Journal of Researches in Islamic Architecture

It is more than one century that the issue of Islamic city and then the Iranian-Islamic city has been noticed systematically and scientifically by the researchers and scholars. The study of the Iranian-Islamic city has been in the intersection of different kinds of scientific systems so that a large number of researchers including geographers, architects, historians, linguists, orientalists, urbanization experts, Islamists, urban planners and etc. have studied the issue of the Iranian-Islamic city and its characteristics. Due to the large number of these researchers, it is essential to categorize these studies to perceive the main trend in this field and also to recognize the concerned research vacuities. One of the main problems in this field is the large and basic discrepancy and disagreement in the studies. It is necessary to do the pathology of Islamic city studies in general and the Iranian-Islamic city studies specifically. These circumstances have caused ambiguity and confusion for the researchers and sometimes have made the conception and comprehension of the Iranian-Islamic city issue difficult. Most of the basic questions about the Iranian-Islamic city issue have been unanswered and subsequently there has been no substantial procedure in this issue. Therefore, it is of much significance to have a comprehensive approach toward the Iranian-Islamic city studies. Making a recent and original foundation in this field is not possible without the comprehensive analyses in the past studies and recognizing the strengths and weaknesses of them. Delavar believes that any researcher who intends to develop a specific science should first identify and study the previous studies carefully (Delavar, 2008, 97-99); Whereas the issue of the Iranian-Islamic city has been noticed by many professors and students in recent years, according to the large number of the articles, theses, and dissertations about this issue, this research has been assigned to study the scientific articles on the Iranian-Islamic city.
The main question of this research is the diagnostic study of doing the scientific researches about the Iranian-Islamic city, analytical conclusion, and suitable approaches. The main object of this research is the meta-analysis of the Iranian-Islamic city issue to conclude and categorize the latest findings of the scientific researches about this issue. The method of doing this research is meta-analysis. The systematic review and evaluation of practical researches in the field of the Iranian-Islamic city indicates that to achieve the scientific attention and concentration, such meta- analyses are essential. Therefore, in this study, ninety-two articles on the Iranian-Islamic city issue from 1974 to 2016 have been recognized through these scientific databases: Noor Specialized Magazines Website, Scientific Information Database, Magiran Information Database, Comprehensive Portal of Humanities and Cultural Studies. The information domain of this research is the articles that studied one or more factors of the Iranian-Islamic city issue specifically. Hence the specified factors were divided into two categories of nature and existence. In the nature dimension the fundamental and identifying attributes were surveyed and in the existence dimension the manifestation of existential factors and personal and public functions (SajadZadeh & Mosavi, 2014; Babich, 2003) of the Iranian-Islamic city were emphasized. The method of sampling in this research is to count the whole available samples. This matter is significant because the national identity of Iranian due to the cultural overlapping has been influenced by three kinds of civilizations including: Persian cultural identity, Islamic cultural identity and western cultural identity. Many questions have been propounded about the nature and existence of the Iranian identity and its attributes and different scientific systems have surveyed it from different points of view and have attempted to explain it so that it is the reflection of misinterpretations and disarrangements about this fact and different topics and goals relating to it. On the other hand, by the advent of obscure thoughts of modernism in Iranian culture and literature not only its conceptual demonstration but also the concrete demonstration of the modernism has been entered in the Iranian-Islamic architecture and urbanization so that the fundamental elements of the present Iranian-Islamic city are losing their identity. Moreover, the western culture and planning has affected these elements and has caused them to lose their identity and urban coherence and stability. This instability is called development and modernity and is increasing day by day. Therefore, the nature and identity of the Iranian -Islamic city has faded because of the economic, social, and cultural evolutions and the unthinking impressions of the western symbols and the modern urbanization patterns. To apply them correctly the necessary approaches for the contemporary issues of the cities and also making the foundation of the comprehensive theories of the Iranian-Islamic city, the critical and pathological point of view of these studies are needed. Accordingly, in this research the most important factors of the Iranian-Islamic city studies are the meaning and conception of the Iranian-Islamic city; the identity of the Iranian-Islamic city; the historical features of spatial organization of the Iranian-Islamic city; the principals and patterns of the Iranian-Islamic city; the identity of the Iranian-Islamic city; the urban space of the Iranian-Islamic city; the social-cultural revolutions in the spatial formation and structure of the Iranian-Islamic city; the impacts of modernism on the Iranian-Islamic city; devotion , and finally the fundamental elements of the Iranian-Islamic city such as neighborhood, mosque, square, and bazaar.