The Importance of Asking Why: The ACSA's research series, 'Where Are My People?', addresses race and its inequitable relationship with architecture

2021-03-16T19:51:00-04:00

The Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) has dedicated its efforts towards architectural education and research by "empowering faculty and schools to educate increasingly diverse students, expand disciplinary impacts, and create knowledge for the advancement of architecture."

2020 sparked a resurgence in the importance of addressing the social and political injustices within architectural academia and professional practice. Last year, ACSA Director of Research and Information, Dr. Kendall A. Nicholson, Assoc. AIA, NOMA posed a pertinent question that has turned into an impactful research series. By examining architecture's history and its ties to race both in the past and the present, we can begin to understand steps towards sustained reform and social equity for architects who identify as Black, Hispanic, Latinx, Asian, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander, and Native Indigenous.

Where Are My People? is a research series that investigates how architecture inte...

Social Design and Restorative Justice: Architect Deanna Van Buren teaches us how to re-design with values

2021-03-03T09:30:00-05:00

For Deanna Van Buren, designing towards justice and equity is more than a trend; it's a lifelong calling to dismantle a system that perpetuates oppression and suppression for Black and Brown communities. Back in October 2019, Archinect chatted with Van Buren to learn more about her firm Designing Justice + Designing Space (DJDS) , and what it means to "design spaces for peacemaking, inside and out."

Many may be familiar with her remarkable work involving decarceration and "justice architecture" by unbuilding racism. Van Buren makes it very clear that while many may call her a "justice architect," her mission works towards ending mass incarceration by developing infrastructure that "counters the traditional adversarial and punitive architecture of justice—courthouses, prisons, and jails."

When we spoke with Van Buren in 2019 she shared, "We started a new practice together because we felt that traditional architecture and real estate development firms were not practicing in alignment...

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The Importance of Asking Why: The ACSA's research series, 'Where Are My People?', addresses race and its inequitable relationship with architecture

Social Design and Restorative Justice: Architect Deanna Van Buren teaches us how to re-design with values