THE MATERIAL POLLUTION OF ACCOUNTABILITY & COMMEMORATION

Abstract

These three chapters focus on the material pollution of two kinds of environments: penitentiaries and commemorative spaces. The notion of material pollution is meant to capture the idea that there are aspects of the built-environment in these two settings that make them unsuitable for use, insofar as they can undermine either an individual or group’s social status, or psychosocial well-being. While the three chapters are unified by the notion of material pollution, their approach differs in virtue of the project’s interdisciplinary nature. The first two chapters take up legally relevant questions and thus draw on case law as well as work in legal and political philosophy. The second and third chapter overlap, insofar as they both focus on questions of symbols and icons, and thus draw on work at the junction of the architectural history, philosophy of architecture, and political theory.