Introduction to Architecture

What is architecture, anyway? We first think of buildings, of periods and styles, of relationships with clients, of codes for safety, of requirement for licensure. This course addressed architecture’s wide reach, and engagied with how the discipline’s long history is at once a foundation for how we think about architecture, and a provocation to think about it more broadly. In contrast to courses in architectural history, the approach here was non-linear, intersectional, and interrogative. In this course, architecture became a lens for viewing the world, and in turn, global challenges of climate change, economic inequity, conflicts over ideas of property and individualism, hierarchies perpetuated through systemic inequity are provoking us to think about architecture in new and expanding ways. Organized by Associate Professor Ozayr Saloojee and Visiting Azrieli critic Mokena Makeka, the course structure included guest lectures by several members of the Architecture and Urbanism faculty, PhD students, practitioners and invited guests. Each week introduced a new theme, which set the stage for understanding architecture’s multiple dimensions, interdisciplinary possibilities, and potential agency.