A Study On Form Patterns Of Traditional Settlements In Central Shanxi From The View Of Environmental Adaptability

The traditional settlement is the spatial production of human responses to theenvironment, with close relations to the natural landscapes, historical culture, sociallife and so forth. The causes, expressions and diachronic representations of settlementforms will be analyzed, as well as the summarization of the form patterns, with theaide of field studies and statistic surveys.The first section will discuss the theoretical support, including Chapter One andTwo. From the view of environmental adaptability, the scope of environmentaladaptability, traditional settlements, Central Shanxi, and form patterns will be defined,integrating the research in the realms of architecture, settlement geography andsociology. On account of hierarchies and interactions of settlements and environment,the physical and human environment factors will be organized, with the inductions ofregional differentiations and orientations.The second section, which is on the empirical analyses, includes Chapter Three,Four and Five. The settlement form consists of spatial and social components, theformer of which can be divided to general and architectural parts. Firstly, the spatialpatterns within the Chinese traditional context will be extracted. And the patterns willbe utilized for the sample interpretation of settlements within plains and hills inCentral Shanxi. By the typology methods and visualization diagrams, the generalforms will be classified to the subjective type, the objective type and the integrativetype, focusing on the transformation trends and structural changes. Secondly, thearchitectural units will be analyzed in the diachronical way, with the conclusions ofunit structures, spatial orders and configurational logics. In addition, the developmentof social organizations, the rank size, multi-dimensional expansions will also bediscussed, taking the demographic transitions as the characteristic for the social formof traditional settlements,In Chapter Six and Seven, the preliminary conclusions about general forms,architectural forms and social forms will be combined, with further discussions on structurality and regionality in Central Shanxi. With the thoughts of form patterns,some social reality matters can be interpreted and responded.The research is based on the investigations about57cases from21counties,aiming at revealing the logics of adaptable development. The rapid urbanization hasput the strong impact on the traditional settlements, during which process thesettlement space and social life have to face multi-cultural influences. The physicalenvironment has gradually disappeared, with the change of social forms. In brief, thecomprehensive study of form patterns in the perspective of environmental adaptabilitywill provide the theoretical support and mythological references for the renovation ofsettlements and the inheritance of historic culture.