Effects of Architecture on Public Behaviour in India

Effects of Architecture on common Behaviour in IndiaINTRODUCTIONIndia and its cities is often time associated with poverty and disorder in the optics of both(prenominal) foreigners and nationals athe likes of. The roadstead and streets argon litte rose-cheeked, w eachs ar indiscriminately sc atomic number 18d by source red paan, old and unmaintained infrastructure is found vandalized as though its fix purpose was to act as a medium of defiance towards the governing bodys inefficiency and any dark niche becomes a place for defecation. This phenomenon, of familiar acceptance toward urban uncleanliness is experienced in almost all cities of India.India is a country which has a deep root memoir and has many an(prenominal) antiquated cities. All of which turn over been documented with awe in the eyes of the writer, talk of their beauty and intricacy. One of the oldest civilizations on the planet, built their projectn along the banks of the Indus. Their cities showed a sens itivity toward cleanliness and the great baths and the sew-age system are a testament to that. til now to daytime, Indian cities are learned upon as filthy, unhygienic and unorganized. No Indian goal preaches of such(prenominal) treatment towards their environment yet the problem still carcass in front of our eyes.However, I believe that the solution to this urban phenomenon may lie in the way we trope our built environment. It is widely real that the environment we are placed in, plays a major role in affecting how we behave in it. This brings me towards my look into questionHow digest computer architecture affect the behaviour of the public in order to curb the expose of littering and hooliganism, hence maintain cleaner and healthier cities?LITERATURE SURVEYMy look testament aim at finding a long term, impersonal answers towards three core topics malicious mischief as a ca mapping of aff fit defiance.Littering as a ca mathematical function of social oversight.Sens e of place as a tool to earn respect of the company.Vandalism around all major Indian cities date back at least to the compound era and they see their fair share of social unrest in the act of strikes, riots or revolts and some eventide have seen war surrounded by empires. Unrest has always existed between different classes or casts over the history of our cities and in the present context it mainly exists between different religious communities and practically more between the public and its government. Vandalism is one of the by-products of this unrest.My interrogation has found that malicious mischief is strongly associated with defiance. This defiance can be rooted toward any birth, institution or a government body. This anti-social activity has been enabled by poorly designed built environments which lose surveillance be it do contrive or automated. This has as well as led toward increase in shame score in many high-rise and has eventually reduced the desirabilit y of the living accommodations project.In Oscar advancedmans give Defensible property, his research is enjoin towards how crime can be reduced in the housing projects of unfermented York by designing urban spaces which will affect the behaviour of state and affectively prevent crime from occurring in the first place. The author defines Defensible quadriceps femoris as Defensible space is a model for residential environments which inhibits crime by creating the physical expression of a social fabric that defends itself. (Newman, Oscar 1972)His work revolves around how simple gestures in the planning phase can have a vast impact on the inter relationships of multiple users in an urban environment. His work revolves around generating spaces which are surveyed by the community, or a group rather than an individual be provoke when quite a little begin to protect themselves as individuals and non as a community, the battle against crime is lost. (Newman, Oscar 1972)Further his b ook talks slightly the need for a site to create a defined territory which can be surveyed by the users of that territory. There is much usefulness in this approach as the potential criminal perceives such a space as controlled by its inhabitants, leaving him an intruder, easily recognize and dealt with. (Newman, Oscar 1972) Edge conditions are alike a vital consideration as the tabooside space becomes more defensible if they are clearly demarcated for the use by one business firm or a small amount of households, and if they are observable by residents, neighbours and passers-by. (Cisneros, Henry, 1996)When interiors are designed, the author has found that military strength towards interior finishes and furnishings creates an institutional atmo arena, non unlike that achieved in our worst hospitals and prisons. even off though the materials are in fact stronger and more resilient to wear, tenants see to go out of their way to test their resistance capabilities. Instead of universe provided with an environment in which they can take pride and might passion to keep up, they are provided with one that begs their ability in tearing it down( in comment of Pruitt Igoe) (Newman, Oscar 1972)Taking inferences from these approaches I aim to see whether standardised principles of design can help prevent vandalism in Indias urban spaces, hence develop yet inferences towards how cultural differences can affect this flow of though and how it can be used to my advantage if possible. Further, I would like to ascertain whether this approach can also be applied towards bar of littering in public spaces as well.Another method of reducing vandalism takes a nonphysical approach a particular area involves community involvement by bureau of fund raising in Jefferson naturalise District, Daly City, California where vandalism had been a concern (average nonchalant attendance 6,100), for many years. Several schools were consistent targets for graffiti and broken windo ws. Maintenance crews devoted Monday mornings to wholesale glass and repainting sur causas. It was time consuming, costly, and most discouraging.