Public spaces in Indonesian city today have undergone 2 (two) times transformations. The public spaces of traditional architecture—the original “alunalun”1) (traditional square)—as the gather place and to channel political aspirations, is now almost completely extinct. The first transformation, is into the modern square with full architectural design at the same place. The Second Transformation, is into a contemporary public space, called “New means of Consumption”. Through this article, the authors proposed a number of theoretical concepts, which are methodologically expected to help prospective researchers who wish to conduct empirical studies on the phenomenon of architectural public spatial transformation occurring in Indonesian cities today. This article was wrote base on a nonempirical study conducted by the authors. In conclusion, the authors recommend of using a number of theoretical concepts, the point is to use the tradition principle of Symbolic Interactionism research, to produce an overview of the phenomenon of architectural public spatial transformation for cities in Indonesia, namely by understanding people’s perceptions of the meaning of architectural symbols related to their behavior in various interactions social, and how they shift in different times and in different space settings, before and after transformation.

Keywords : Symbolic Interactionism; Architectural Public Space; Transformation of Architectural Public Space; Original Alun-alun (Traditional Square fields); Modern alunalun; New Means of Consumption.