Land Use and Development

Land Use and Development SPRAWL MEGA-CITIES RAPID URBANIZATION DECENTRALIZATION SMART GROWTH COMMUNITY PLANNING RESOURCE MANAGEMENT MUNICIPAL INFRASTRUCTURE POSTINDUSTRIALISM ADAPTIVE REUSE NEW URBANISM UNEVEN DEVELOPMENT ZONING GENTRIFICATION EXURBANIZATION

This project area refers broadly to the ways public space is created and sustained in the planning and development of built landscapes and in the ordering and regulation of their use. The Institute seeks a range of investigations that engage the following questions: What are the conditions, limits and possibilities of public space within existing models of land use and development? How do such models support the physical and social networks and relationships that make up public life? How might such models be challenged and transformed to enable new forms of public life?

Forms and Materials

Forms and Materials TECTONICS ORNAMENT TYPOLOGY SIGNIFICATION MORPHOLOGY TECHNÉ SENSORY PERCEPTION AESTHETICS PHENOMENOLOGY FABRICATION TECHNOLOGIES CONSTRUCTION METHODS SMART MATERIALS PARAMETRIC MODELING MASSING EARTHWORKS

This project area refers broadly to the physical form, composition, structure and materials of architecture and landscape in the public realm. The Institute seeks a range of investigations that engage the following questions: What are the effects of forms and materials on the way that people behave, assemble and participate in and as publics? What material conditions, processes and forces shape the design of public space? How are forms and materials used as instruments of power, persuasion, innovation and change in public culture?

Information and Communication

Information and Communication PUBLICITY MASS MEDIA PRINT CULTURE MAPPING INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY TELECOMMUNICATIONS NETWORKED COMPUTING SOCIABLE MEDIA WIRELESS TECHNOLOGIES DEMOGRAPHIC PROFILING SURVEILLANCE CITIZEN JOURNALISM SOCIAL SOFTWARE SOURCE CODE GAMING

This project area refers broadly to the production and circulation of information in the public realm. The Institute seeks a range of investigations that engage the following questions: How do print, electronic and digital forms of communication mediate and transform our experience of public space? How is public life shaped by the exchange of information, and what is the space of this exchange? What alternative collectivities and territories of public space are enabled by new information and communication technologies?

Systems and Ecology

Systems and Ecology ENERGY EFFICIENCY LAND CONVERSION LANDSCAPE RESTORATION BROWNFIELD RECLAMATION WATERSHED MANAGEMENT GREEN ROOF TECHNOLOGIES WHOLE BUILDING DESIGN BIODIVERSITY ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE POPULATION DYNAMICS SYSTEMS THEORY SELF-ORGANIZATION RESPONSIVE ENVIRONMENTS FEEDBACK OPEN SYSTEMS

This project area refers broadly to physical landscapes as dynamic systems of interrelating organisms. The Institute seeks a range of investigations that engage the following questions: How are built landscapes conceived and created to adapt to open-ended, indeterminate and changing environmental conditions over time? How do the forms and meanings of places emerge from the interactions these places sustain? How are public life and public space important to healthy ecosystems? In what ways can publics themselves be understood as eco-systems that are more than the sum of their individual parts? How do we responsibly and intelligently construct public spaces that maintain ecological health while enhancing the needs of present and future forms of public life?

Culture and Politics

Culture and Politics MONUMENTALITY COLLECTIVE MEMORY PROPRIETY PROPERTY RIGHTS EVERYDAY URBANISM IDENTITY POLITICS BIOPOWER HOMELAND SECURITY DEFENSIBLE SPACE CIVIL LIBERTIES CITIZENSHIP GEOPOLITICS MULTICULTURALISM SPECTATORSHIP TOURISM

This project area refers broadly to how social forms, norms, identities and institutions are constituted by and through spatial practices in the public realm. The Institute seeks a range of investigations that engage the following questions: How is public architecture alternately constructed and occupied as a site of freedom, exclusion, resistance, control and uncertainty? How are public spaces made and unmade through social struggles over rights and access? How are they shaped by cultural conflict and political debate over representation? How does design in the public realm variously operate as a vehicle for historical, social, cultural and political meanings and values? What space do different kinds of bodies, behaviors and emotions take up in public? How do they belong or not belong in public life and how might we imagine alternative forms of belonging?