Dear SSJ members,

 

Greetings,

Polis Architecture Institute and Waseda University are pleased to invite you to participate in our second talk of a lecture series titled "Active Agents: Toward a Critical Archaeology of the Architecture Discipline." This initiative aims to facilitate a dialogue in the form of a roundtable discussion between architecture and other related disciplines. This talk series operates under the De-Discipline Program in collaboration with Waseda University (Keigo Kobayashi Lab) and Happy Hours (Institute of Science Tokyo) as a critical historiographical inquiry into the structural foundations of the architectural discipline.

We would like to extend the invitation to you to join our 4^th talk and roundtable discussion titled "Architecture between Art and Technology: Based on Heidegger's Reading of Aristotle" by Masumi Nagasaka.

 

TALK INFORMATION:

PRESENTER: Prof. Masumi Nagasaka. 

CHAIR: Abudjana Babiker.

DATE: October 6, 2025.

TIME: 18:00 ~ 20:00

LOCATION: Tokyo, Shinjuku, Nishiwaseda Campus, Building 55, First Floor, Innovation Lab.

FEES: Free. 

TITLE:

 

Architecture between Art and Technology: Based on Heidegger's Reading of Aristotle

 

DESCRIPTION: 

As Heidegger states in his 1953 conference, 'Question Concerning Technology', the term τέχνη signified in ancient Greek not only 'technology' but also 'art'. Now, one of the things that are at the same time 'technology' and 'art' is architecture. Heidegger claims that, among the so-called four causes - material, formal, efficient and final causes - only the efficient cause is dominant in the meaning of causality today and determines all sorts of causality. However, according to Heidegger, the ancient Greek term αἴτιον (aition), which is the source of the Latin translation causa, signified 'to be responsible' and did not mean 'bringing an effect'; rather, it referred to gathering the three ways of being - material, form and completed status. Hence, this talk will take Heidegger's conference as a guide to examine what it means to build a building, by making a detour to Heidegger's discussion of Aristotle's theory of four causes.

 

ABOUT THE PRESENTER:

 

Prof. Masumi Nagasaka:

Masumi Nagasaka, a doctor of philosophy and professor at Waseda University (Japan), investigates German and French phenomenology by situating it in the history of metaphysics and European philosophy, particularly as a critical heir of Kant's transcendental philosophy and German idealism. Her doctoral thesis enquires about Faith in mistrust--Derrida's 'possibility of the impossibility' in his reading of Husserl, Heidegger and Levinas (La foi dans la méfiance - « la possibilité de l'impossibilité » chez Derrida, à travers sa lecture de Husserl, Heidegger et Levinas) (2013, co-tutored thesis between the University of Toulouse, France, and the University of Wuppertal, Germany). She is the author of numerous articles, including "Verticality - Two Sorts of Multiplicity in Bergson and Levinas" (« Verticalité - Deux espèces de multiplicité chez Bergson et Levinas ») in: Flora Bastiani (dir.), Bergson-Jankélévitch-Levinas, Éditions Manucius, 2017; "Levinas and his transformation of the concept of experience: the inversion of consciousness as anarchic derangement" « Levinas et sa transformation du concept de l'expérience : l'inversion de la conscience comme dérangement anarchique ») in : Corine Pelluchon, Yotetsu Tunaki (dir.), Levinas et Merleau-Ponty - Le corps et le monde (Levinas and Merleau-Ponty: Body and World), Hermann, 2023.

 

HOST: ABUDJANA BABIKER.

Abudjana Babiker is an architect, researcher, author, and curator based in Tokyo. He is currently a PhD candidate at Waseda University. He has actively participated in a number of architecture competitions, architecture/urban research, and transdisciplinary projects and contributed to a number of publications and conferences. He is a founding director of Mittetulundusühing Polis Architecture Institute (PAI), an institute dedicated to liberal art, architecture history and empowerment of architects. His major research interests and activities encompass architectural discourse, ontology of architectural elements & composition, the objects of the city, historiography, production and reproduction through architecture, architectural borders and territories, representation & aesthetics and architecture journalism. His recent interest expands to the limitations and problematics in architecture.

CONTACT:

Name: Abudjana Babiker.

Email: abudjana@akane.waseda.jp

 

We look forward to your participation. Thank you.

 

With kind regards,

Abudjana H. E. Babiker

Arch. SIA | Ph.D. Candidate.
Department of Architecture 建築学科

School of Creative Science and Engineering  創造理工学部・研究科 
Waseda University 早稲田大学