TŪHONONGA: Architecture Co-occupying with Earth and Sky

Date
2022
Authors
Yates-Francis, Matangireia Mita Ngarua
Supervisor
Yates, Amanda
Item type
Thesis
Degree name
Master of Architecture (Professional)
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Publisher
Auckland University of Technology
Abstract

TŪHONONGA is a design-based research proposal exploring indigenous Māori narratives to help understand how we can better co-occupy with more-than-human entities like maunga, wai, Rangi and whenua. Designing a long-term vertical papakāinga that is themed with such notions is the objective of this research, while delving into how Te ao Māori practice explored through narratives can create architecture that highlights our surrounding environmental entities while also re-imaging how we can co-exist on earth between Ranginui and Papatūānuku. This concept of thinking challenges the current westernised state of living by questioning our actions as humans on this earth, as the ever-present ecological crisis worsens by the day. This exegesis weaves itself in and out of the themes of TE KORE, to acknowledge traditional indigenous forms of exchanging knowledge and history told through storytelling. The narrative grounds the thesis in an authentic Māori position, bringing a form of spirituality to the text, while also developing a personal design approach. The signifificance of the project is how it translates the notions of co-occupancy with the more-than-human and Te ao Māori practices into the field of design. It demonstrates how design practice can approach relationships of the physical and the metaphysical to gain understanding of the potential of co-occupancy within future environments. Doing this through the development of co-occupancy as a methodology framework, uses the notions as settings for design process and analysis, revealing the importance of relationship and consciousness of our actions and decisions in relationality to site and environment.

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