Sacred are the Gods who we give
praise and worship on bended knees. Sacred is what we define as divinity which
in theory is what separates the Gods from human beings. In today’s world,
design has continued to evolve to a point where the reuse has become a social
norm. Agamben’s, “In praise of Profanity” illustrates how profanity is the
inappropriate use or reuse through play. This occurrence may be due to the fact
that in our modern society, people are being more acceptable to things. The
level of integrity are beginning to be lost as how we can see in television
shows where the use of the word, “bitch” is highly inappropriate twenty years
ago. But today it may seem to be a normal use of words despite these shows are
easily available to kids at a very young age.
Now if you were to reflect this
kind of profanity in architecture, the change in society can also be see in
building elements or sacred temples itself like the Angkor Wat.
This place may be one of the most
sacred places around its area. While still being used as a place of worship, it
still works as a marketable asset for the country using it as a tourist
attraction. To me, it seems that in its marketing that the value and sacredness
of the place it lost in the true intentions of the business owners. Using the pictures
of Angkor Wat for advertising and perspective views in the temple to attract tourist.
In its loss of sacredness, this should then be considered as profanity.
Another example is the refurbishment
of temples in Ayutthaya.
The intentions of the
refurbishments was to preserve or rebuilt what was lost a sacred place of
worship. But in reality, the place is
now used as a tourist location. The architectural elements may be in track but
the use is a profanity to the ancient Thai culture. The board should consider
that all tourist reasons to be illegal but rather use the temples as an actual
place of worship.
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