Community Organization of the Village Settlement and Service Area of Religious Centres: Si-Miao, in Konghinglie (Singdyam City, Taiwan)

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to consider the space formation of the village settlement of Konghinglie (Singdyam city), which is a typical traditional village in Taipei basin. The study is based on the analysis of the interrelations between the religious service area of si-miao (Buddhist and Confucian temples) and village organization. The target village of the study was the frontier settlement in the period of migration from Mainland China that still preserves a traditional way of life. Several building types can be observed in the space formation of village of Hang tribe in Taipei basin. The paper firstly clarifies the distribution of building types in the village and analyzes the community organization with respect to the religious service areas of si-miao. It was found that there are two types of si-miao-the indigenous type and the foreign origin type. The service area of indigenous type is formed on the traditional community organization but the foreign origin type has no such organization in the village. Finally this paper points out the process of the destruction of traditional community organization, which is a key to understand the urbanization process of Taiwan. © 2003, Architectural Institute of Japan. All rights reserved.