We invite you to present at the Fielding Architecture: Feminist Practices for a Decolonised Pedagogy in June 2019, to be held in Brighton.

This interdisciplinary symposium proposes to explore and question the practice of teaching architectural history / theory primarily focused in the UK context though welcoming a debate through dialogues with other contexts from a feminist and critical perspective, askng: how is it constructed, from which positions, and from where its content derives; how can its construction be critiqued and informed by other disciplines such as feminist geographies, environmental psychology, cultural studies, technology and science studies, queer theory and urban geography amongst others; and, moreover, how should architectural histories and theories be constructed in the future. We will situate ourselves at the boundary: looking both inside at the fundamentals of architecture; and looking outside at the expanded field, yet always maintaining a critical gendered perspective.

The symposium will focus on four areas:

1. Critiques: What constitutes the canon of architecture (the rules, frameworks, habits, practices, contents). How is this an effective architectural knowledge base? How can this be criticised? What does the criticism in itself constitute as a method or framework? What questions can/should be formed here on decolonisation?

2. Contents: Addressing the sites of architectural knowledge, we work towards creating a broader body of knowledge inclusive of gender, class and race, and one that flexes and bends, grows rather than calcifies and sets limits. How can we translate across contexts? Here we also call for papers that even problematise the idea of architecture itself, as a set of neutral normative, westernised and gendered ideologies and values.

3. Modes and sites of writing and research: Focusing on the institutional sites and frameworks in which architectural knowledge is produced and constrained, we reconsider writing and researching as spaces of action, production and contestation. How can we critique, challenge and re-propose modes of writing and dissemination?

4. Modes and sites of teaching: Engaging with modes of architectural exploration in pedagogical settings – from the lecture theatre, the seminar, to the tutorial, to the online rubric – how can these re-evaluate the relationships between content and knowledge as well as of ethics and care? How can we develop and scope the invention and application of new methods of teaching and writing that reflect this? 

Keynote speakers:

• Professor Katie Lloyd Thomas (Newcastle University) 
• With a contribution by Professor Lesley Lokko (University of Johannesburg)

Session formats

There are two modes of delivery in this 2-day symposium:

Day 1 / Conference day / standard 20 minute papers: in four consecutive sessions structured around the areas 1–4 outlined above.

Day 2 / Workshop sessions / 10 minute position papers: in four concurrent workshops consisting of the session speakers and chair from day 1, plus five speakers delivering 10 mins position papers. Subsequent workshop discussion will focus on the co-production of a set of documents in real time.