This subject presents an overview of central issues within architectural theory. The basic presupposition guiding the subject is that architecture is inextricably bound up with questions of representation.
In part, the history of architecture is the history of its 'self-representation'. As such, emphasis is given to the way elements of architecture – line, diagrams, walls, corners, etc. – are articulated within the history of architecture's continual attempt to conceptualise its own practice. Instead of understanding theory as the application of a discourse external to architecture, theory is understood in terms of the issues that arise from the practice of design.