(Brietler,B , 1988) An Idea came in 1985from the newly establish superintendent, Joseph DiGeronimo. His plan was to offer an incentive program to the students. Each school would have $500 put into a reserve account for eventual use by students-that is, unless the money was first consumed by the costs of vandalism. The money would go to the student body to use as it wished, as long as the expenditures were legal and in good taste. (Brietler,B , 1988)The scheme was successful enough that it was able to reduce incidents from 114 in 1985-86 to 51 incidents in 1986-87. (Brietler,B , 1988)Even though my research is focalisationed in finding a prevention rather than a cure, secondary measures will exactly help to reinforce the former. Since, in the Indian context, where monetary gain is the main incentive to get work do efficiently, schemes of a similar nature be implemented so as to facilitate maintenance of our urban spaces.LitteringI was initially filled with the legal opinion that vandalism and littering are done by the same social strata and for similar reasons. But on further studying I realized that they are two distinct behaviours and are motivated by different factors. Vandalism had been associated in almost all my readings as an act of defiance of the people of the lower class or people who believe have been pretermit by a governing body. It would be wrong to assume that it is the lack of awareness or literacy that is the root cause of littering. The most common messiness of littering is that of plastics bags, disposable containers, plates and spoons Items which are attri provideded with the consumerist classes i.e. the nerve centre class and high class.The Indian surgical incision of sciences and technology statesMost of todays plastics and synthetic polymers are produced from petrochemicals. As convention al plastics are persistent in the environment, improperly disposed plastic materials are a significant source of environmental pollution, potentially harming life. Therefore Littering is not entirely an eye sore but also a health accident and, it should be a matter of concern that we keep our cities clean so that we can benefit in the long run.Another fashion of littering is truly unique to India owing to a recipe that is unique to Indian culture. Almost all public spaces can be distinctly associated with the splashes of paan cud, commonly seen at every corner of a staircase or the end of a passageway. Paan is made using a single beetle leaf with a filling which is usually constituted of areca nut, lime and cured tobacco. This form of paan is not meant to be swallowed and so spitting is inevitable. The areca nut is what is accountable for creating the blood red coloration which is the key identifier of paan cud. Paan is cheaply available to both the poor husbandman and the rich merchant, and is an Indian mans pass time, chewing evermore to while away the long and monotonous day.The primary cause of this uncouth negligence towards correct disposal of rubbish, is because of the lack of uttermost-sightedness of the common man. The lack of a united spirit in the city, whereevery man is out in that location to fend for himself be it status, earning or only whenice and this has led to a atomisation in the urban society. This is what has eluded the minds of the people, that, even trivial acts such as littering can add up to self-aggrandizingr consequences. Liberalization has granted the benefit of esoteric ownership of land, but this has allowed people to assume the corollary, that, what is not owned by them is not under their jurisdiction completely forgetting the democratically It belongs to him but at the same time, also to his fellow countrymen. This blatant thinking of in and out, tap and not mine has deluded the spirit of a common in urban societ y which manifests itself in the form of negligence.Vassos Argyrou argues that depending on ones horizon in space people may find things to be in place (have positive value) or out of place (have ostracise value) or, they may be invisible to the observer Therefore, the like beauty, litter is in the eye of the beholder. (Argyrou, Vassos, 1997) Depending on these characteristics society way either be proactive or they may be negligent towards littering.Peoples understanding toward cleanliness is mainly defined by their way of life. The fact that some people treat littering as eyesores is presupported by the ability to detach oneself from the founding and constitute it as an object of mirror image and reflection. (Argyrou, Vassos, 1997).. This portion of societys ability is rendered possible by the parting between mental labour and physical labour. This is possible in those who are economically well off and have the luxury to thought process the world and its problems. The do not need to partake cumbersome labour (like brick place and farming) in order to fight the elements of nature, rather, they would prefer to do the same finished sport (by going rock climbing or hiking). They tend to contemplate the world as an aesthetic reality. Trying to treat nature as a body whose truths assessed and aliments cured.By contrast, for many people the world is far from a comforts and conveniences, and the possibility to contemplate the world is distant. These people are compelled to work on days which, most people would take the day off. To them, the world is a battle field and life a daily struggle. Out of this confrontation akin to physical combat the world emerges as a formidable adversary and the Self emerges as a physically and mentally strong individual who, far from being deterred by the challenge, welcomes and even provokes it.(Argyrou, Vassos , 1997)They are too obstinate to give up on the challenges that face them and, given these circumstances, their aggre ssive approach towards life, to them avoiding littering is a far too gratuitous an act to be seriously considered.However, it would be premature to assume that the cause of this uncleanliness is because of the lower working class and that the middle and higher classes are unacquainted(p) of this attitude towards our cities. This only suggests that different conditions of existence predispose people to thinking the world and themselves, in different ways.The author later goes on to recount that the middle class claim is that people litter because they are ignorant. Rather, it is that people are ignorant because they litter. The distinction is significant because it implies that litter is a self- seeming(a) truth accessible to everyone. If the middle class can perceive it as a problem, villagers and urban working classes can see it too.But, as middle class rhetoric has it, they choose to ignore it and this is what makes them ignorantThis act of negligence towards the city is well illustrated by Sudipta Kaviraj, in his paper Filth and the Public Sphere Concepts and Practices