The Syracuse University chapter of the Society of Multicultural Architects and
Designers (SMAD), the National Organization of Minority Architect Students
(NOMAS) and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc., Delta Zeta Chapter, will present the
symposium "Transitions: Progressing Across a Shifting Cultural Landscape" on
Friday, Feb. 27, in the Syracuse University School of Architecture's Slocum Hall
Auditorium. The event explores the issues of multiculturalism and architecture, and
features prominent academics and minority practitioners. The event will focus on
topics of race and ethnicity within the design fields and what it means to represent
another culture through design.
"We hope to inform both participants and the audience about the new possibilities at
stake and encourage students to do more to ensure we create a better professional
climate in architecture for people from all backgrounds to succeed," says SMAD
president and architecture student Danielle Christina Segovia-Burke.
The day will include an afternoon of panel discussions beginning at 1 p.m.
Participants include Raymond A. Dalton, executive director of Cornell University's
Office of Minority Educational Affairs where he was instrumental in developing
programs and services to support recruitment and retention of underrepresented
students; Angel David Nieves (B. Arch. '94), associate professor of Africana studies at
Hamilton College whose scholarly work and community-based activism engage with
issues of memory, heritage preservation, gender and nationalism at the intersections
of race and the built environment in cities across the global south from New Orleans
to Johannesburg, South Africa; Bradford Grant, professor and director of the College
of Engineering, Architecture and Computer Science at Howard University and
former chair and Endowed University Professor of Architecture in the Department of
Architecture at Hampton University with extensive experience in housing and
community design; and Mabel Wilson, associate professor of architecture at
Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture Planning and Preservation
where she directs the program for Advanced Architectural Research.
The day will conclude with a keynote lecture at 5:45 p.m. by Craig Wilkins,
University of Michigan College of Architecture and Urban Planning lecturer and
director of the Detroit Community Design Center. Wilkins received a bachelor's
degree from the University of Detroit School of Architecture, a master's degree from
the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
and his doctorate from the University of Minnesota. He has worked as a designer,
project architect and urban designer in Washington, D.C., New York, Houston and
Minneapolis. He has written and lectured on a wide range of topics, from hip-hop
architecture at the University of Michigan to the prospects of globalization on African
spaces at the University of Witswatersrand.
Wilkins' work in the areas of space, race and music culminated in his most recent
publication, "The Aesthetics of Equity: Notes on race, space, architecture and music"
(University of Minnesota Press, 2007), winner of the prestigious 2008 Montaigne
Medal for Best New Writing. His forthcoming book, "Activist Architecture: A Field
Guide to Community-Based Practice" (Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), will
focus on the philosophy and practice of community design centers.
The symposium is the culminating event of Design Diversity Week, which takes place
from Feb. 23-27. Sunil Bald and Yolande Daniels of Studio SUMO in New York City
will present the lecture "Breaking the ICE" on Thursday, Feb. 26, at 5 p.m., in
Slocum Hall Auditorium; the event is co-sponsored by Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity
Inc., Delta Zeta Chapter. Formed in 1995, SUMO has received recognition from the
New York Foundation for the Arts, the Young Architects Program of the Museum of
Modern Art/PS1 and the Architectural League of New York.
Other events during Design Diversity Week include:
Events are free open to the public and will take place in Slocum Hall, home of the
Syracuse University School of Architecture, unless otherwise indicated.
For more information, visit http://soa.syr.edu.
