Introduction
Man is the measure of all things. This sentence ascribed to Protagoras (5th century BC) may be considered to be one of the most essential and earliest expressions of humanism, the philosophy that makes man, human life and human destiny its main concern. Former Director General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Irina Bokova said that “Humanism is an age-old promise, as well as an idea that is always new, endlessly reinventing itself.” Indeed, in Week 12 we examined the history of humanism’s reinvention in Western culture, beginning with the movement’s flourishing in Europe at the time of the Renaissance (Kristeller) and the later Enlightenment (Dupré), and, then, finally, taking stock of the potential value of humanism today (Pinker).
For your essay, you will further explore how humanism has evolved to to address the urgent need to redefine the notion of the human and move beyond anthropocentrism in our contemporary moment. What does it mean to be human today? Where humanism argues that there is something universal shared by humanity across time, posthumanism perceives the human as a non-fixed and mutable condition. There are, however, many strands and/or movements within posthumanism: antihumanism, transhumanism, metahumanism, etc. You will read three chapters from Rosi Braidotti’s The Posthuman (Link: Braidotti. Posthuman), which provides a comprehensive and engaging account of the debates in the field.
Prompt
In the episode you watched on the Vitruvian Man from the BBC Four series The Beauty of Diagrams in week 1, the Renaissance art historian Martin Kemp remarked that “the ghost of the Vitruvian Man lies behind every building.”
Using the readings from week 12 and their critique in Braidotti’s overview of the posthumanist movement, discuss the implications of Kemp’s claim? If the Vitruvian man symbolizes humanist ideas of Man’s place in the universe and the universe’s place in man, what does this say about our built environment? What kind of values and ideas are embedded in and projected by the buildings we construct?
In your essay, first explain what precisely the Vitruvian Man symbolizes and produce your own account of the redefinition of humanism in Western culture. Then proceed to summarize the posthuman critique of the ideas and values symbolized by the Vitruvian Man. Finally, evaluate whether the humanist vision of Man is good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, valuable or deplorable? Is this the right kind of ghost for our built environment? Where do you stand on the humanism-posthumanism spectrum? If you like, you are welcome to make a case for an alternative model for architecture.
The essay should be 4-5 pages double-spaced in 12-pt. Times New Roman font. Please upload the essay as a document (Word or Google doc) to this folder by Sunday, December 6th at 11:59PM.