current Syrian political climate has been hard for me to fully grasp from such a removed perspective... Until reading this book.
Through the lens of Architecture and Urban Planning, Marwa Al-Sabouni delves successfully into the causes and effects of the current social and political climate of Homs, the third largest city in Syria.
Accompanied by informative illustrations and direct writing style, I would recommend this book to any Architecture student as its message is not only true of Syria, but of the built environment as a whole. ⭐️
December 26, 2020
Tell us what you really think. The author is a storyteller first and architect second, as this is a well written book with a personal account of the difficulties in Homs and broader Syria, and how the built environment contributed to these divisions. Politics and policies resulted in a built environment which has not been conducive to integration - or even more basically homes fit for habitation.
This is not a particularly balanced account nor should it be. The author’s passion makes it a particularly good read.
This is not a particularly balanced account nor should it be. The author’s passion makes it a particularly good read.
April 6, 2023
Loved that one was able to know her story in the contrast of how architecture and the outline of a city can really capture and foster so much hate as well as destruction.
February 25, 2024
want to read again
October 1, 2018
‘How can an architect create Home in any building when he himself has never experienced it; when all that he has seen around him is a trampled life that seeks relentlessly to emerge, like the persistent green shoots that spring up from the smallest cracks in the tarmac of a road? Home is the goal of architecture, and a true home is like a mirror that always shows us our best profile, no matter
where we stand in relation to it. But when a building shows only our worst side, and when it is the wreckage of our dreams, then it is no longer a home, and nor is it architecture.
...this kind of built environment sends a clear message of atrophy, and of the subversion of moral and social values. It is visible in the aesthetic devastation: a jungle of misshapen and inhuman forms, in which survival is not just for the fittest, but for the wildest and the greediest. In short, it is tangible as a precursor to war. And course that is what we have witnessed, as human beings wiped out, together with their shadow, which were their homes. These shadows were hit, punctured and tortured like the bodies that produced them, and now they lie in ruins.
Millions of people are now displaced and uprooted, wondering, in their changed life that can only get worse, where to go, what to hold onto, where to cut losses and where to take risks. Some had the luxury of reflecting on these questions for a while, others have had to make a decision while covered in blood and fleeing under fire. Disasters, both natural and man-made, are habitual occurrences on earth, but when you lose your home, and the land that your home once sat upon, and when you lose them in a world that has not decided to which party you had lost them, and when you lose them without ever knowing when and from whom they might be regained, if ever, that’s when you have lost your shadow in this world, the proof of your being here, under the shared light of the sun.’
I’m unable to recall a book more thoughtful or more beautiful I’ve come across in recent time. Marwa’s words, her wisdom, her ideas overpower you at times. This is so much more than a book just about architecture, it talks of the mind, the psyche, the shared spaces, the philosophical musings, the entire gamut of thoughts and ideas that make us human. It is a meditation during a time of war, one that invites you as it enlightens you.
where we stand in relation to it. But when a building shows only our worst side, and when it is the wreckage of our dreams, then it is no longer a home, and nor is it architecture.
...this kind of built environment sends a clear message of atrophy, and of the subversion of moral and social values. It is visible in the aesthetic devastation: a jungle of misshapen and inhuman forms, in which survival is not just for the fittest, but for the wildest and the greediest. In short, it is tangible as a precursor to war. And course that is what we have witnessed, as human beings wiped out, together with their shadow, which were their homes. These shadows were hit, punctured and tortured like the bodies that produced them, and now they lie in ruins.
Millions of people are now displaced and uprooted, wondering, in their changed life that can only get worse, where to go, what to hold onto, where to cut losses and where to take risks. Some had the luxury of reflecting on these questions for a while, others have had to make a decision while covered in blood and fleeing under fire. Disasters, both natural and man-made, are habitual occurrences on earth, but when you lose your home, and the land that your home once sat upon, and when you lose them in a world that has not decided to which party you had lost them, and when you lose them without ever knowing when and from whom they might be regained, if ever, that’s when you have lost your shadow in this world, the proof of your being here, under the shared light of the sun.’
I’m unable to recall a book more thoughtful or more beautiful I’ve come across in recent time. Marwa’s words, her wisdom, her ideas overpower you at times. This is so much more than a book just about architecture, it talks of the mind, the psyche, the shared spaces, the philosophical musings, the entire gamut of thoughts and ideas that make us human. It is a meditation during a time of war, one that invites you as it enlightens you.
November 28, 2020
تتحدث الكاتبة مروة الصابوني في كتابها المعركة من أجل الوطن عن جذور الازمة السورية من منطلق الهندسة المعمارية و حاججت في كتابها أن المواطن السوري فقد معنى الانتماء إلى محيطه بسبب التخبط والعشوائية التي اتبعها نظام الحكم في ادارة " معمارية " المدن , و كيف أدت تلك إلى عزل المواطن عن محيطه وثقافته , مسهبة بذلك عدة امثلة عن تغير معالم الاسواق القديمة في مدينة حمص و خلق كنتونات طبقية وطائفية عبر إستخدام منظومة التعاون السكني و عمليات الترميم المجحفة بحق المباني التراثية او المشاريع الكبيرة التي تعثرت مخلفة هياكل كونكريتية قبيحة في منتصف عدة مدن , ثم تحدثت عن ضعف و قصور الانظمة الحاكمة في خلق هويات ثقافية في مشاريع التوسع الحضرية أو البنى التحتية وكيف أدى كل هذا إلى خلل في مفهوم " الوطن " و عزلة تامة له في منتصف مدينته مما ساهم في زعزعة المجتمع ككل خاصة مع هجرة أبناء الريف واسعة النطاق إلى المدن . بصورة عامة الكتاب مليء بالافكار المميزة من مثل الفرق بين المعمار العربي والاسلامي و يمكن القول أنه يتحدث عن أزمة المواطن السوري مع هويته من زاوية جديدة كلياً , ناهيك عن قصة كفاح الكاتبة في الحصول على درجة الدكتوراة خاصتها خلال فترة الحرب والتي اضفت بعد درامي للكتاب , وفي الختام يترك الكتاب السؤال الاكثر أهمية حيال مفهوم الهوية السورية معلقاً , و خاصة عندما يتعلق الأمر بنوع الهوية التي سوف تنقل إلى الجيل الجديد الذي تبعثر في بقاع كثيرة من الأرض ! تقيمي للكتاب 4/5 و أنصح به .
