The Assertion of Indigenous Identity through
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190
Architecture: A Commentary on Australian and
Sub-Saharan African Architectural Experiences
Elizabeth Grant, Scott Heyes
Within the last decade there has been
a noticeable rise in contemporary archi-
tecture designed by, with, and for In-
digenous peoples across the world. Such
archi­ tectural projects have been de-
veloped at a range of scales (for exam-
ple, residential, community, provin-
cial ⁄ homeland, and national works), each
drawing on culturally-­ specific Indige-
nous ways of knowing to generate mean-
ingful works that are consistent with and
reflective of Indigenous lifestyles, his-
tories, cultures, and communities, and
that celebrate and embed Indigenous
identities. Making archi­ tectural works
that are Indigenous-led (i.e. guided by
Indigenous ontology) or Indigenous-­
informed is not an homogeneous pro-
cess, as ­ Johannesburg-based architect,
­Mphethi Morojele notes: ‘… the manner in
which indigeneity is interpreted around
the world is extremely diverse’.1 This ar-
ticle comments on traditional Indige-
nous architectures, housing design, and
the growth of contemporary Indigenous
archi­tec­tures in A
­ ustralia, as compared
to countries across sub-­Saharan Africa.
Traditional Indigenous Architectures
At the time of the European invasion
of Australia (1788), there were an esti­
mated 250 Aboriginal 2 Nations, each re-
plete with distinct and varied language ⁄ s
and customs. Each First Nation had di-
verse and complex ranges of architectural
forms, building knowledges, use of mate-
rials, and settlement-planning traditions
in response to different climatic condi-
tions and terrains, socio-spatial customs,
and available materials. Despite constant
interaction with Indigenous inhabitants,
Australia was deemed terra nullius (i.e.
legally deemed to be unoccupied or unin-
habited) by settlers ⁄ invaders. Alongside
Indigenous Identities:
this myth, there was an assumption that
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peo-
ples were nomadic hunter gatherers with
no architectural traditions. Indigenous
oral histories and other sources have
long maintained this to be false. This is
supported by recent scholarship demon-
strating that Aboriginal people had com-
plex systems of agriculture and rich and
diverse settlement planning and archi-
tectural traditions.3 This myth has ­only
been debunked in the public arena for
a little over a decade, and few architects
in Australia have used traditional Indige-
nous architectures as references for con-
temporary projects.4
As in Australia, there is no homoge-
nous Indigenous style or practice of tra­
di­tional architecture in Africa. Each so­
ciety in ­Africa had ⁄ has unique architec-
tural morphologies, iconographies, and
construction methodologies, each influ-
enced and shaped by various sociocul-
tural narratives. The general consensus
is that colo­nialism sig­nificantly impeded
the evolution, practice, and knowledge-­
transmission of tra­di­t ional African archi-
tectures, largely because colonial admin-
istrators failed to acknowledge or accept
pre-existing archi­ tectures. Traditional
­African archi­tec­tural typologies (espe-
cially in sub-­Saharan Africa) are well doc-
umented, but are unfortunately labelled
as ‘primitive’ by some, and commonly as-
sociated with poverty. There are notable
exceptions, though. Architects such as
­Demas Nwoko and ­Francis Kéré use tradi-
tional A ­ frican archi­tecture forms, artisan-
ship and local materials alongside mod-
ern design techniques to create new con-
temporary A ­ frican architec­tural styles.
The Design of Housing
Few Australian Aboriginal peoples live
Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3614220
Australian and African Architectural Experiences
Elizabeth Grant, Scott Heyes
permanently in traditional architecture
today, as the forms are lightweight and
seasonally constructed, and most Indig-
enous peoples were displaced from their
traditional lands onto reservations, mis-
sions, and stations or to town f­ringes
where Western-style housing or o­ther
forms of basic shelter were pro­ v ided.
­A boriginal peoples and Torres Strait Is-
landers still residing in discrete Indig-
enous settlements are provided with
government-­funded community housing.
