geographies of urban filth by liyang zhang architecture + design rethinks the spatial, cultural, and social constructs of dirt and cleanliness through an intervention at the north toronto wastewater treatment plant. examining how such concepts are bound to issues of class and race, the thesis proposes to insert a public space and bath within the facility, which is located centrally to three physically and socially disconnected neighborhoods of different income levels and ethnic groups.
 
 
supervised by rick andrighetti, university of waterloo, geographies of urban filth has been developed based on existing ideas of identity and otherness by julia kristeva, R.D laing, krzysztof wodiczko and mary douglas. ?in julia kristeva?s essays on abjection, she describes abjection as the discomfort caused when impurities and contamination become a threat to one?s own identity and order,? liyang zhang points out. ?it is when borders that are meant to protect us from the other, become ambiguous. the inherent fear of the abject breeds an obsession for purity which erases opportunities to engage with and understand those other to ourselves.?
 
 
these ideas are explored practically through the intervention at the north toronto wastewater treatment plant, which sits disguised below city level within the don valley ravine, collecting and filtering wastewater from three neighboring communities and releasing it back into the don valley river. ?mary douglas examines our cultural understa...