about Space In Calcutta (1997), talking of the notions, of what is public in the eyes of Indians, in the city of Calcutta. He talks of how Hindu culture is responsible for the concept for apan/par in which people only look at their property as their world, which requires attention and has to be kept clean. Whereas the touch is of no vastness to the dweller.The inner of a Brahmin house was often kept impressively clean, including utensils and other household goods. Interiors of houses were swept and scrubbed with punctilious regularity. Indeed, thither was an interesting connection between these duties and the religious markings on the times of day. The households internal space had to be cleaned at the hours of connecter between light and darkness, at dawn and dusk, which coincided with time for worship (puja). The form of this puja, especially at nightfall, was to light the auspicio us lamp, which had an understated piety about it and was performed by women, who shared a strong connection with the symbolism of the interior. It would be considered odd, and faintly sacrilegious, to take the auspicious lamp into a room that had not been cleaned in preparation for this most ordinary form of thanksgiving. Thus, the cleaning chores were considered quasi-religious duties for household members (mostly women). Yet the garbage collected from this obsessive house-cleaning would be dumped on a mound right in front of the house. This owed not to a material-geographic but a conceptual distinction. When the garbage is dumped, it is not placed at a point where it cannot casually affect the realm of the household and its hygienic well-being. It is propel over a conceptual boundary. The street was the outside, the space for which one did not have responsibility, or which not ones own was, and it and then lacked any association with obligation, because it did not symbolise any significant principle, did not express any values. It was merely a conceptually insignificant negative of the inside, which was prized and invested with affectionate decoration. Thus, the outsidethe streets, squares, bathing Ghats, and other facilities used by large numberswere crowded, but they did not constitute a different salmagundi of valued space, a civic space with norms and rules of use of its own, different from the home(prenominal) values of bourgeois privacy. (Kaviraj, S 1997)Kaviraj also mentions that cast is not the only factor but the differences in perceptions between the different classes also is responsible for the littering. The middle class who were capable of affording an education attach much schmaltzy values to their public parks, but the lower class cannot understand the importance of the latter as much of the middle classs sentiments had reddened from historic contexts which the lower classes could not relate to due to lack of an education. What this show s is that there were two different codes for using social space, one mapping of inside/outside and another of public/ private.(Kaviraj,S 1997)This study has helped me grasp the gravity of the situation. That there is a cultural link towards the way we maintain our public sphere and that there lies a differences of conceptual approach towards the term public by the different economic strata of society.Another concept I would like to localize on is the broken window theory, which says that a crime is more liable(predicate) to happen if the physical environment is already abused. This phenomenon is necessary to understand as it acts as the spark to the fire if not tended to.The corollary of the theory can also be tested to see if extremely clean environments can also be used to create a social unacceptance toward uncleanliness of our public spaces. purposeLittering is a social and health problem. It may be harmless in small quantities, but when it is upscaled to the urban level, it b ecomes a menace and a cause of concern. Today the Indian government has tried to curb littering by means of promotional messages on television. And people are well aware that it is iniquitous to litter. Under this circumstance, littering is not merely an act, but also a logical argument whose message echoes through all people who see it. Citizens who see their streets and roads littered will be filled with the notion that their government is gawky and incapable. This eventually will lead people to be lax, not just towards littering laws but also towards other restrictions, quoting the latter failure as an example. owe to its visual nature, littering spreads like a disease in the spaces of the citizen minds and then into the spaces of the city.This will eventually breed negligence among the masses and destroy community culture. This further translates into more extreme cases where our urban spaces will be vandalized to vent out anger.Therefore it is of at most importance that we t ake immediate execution and strongly reinforce these actions with preventative measures in order to maintain a physically and mentally society.From my literature survey it has come to my knowledge that littering and vandalism have been looked at from a very objective point of view and research is directed more towards these phenomena as reactive measures and not a long term preventative measures. Therefore I would like to focus my future efforts into finding ways in which we can prevent littering and vandalism before it can even happen.ReferencesNewman, Oscar 1972, Crime Prevention through urban Design Defensible Space, the Macmillan Company, New York.Colquhoun, Ian, Design out of crime Creating good and Sustainable Communities, Architectural PressCanter, David 1977, Psychology of Place, The Architectural Press Ltd. capital of the United KingdomG.P.D, 2004 , Economics and Political Weekly , Vol. 39 ,No. 9.The British Medical journal Vol .2 No. 4255 1942 ,Towards The Clean City, BM JKaviraj,Sudipta 1997 , Duke University Press, Filth and the public Sphere Concepts and practices about Space in Calcutta, Public Culture.Keizer, Kees, 2008 American association for the advancement of science, Vol. 322, No. 5908 Science, New Series.Brietler, Bruce 1988 ,Taylor Francis, Ltd., Vandalism The carrot instead of the Stick, Vol. 61, No.8Argyrou, Vassos 1997,Wiley on behalf American Anthropological Association, honor Cyprus Clean Littering , Pollution, and Otherness, Vol. 12, No.2Hazards of plastic, 2009, viewed 20 July 2014 TIFAC, http//www.tifac.org.in/index.php?option=com_contentview=articleid=739itemid=205