A Genealogy of Tropical Architecture

In this masterly account of the evolution of tropical architecture, Jiat-Hwee Chang combines the insights of Foucauldian governmentality with in-depth historical research and a keen understanding of colonial exceptionality. Focussing on four building types - the home, the barracks, the hospital and 'native' housing - he uncovers the colonial lineage of modern architectural forms and offers a radical reinterpretation of the ancestry of architectural tropicality. While centring on Singapore, Chang's theoretically informed and richly empirical study opens up a wider critical perspective on architectural history across the entire region of South and Southeast Asia. - David Arnold, Professor Emeritus, University of Warwick, UK, author of Colonizing the Body and The Problem of Nature Meticulous and rigorous, Jiat-Hwee Chang brings us the first major study convincingly to span Victorian and modern colonial architecture. From colonial bungalows, through barracks, hospitals, public housing, court buildings and shophouses, covering technoscientific research and architectural education, and drawing from rich visual and scientific material, the book provocatively re-draws our understanding of tropical architecture. This is a true 'genealogy', a history of an idea as much as an account of its technologies and architectural manifestations. - Mark Crinson, Professor of Architectural History, Birkbeck College (London), UK, author of Modern Architecture and the End of Empire Jiat-Hwee Chang gives us a masterful history of tropical architecture way before that term was invented. He shows us how this architecture is entangled with social constructions of nature, the politics of colonialism, and the development of post-colonial discourses. It is a substantive and fascinating account that will be of significance to the architecture practitioners and academics in the region and beyond. - Nezar AlSayyad, Professor of Architecture, Planning, Urban Design, and Urban History, University of California, Berkeley, USA In this important and timely book, Jiat-Hwee Chang argues that tropical architecture -- often understood as a localized response to climatic conditions in the global south -- was conceived and produced through (post)colonial networks of knowledge and power. Drawing upon the case of Singapore, Chang's meticulous and carefully theorized account reveals how the tropical and its architectural variants are at once a mode of governing, a framework for biopolitics, and a historical struggle over technoscience. - C. Greig Crysler, Associate Professor of Architecture and Arcus Chair for Gender, Sexuality and the Built Environment, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley, USA