Doors of Learning: Microcosms of a Future South Africa

Considering the place of prefabricated architecture in struggles for democracy in South Africa

A 1988 UN Habitat seminar considered issues of housing construction in "developing countries." Included in the presentation was a prefabricated building system designed by East German architects, which was used in an education and development center operated by the African National Congress in Tanzania. In this publication, a multidisciplinary and international group of artists, curators, historians and researchers reflect on the education and development centers as radical experiments in learning and living, as well as their spatial and design implementation in the context of the efforts to create a future democratic South Africa free of racism. This book focuses on why education was seen as the key to building a new democratic society. What were the immediate educational needs in those temporary learning environments? How were the educational priorities implemented spatially and creatively? And what was everyday life like for the people who lived there?