Adapting a framework

Baron and Dobbs, in the article cited earlier, developed a framework.  They called it “Historical Thinking Framework for Buildings” (or HTFB) and included it as table 1 of their article.  Each represents a different perspective from which the building can be viewed, and each paints a bit more of the picture of the building as what the authors consider the building as historical text.

For this analysis, we took the five elements the authors had defined:  Origination, Intertectionality, Stratification, Supposition, and Empathetic Insight, and restated them as six elements — tasks, really — as follows:

1.  Defining connection to the eras when it was constructed

2. Stratification of building elements – what happened when?

3. Reviewing the historical contexts in which the building was present

4. Examining correlations with other similar buildings of those periods

5. Consider occupants/users, their roles in society, and how they might have responded to the building

6. Elaborating on the macrostructure: competing uses of structural elements

 That said, we didn’t necessarily tackle the tasks in order, and in fact worked on more that one simultaneously.

Some tasks were fairly easy — at least on the surface — while others became quite complex upon further investigation.