The Factors and Basis of Continuity and Interruption in Iran's Bio-social Zones

In comparison to urban texture, contemporary texture, which is formed from the beginning of the present century, occupies less space and was formed based on pedestrian connection. Contemporary texture was on a gradual increase and there was a relative correlation between needs of residents and building of infrastructures,providing services which because of this, there was a balance between residential and other users. The new needs were not forced on texture’s space structure and idea of “housingrepair” was popular as oppose to the idea “housingreplacement”. But since the beginning of 40s(Persian calendar),Due to numerous reasons such as the overwhelming effect of foreign culturecompared to past, sheer residential use of the space and high dependency on new cities facilities has put historical textures among  one of the most unbalanced urban textures. This has been an ongoing process and majority of historical textures and their residents are facing new problems and unstable factors on daily basis. Some experts believe that there had been a continuous trend previously and recent occurrences has caused an interruption in history. There are two completely different perspectives regarding this issue, one believes that there has been a continuity in different eras of the history but the other believes that due to interruption, these eras are not necessary part of an evolution. However this continuity throughout the 3000 years up to beginning of the present century has been confirmed by many experts. Historians and social theorists have different views on the historical course of these issues in Iran, which are classified into three categories. Based on this, and given the fact that the historical-social dimensions have had a definite influence on the architecture of Iran, the impact of different views on history can be traced back to architecture, with the difference that the reflection of social change on architecture has taken place with a slight delay, which includes the past six decades. Accordingly, this study has raised some questions as following: What are the elements and components of continuity as oppose to interruption in a social life zone such as historical textures? Which factors and bases effective in birth of these two perspectives are the most important from experts’ point of view? Gathering and measuring the importance of elements and components of continuity and interruption perspectives in historical texture is the objective of this study. Initially, the elements and components of these perspectives are found through review of sources and exploratory interviews with experts and after categorizing them into different dimensions, they are measured and weighed firstly by the number of references and then the surveys completed by experts. The examples are drawn from scholars of sociology and architecture using snow ball sampling method. The credibility of experts measurement is surely more than number of references (due to importance of components localism and extent of sources), but alignment of these two methods can be a reliant factor in giving importance to the dimension and components. Also, it is visible that this interruption has influenced all social aspects and Iran’s architecture and urbanization consecutively. By considering the consequences of interruption, future urban and architectural plan should be prepared in a way which could close the gap between past and present.