August 13, 2016
This was a difficult book to rate. It wasn't what I expected. It was less than I expected while much more at the same time. This was not a war journal. Al-Sabouni does not describe the war in Syria is any detail or choose sides. She comments about the conflict sparingly and then only as it relates to the peoples' loss of what can be considered their "home". But "home" means much more to the author than simply a place where one resides. Home includes all the social, political, religious and philosophical history of its people, reflected in its architecture and built environment.
This book seemed at times equal parts a study of Islamic architecture and at the same time the philosophy of ones' connection to a physical space that is a communal home. This book had much more depth than I expected. There are some very big ideas contained in its relatively short length.
This book seemed at times equal parts a study of Islamic architecture and at the same time the philosophy of ones' connection to a physical space that is a communal home. This book had much more depth than I expected. There are some very big ideas contained in its relatively short length.
February 5, 2018
Um belo livro a que cheguei nas minhas investigações a propósito da tese.
Mais do que uma reflexão gerada pelas questões lançadas pela sua tese de doutoramento, é uma chamada de atenção de uma jovem arquitecta síria sobre questões prementes nos dias que correm quanto às questões da memória e identidade espelhadas na Arquitectura. A sua ausência resulta num espaço urbano e arquitectónico esvaziado de sentido que acicata confrontos e destruição, onde antes havia paz e sã convivência. Abre também caminhos para o conhecimento mais alargado da Arquitectura Islâmica e critica a apropriação das suas formas sem compreender a narrativa que as subjaz. Sem dúvida a ler. O relato de quem observou o desmoronar de uma cidade com os próprios olhos. (Li a versão inglesa adquirida através do Book Depository)
Mais do que uma reflexão gerada pelas questões lançadas pela sua tese de doutoramento, é uma chamada de atenção de uma jovem arquitecta síria sobre questões prementes nos dias que correm quanto às questões da memória e identidade espelhadas na Arquitectura. A sua ausência resulta num espaço urbano e arquitectónico esvaziado de sentido que acicata confrontos e destruição, onde antes havia paz e sã convivência. Abre também caminhos para o conhecimento mais alargado da Arquitectura Islâmica e critica a apropriação das suas formas sem compreender a narrativa que as subjaz. Sem dúvida a ler. O relato de quem observou o desmoronar de uma cidade com os próprios olhos. (Li a versão inglesa adquirida através do Book Depository)
March 2, 2018
This memoir starts out describing the battles Marwa Al-Sabouni has witnessed in her own backyard and how her heart bleeds for her home, as well as some well thought out theories about how and why everything went so terribly wrong.
But then, as she decides to do something on a personal level about global events, the book shifts into a description of the battle she had to fight herself against the gate-keeping that takes place at any university, anywhere, whenever anyone not white and male tries to get a doctorate.
She wants to build better houses, to try and create a brighter future, and is succeeding, no matter how much the shameless men wanted to stop her, huzzah!
December 22, 2017
Architecture is one of the first steps taken when peace arrives, after everyone agrees it's time to rebuild. But can architecture be a weapon, as well, something that seeks to divide rather than unite? So says the author, a young female architect who has witnessed the horrific destruction of her home city. She believes there is a cautionary tale in the story of Syrian architecture, which enforced segregated communities. Full review at MidCenturyBooks.Net, Syria
September 3, 2016
Provoking
Having lived in Damascus and loving the old cities, it was refreshing to hear a Syrian decry the hideous concrete block apartments that fill tiny streets with such ugliness. But her review of the architecture community does not give me much hope that Syria will be rebuilt with any beauty.
Having lived in Damascus and loving the old cities, it was refreshing to hear a Syrian decry the hideous concrete block apartments that fill tiny streets with such ugliness. But her review of the architecture community does not give me much hope that Syria will be rebuilt with any beauty.
Read
September 22, 2016Regrettably this was the sort of nonfiction that I can't read because it has lots of dry stuff about buildings (but the title sort of gives that way, so I shouldn't have been naive). It does contain many eerily wise lines of prose, though, in between. Ultimately, I'm confused by the format of the narrative, and wish I could absorb the contents other than by reading.
November 19, 2016
This book was very dense, but I came away from it with a new approach to the built environment. In particular, it presents a very useful case study in Baba Amr for social stratification and religious division.
Read
September 19, 2016956.91042 A3164 2016
June 13, 2017
The five-star is for the architect's spirit; her professionalism and the responsibility she is willing to bear, in hopes of making her community a better place.
September 6, 2017
A remarkable woman living in a time that speaks of no hope, yet she is full of hope and optimism for the future of her country. A story of courage and strength.
October 3, 2017
A Syrian Muslim architect writes about home and architecture in her own city. Informative and insightful.
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