Embodied pedagogies: introducing ‘otherness’ in architectural education

The research examines the educational and ethical value that embodied pedagogies and pedagogies of alterity hold for architectural education.

It looks at how ‘other’ bodies can help us navigate aesthetical/technological aspects of design, promote synergies with other disciplinary-areas, raise awareness on unstable bodies and contexts, and positively infiltrate studio cultures.

In the context of UK-architectural education, unstable, diverse and ephemeral bodies are usually absent from design studios, or find ‘thin’ passages to their briefs through the Architects Registration Board (GC5-GC6) criteria.

In their common manifestations, these bodies become a learning vehicle for introducing basic architectural tools and qualities (scale, orientation, views, materiality) in the first year. However, during these initiations to embodied thinking, discussions on their complexity, diversity and ephemerality are often limited to sensory explorations of architecture or to debates on ergonomic design.

These same qualities are rarely addressed in third and fourth-year studios, where students usually work on large-scale public programmes, and manage the needs of ‘average’ users and diverse social groups. As a result, complexity, diversity and ephemerality are then predominantly explored discursively in history and theory modules and dissertations, keeping safe distance from the design studio.

The research-examines the educational and ethical value that embodied pedagogies and pedagogies of alterity hold for architectural education. It-looks at how ‘other’ bodies can help us navigate aesthetical/technological aspects of design, promote synergies with other disciplinary-areas, raise awareness on unstable bodies and contexts, and positively infiltrate studio cultures.

Publications

• Ntzani, D. 2021. “Troublesome pedagogies: introducing 'otherness' to 1st year design studio”, in Initiations: practices of teaching 1st year design in architecture,  Chatzichristou, C., Icavovou, P. and Koutsoumpos, L. eds. pp. 195-204.

Partners

• Sophia Banou
• Aikaterini Antonopoulou