There are major housing issues in most
discrete communities, including housing
shortages, overcrowding, inappropriate
design, poor quality housing and main-
tenance. Under 1950s assimilation poli-
cies, ‘select’ Australian Aboriginal fami-
lies moved into towns and cities,and to-
day nearly 80 per cent of the Australian
Indigenous population now live in towns
and cities.5 The lack of publicly funded
housing, racial discrimination in private
rental markets, and the inappropriate de-
sign of housing to meet the diverse and
complex socio-spatial needs for Indige-
nous families continue to be contentious
issues that have not been adequately ad-
dressed in urban, rural, and remote are-
as of A
­ ustralia.
Across sub-Saharan Africa, the mas-
sive housing shortage is the foremost is-
sue. As an example, the World Bank6 esti-
mates that two million homes are ­needed
in Kenya, while Nigeria has a shortfall of
17 million homes. Most attribute hous-
ing shortages to mass migrations to ur-
ban areas to access employment oppor-
tunities and services (and im­ portantly
as a post-apartheid response in South
­Africa).7 Most African countries lack the
financial capacity to construct large-
scale projects and the soaring demand
is generally unmet. A lack of access to
affordable housing results in informal
settlements (such as shacks, backyard
dwellings, squatter settlements, and mo-
bile homes), which continue to grow due
to new household formations and contin-
uing migration from rural areas. Housing
design across Africa has had a primary
focus on producing low-cost housing to
deal the sheer volume of people who live
in makeshift and substandard conditions.
Contemporary Indigenous Architecture
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peo-
ples, a minority population who ­ only
gained full equality under Australian law
in 1967, have fought to regain their lands
and retain and revive cultural practices
and identity. The design of specific build-
ings to house their activities and organ-
isations grew from 1960 onwards.8 ­E arly
architectural approaches were modest
and often achieved, perhaps facilely, by
layering Indigenous signs and symbols
on Western-style buildings. Later, public
buildings and spaces began to incorpo-
rate acknowledgement of Indigenous cul-
tures and emphasise relationships to land
in their designs through totemic repre-
sentations, specific detailing and mate-
rials, and references to significant land-
LL
scapes.9 Today there is a growing num-
ber of buildings – and new architectural
types – which have been devised to sup-
port, display, and safeguard Indigenous
cultures, and to accommodate Indige-
nous organisations. The projects often
seek to create new architectural styles
that better fit the needs of the users, to
participate in the recognition of the un-
just treatment of Indigenous A­ ustralians,
and to dignify contemporary I­ ndigenous
cultures through architectural excel-
lence. Many of the projects could be
deemed as a small ‘a’ architecture in scale
and an active discourse of how buildings
 represent Indigenous identities through
192
design continues.10
Such discourses also occurred in A ­ frica
and continue to the present day. The re-
sultant projects have differed in scale,
though. The design and construction of
major monumental structures erected
in the years following the independence
of African nations symbolised the newly
born viability of these states. The build-
ings demonstrated a clear distinction be-
tween colonisers and colonised and rein-
forced political and social changes.
Indigenous populations are portrayed
through design, with architecture re-
sponding and enhancing the historical
and emerging African condition.11 No-
where in the world are the spatial di-
mensions of politics more nakedly visi-
ble than in South Africa.12 Since the end
of apartheid, architects have rejected co-
lonial aesthetics for a new contemporary
public architecture that ‘con­c retises’ im-
aginative dialogues with A­ f rican land-
scapes.13 Within the diversity of archi-
tectural expressions, a broad range of
concerns are driving South African archi-
tecture. Most importantly among these
are the questions of how to transform the
spatial legacy of apartheid, and thereby
to contribute to social and economic rec-
onciliation14 and how to represent a plu-
ralistic, post-apartheid democracy and
a multitude of regional cultures, geogra-
phies, and climates.
