Tipologia e contesto. Abitare la permacrisi nelle regioni MENA. Typology and context. Inhabiting the permacrisis in the MENA Regions

This essay revisits the research Culture Mediterranee dell’Abitare (Picone 2016), grounding the architectural project in a renewed contextualism aligned with Frampton’s Critical Regionalism. This methodological hinge demands a profound reading of contexts, moving beyond modernist mythopoeia to address the “globalisation of indifference” and the environmental “shipwreck of civilization”. The Mediterranean is identified as the epicenter of a “permacrisis”, marked by a dichotomy between hyper-consuming metropolises and depopulated areas. To counter this, the research advocates a shift from anthropocentrism to a one-health perspective and a political strategy of mutual aid between urban and inland zones. The dwelling is redefined as an “antifragile” laboratory. The text argues that recovering material culture is vital but insufficient; true innovation requires a deep contextual knowledge that integrates complex social dynamics and engages inhabitants, human and non-human. The courtyard house is reaffirmed as the central invariant: a climatic device and relational apparatus for “being-with”. Invoking Hannah Arendt, the conclusion asserts that dwelling is an ontologically political act rooted in plurality; architecture must therefore facilitate coexistence to ensure collective survival.