A study on the history of urban morphology in China based on discourse analysis

Abstract

[EN] Urban morphology is a method widely used in China in the field of urban design and urban conservation. Since its first introduction to the Chinese context about 30 years ago, the key ideas and concepts of urban morphology underwent a significant phenomenon of ‘lost in translation’. Different origins of morphological thoughts, different versions of translation, as well as different disciplinary context, have all together led to a chaotic discourse. This paper reviews the key Chinese articles in the field of urban morphology since 1982 and draws out a group of persistent keywords, such as urban form, growth mechanism, evolution and axis that characterize the morphological approach to urban issues, to find unusual evolutionary process. By reviewing the transformation of the definition of these keywords, this paper aims to generate an evolutionary diagram of landmark ideas and concepts.