Diagramming: A Visual Language

Diagramming: A Visual LanguageAuthor(s): Frances Downing and Thomas C. HubkaSource: Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture, Vol. 2 (1986), pp. 44-52Published by: Vernacular Architecture ForumStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3514315 .

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5 FRANCES DOWNING AND THOMAS C. HUBKA

Diagramming: A Visual Language

A picture, photograph, or any depiction of the world is often said to be worth a thousand words. Pictures, however, may also be worth too many words, barraging the viewer with too many ideas. In fact, most visual documentation is subject to multiple interpretations depending on the point of view, mood, or cultural perspective of the viewer. The diagrammatic process is particularly useful for architects and architectural historians who must analyze the visual world. Diagramming facilitates the extraction of discrete information or issues from a complex, multifaceted environment. For example, a diagram of All Saints Margaret Street Church can isolate the structural bay system from an exceedingly complicated interior space (Fig. 1). Diagramming allows the environmental researcher to identify and visually explain specific characteristics of an artifact,

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Fig. 1. Axonometric diagram of the structural bay system in All Saints Margaret Street Church, London. (Hubka)

44



building, or experience while retaining an overview of the whole. Reference to both part and whole within the same drawing is one of the qualities that makes diagramming such a valuable method for analyzing the physical environment.

Diagramming can work two ways: as a graphic design, and as a method of thinking. Graphically, a diagram is less a mode of direct representation than it is an analytical visualization. Unlike verbal analysis, however, a diagram retains visual characteristics of the object or situation under investigation. As a method of thinking, diagramming provides a way of visualizing ideas and giving form to thought. Through a process of extraction and separation of attri- butes, diagrams make it easier for the environmental researcher to grasp ideas and arrange them in a visual field. As both a medium and a method, diagramming might be characterized as a strategy toward visualization that enjoys a distinct advantage over verbal analytical methods. The process of diagramming allows the researcher a flexibility to perform a delicate balancing act between understanding the world experientially and understanding the world intellectually.

Architects employ diagramming skills constantly (Fig. 2). Basic to the architectural design process is a need to visualize initial ideas, recall historical examples, synthesize complex systems into manageable wholes, test and compare multiple solutions. All of these processes require diagrams. In fact, diagramming is part of the highly developed visual language that architects use in design development. The same process can also enhance the study of material culture.

Diagrams can be categorized by their process or operational characteristics, and by their content. Certain basic processes are common to all diagrams: abstraction, visualization, and intensification. Abstraction and visualization are the parallel processes by which ideas are distilled and given spatial form. Intensification is the process by which diagrams isolate and focus on a particular characteristic or set of characteristics. Together, these processes re-

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Fig. 2. A typical architectural design diagram analyzing inside and outside spaces. (Hubka)

Methods for Understanding Buildings / 45



duce information to a manageable form, but, unlike drawings or photographs, diagrams serve to magnify and emphasize information during the reductive process. The diagrammatic method of abstraction, visualization, and intensification can take several forms.

Isolation is the process of abstraction by which the diagram is used to focus attention on one of many phenomena (Fig. 3).

Emphasis is the process by which diagrams can be made to ac- centuate a particular attribute or idea. This usually involves the ex- aggeration or magnification of information (Fig. 4).

Juxtaposition is the process by which multiple or diverse phenomena are expressed in one diagram, usually allowing a compar- ative interpretation (Fig. 5).

Fig. 3. A diagram isolating the screen wall in a bungalow plan. (Downing)

Fig. 5. A diagram that compares the vibrant interior of a Polish synagogue with its stark vernacular setting. (Hubka)

Fig. 4. A "fish-eye" perspective diagram emphasizing the invitational quality of a bungalow porch. (Down- ing)

46 / Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture, II



Systemization is the process by which diagrams structure and compare relationships, as in hierarchies, typologies, categories, and taxonomies (Fig. 6).

Spatialization is the process by which diagrams give visual and three-dimensional relationships to ideas (Fig. 7).

Abstract visualization is the process by which diagrams depict nonvisual phenomena like sequence in time, spatial usage, quality of light, or even theories and ideas. This method also permits the expression of imaginary or magical interpretations (Fig. 8).

Five categories in which architects have traditionally employed diagrams also provide a starting point for investigators of the his- toric environment.

Fig. 6. A typological diagram of roof and porch organization of bungalows. (Downing)

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Fig. 7. An axonometric diagram that clarifies the form and plan of a bungalow. (Downing)

Fig. 8. A diagram expressing the con- trol and excitement gained by rising above the ground plane. (Downing)




Space and form: Diagrams may be used to record and analyze the physical content of architecture including the traditional categories of volume, structure, materials, architectural style, and building systems (Fig. 9).

Context: Diagrams may be used to record and analyze the physical and cultural setting of buildings by including topography, cli- mate, vegetation, and surrounding architecture, as well as the ideas, beliefs, and attitudes with which people respond to their environment (Fig. 10).

