A Paean to the Prayer Quarry: Memories and burial in the Old Malay Quarter, Bo-Kaap
Master Thesis
2014
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University of Cape Town
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Abstract
The Bo-Kaap is my landscape of memories, serving as a platform from which I can direct my story. It is a landscape that gives me a sense of belonging and provides me with spatial reference points to anchor my memories. The Bo-Kaap was my place of childhood encounters and is still my landscape of identity. The approach to the dissertation design is inspired by a keen personal interest In uncovering and creating a narrative of the open public places within the Old Malay Quarter of the Bo-Kaap, Cape Town; specifically the Prayer Quarry. It is the power of this unknown that needs to be augmented and captured. The dissertation design strives to re- create and re-instill a sense of public place within the Prayer Quarry. This idea of re-presencing absence is envisioned through a programme that resists the loss of memory by proposing a cemetery for the local Muslim Bo-Kaap community which serves as an acclamation to the Cape Malay social practices and cultural traditions. The design engages with the historical values of the site and establishes itself as a new gathering place within the Old Malay Quarter that pays tribute to the significance of the Prayer Quarry as one of the previously popular public places within the Bo- Kaap; A Paean to the Prayer Quarry.
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Includes bibliographical references.
Reference:
Soeker, N. 2014. A Paean to the Prayer Quarry: Memories and burial in the Old Malay Quarter, Bo-Kaap. University of Cape Town.