Documenting the Undocumented: Carceral Architecture and Migrant Bodies
<p>In this conversation that occurred before her presentation at New York’s Left Forum, Tings Chak and I discuss the historical and contemporary racialized treatment of migrant bodies in North America and Europe. Refused, expelled, marginalized, or detained, the migrant body is a precarious one. Through Ting’s upcoming graphic-essay book, we talk about carceral architecture, in particular the one that embodies the numerous migrant detention centers in Canada. What does that mean at a legal standpoint to be incarcerated not for punishing reasons but for administrative reasons? How does architecture unfold violence upon bodies through its very physicality? What would that mean for architecture to pledge not to design spaces of torture like the one Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility drafted? What is a Sanctuary City? We try to examine these questions and determine the role we play in them as trained architects.</p>
Host: Léopold Lambert
Guests: Tings Chak
Part of: The Funambulist Podcast