Conclusion
Australian Indigenous peoples do not
have sovereignty and although A ­ ustralia
is a developed nation, many ­A boriginal
and Torres Strait Islander peoples
live in abject poverty. From the 1970s,
community-­ based projects were built
with Indigenous references, to cele-
brate the importance of traditional lands
and ⁄ or in consideration for the varying
and diverse cultural needs. There is a mul-
titude of projects across A ­ ustralia; how­
ever, the works are small scale. ­Australian
­A boriginal and T­ orres Strait Islander peo-
ples still seek the monumental political
and social structural changes that have
occurred across Africa. There is a concert-
ed push for treaties and constitutional
reform from many quarters. If such so- Image Caption
L 193
cietal changes occur, archi­ tec­
t ural re- Source: ???
sponses may also occur.
Some commonalities in design philosophy
have been eloquently stated by ­Mphethi
Morojele: ‘What is common amongst peo-
ple who are Indigenous any­where in the
world is their deep psychological rela-
tionship to land and place and their sense
of ownership and belonging. This is an
important design sensibility that we need
to discuss and reinforce.’ This discourse
is in its infancy in ­Australia and the next
decade may produce interesting devel-
opments in both sub-­ Saharan African
and Australian ­Indigenous archi­tec ­t ure
as design professionals and ­Indigenous
communities grapple with how to rep-
resent individual cultural identities and
­Indigenous relationships to land through
design, whilst simultaneously attempt-
ing to improve the socio-economic dis-
advantage of many Indigenous groups
through design.
Notes
1 Harris, J., ‘Re-building a country: Interview with
Mphethi M. Morojele on indigeneity, animist
architecture and sending off Nelson Mandela’,
Architecture Australia, 15 August 2018,
architectureau.com⁄articles⁄re-building-a-country-
mphethi-m-morojele-on-indigeneity-animist-
architecture-and-sending-off-nelson-mandela
(accessed 9 January 2019).
2 The terms ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
peoples’ and ‘Indigenous’ are used interchangeably in
this paper to refer to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander peoples across Australia.
3 See Pascoe, B., Dark Emu Black Seeds: Agriculture
or Accident? (Broome, 2014); Memmott, P., Gunyah,
Goondie and Wurley: Australian Aboriginal Architecture.
(St Lucia, 2007).
4 See Elizabeth Grant and Greenop, K., ‘Affirming and
reaf­fi rm­ing Indigenous presence: Contemporary
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community,
public and institutional architecture in Australia’, in
Grant, E.
et al. (eds), The Handbook of Contemporary Indigenous
Architecture (Singapore, 2018), pp. 57–105, here p. 61.
LL
5 Australian Statistics Bureau, ‘Census of Popu­l a­t ion and
Housing: Characteristics of Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander Australians, 2016’ (Canberra, 2018).
6 World Bank Group, ‘Rapid urbanization is pushing
up demand for housing in Sub-Saharan Africa’,
Affordable Housing in Africa, https:⁄⁄www.ifc.
org⁄wps⁄wcm⁄connect ⁄news_ext_content ⁄ifc_
external_corporate_site ⁄news+and+events⁄news⁄
trp_featurestory_africahousing⁄, accessed 2019.
7 Smith, D. M., (ed.), The Apartheid City and Beyond:
Urbanization and Social Change in South Africa
(London and New York, 2003).
8 Grant and Greenop, 2018.
9 Ibid.
10 Dovey, K., ‘Architecture for Aborigines’, Architecture
Australia, 85 ⁄ 4 (1996), pp. 98–103.
11 Morojele in Harris, 2018.
12 Noble, J. A., African Identity in Post-apartheid Public
Architecture: White Skin, Black Masks (Farnham, 2011).
13 Hannah LeRoux, and Mphethi Morojele, ‘The Lakeside
Community Crêche: Architecture beyond Apartheid’,
The Journal of Architecture, 8 ⁄ 2 (2003), pp. 265–272.
14 Iain Low, ‘Space and Reconciliation: Cape Town and the
South African City under Transformation, Urban Design
International, 8 ⁄ 4, 2003, p. 223–246.
Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3614220