Usage: Diagrams may be used to record and analyze the spatial settings for human activities. They may depict specific users, different functions, and social organization (Fig. 11).

Time: Diagrams may be used to record and analyze different stages of development, including the relationship between perma- nence and change (Fig. 12).

Fig. 9. An axonometric diagram analyzing the entrance courtyard of All Saints Margaret Street Church. (Hubka)

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Fig. 10. A diagram showing typical building and yard usage for nine- teenth-century New England connected farm buildings. From Big House, Little House, Back House, Barn: The Connected Farm Buildings of New En- gland. (Hubka, courtesy of University Press of New England)

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Design: Diagrams may be used to record and analyze the development of spatial ideas by builders, owners, and architects. Sim- ilarly, an environmental researcher may use diagrams to explore and formulate hypotheses about a building or environment of the past (Fig. 10).

Fig. 11. A sectional diagram showing the relationship of activity realms along a street. (Downing)

Fig. 12. Diagrams depicting change over time among the buildings of a New England farm. From Big House, Little House, Back House, Barn: The Con- nected Farm Buildings of New England. (Hubka, courtesy of University Press of New England)

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In order for scholars to apply diagrammatic techniques to the analysis of the architectural environment skillfully, it is useful to understand the philosophical and methodological assumptions be- hind the act of diagramming. There are at least three models of knowledge under which diagramming can function as a technique. Each contains different assumptions about how the world should be understood.

Rationalism is a model of knowledge in which an investigator of the environment might use diagramming. Rationalists tend to believe that knowledge is logical and embodied in precedents. A rationalist's scientific procedure involves the justification of plau- sible arguments through appeals to logical precedents. Truth is de- rived from deductive inferences that follow an acceptable premise and survive all reasonable challenges.

Another model in which diagramming has relevance is struc- turalism. A structuralist believes that knowledge is generic and embodied in taxonomies. Structuralist procedure involves the succes- sive approximation of categories that interact to exhaust the naturally occurring events or characteristics of a given subject. Or- der is inherent when objects or ideas are sorted into related groups.

Finally, a model on which the American scientific community bases most of its exploration is empiricism. To empiricists, knowledge is provable and embodied in theories. The scientific procedure relies on unbiased observations to confirm hypothetically predicted events that are isolated through experimental or statistical controls.

In any one of these systems, diagrams are potent tools. Ration- alists, including many architectural historians, utilize diagrams to explore a selective range of architectural examples that demonstrate preexisting laws or patterns. A rationalist employs diagrams to

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Fig. 13. A rationalist diagram using the "golden section" to explore the meaning and physical proportions of classical architecture. (Downing)




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Fig. 14. A structuralist diagram explor- ing a typology of screens found in bungalows. (Downing) identify the abstract ideal. Frequently researchers using rational

logic attempt to emphasize proportions, rhythms, symmetry, stylis- tic orders, and other regulating patterns (Fig. 13).

A structuralist utilizes diagrams to explore a universe of objects in order to find inherent and systematizing elements. Less con- cerned with the particularities of individual buildings than with the elements common to many similar buildings, a structuralist pro- duces diagrams to emphasize taxonomies, categories, and hierarchies (Fig. 14).

An empiricist uses diagrams to explore concrete instances de- rived from sensate data. The empiricist selects information that is scientific rather than abstract. Diagrams generated under this model tend to be place-specific and are more sensuously and experientially based than are the diagrams generated by rationalist or structuralist methods (Fig. 15).

Outside the hard sciences, most researchers tend to mix and overlap models, methods, and techniques, depending on their particular area of interest. Most architects and architectural historians have been enculturated and educated within the American system and may need to admit to a fourth model-pragmatism. Pragmatists believe that knowledge is, above all, useful. Pragmatism suggests that the value of any concept is determined by the results. Thus, a fluid mixing of ideal models is not uncommon. Combining models is a problem, however, if the researcher is ignorant of the assumptions implicit in each model.

Clearly the diagrammatic process can be a valuable means for analyzing historical environments. Diagrammatic thinking and drawing invite a healthy disregard for the rigid boundaries between academic disciplines by pushing the normal intellectual process of concept formulation into a less familiar realm-the spatial mode. Whatever the precise determinants, diagrams thrive in the sort of robust juxtaposition of intellectual philosophies that characterizes much of the best recent scholarship.

Another distinct advantage of the diagrammatic mode of anal-




ysis is its potential to become an extension of the analyzing mind- a tool for thinking and speculating about the environment. The diagram is also an egalitarian device. The ability to construct basic analytical diagrams does not require advanced or technical drawing skills. Of course diagramming is not easy, but the hard part is the thinking and analyzing-nothing new to those scholars of material culture who have been struggling toward an understanding of the built environment.

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Fig. 15. An empiricist diagram inter- preting the experimental qualities of the entrance sequence for All Saints Margaret Street Church. (Hubka)




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Diagramming: A Visual Language