Activism, reflection and Paulo Freire – an embodied pedagogy

This paper explores the critical pedagogy of activists as they participate in activism on some of the most important human rights issues of our time. I argue the pedagogy of activism is critically cognitive and embodied in a practice that is inherently social. The paper commences with some writing on what I claim is Freire’s own activism, always working towards a struggle for social justice and social change. His educational practices were never removed from sites and movements of struggle and resistance and he encouraged teachers to be political, that their teaching should never be disassociated from a critique of the political and social realities that impact on and create impediments to a democratic education.The paper then outlines empirical research on the learning dimensions of activists conducted in Australia and draws on some of the personal narratives of activists. I explore the reflexivity of activists as they work within and against the state, on issues of indigenous self-determination, racism, religion, homophobia, urban development, climate change, civil liberties, economic inequality and others. I argue for a critically reflexive pedagogy, as Paulo Freire reminds us, activism without purposeful reflection has the potential to become what he termed “naïve activism’’. That is, a focus on the theory and philosophical underpinnings of activism, and the tactics and strategies necessary to instigate social change, can create a pedagogy that is wanting in praxis. Yet the urgency of activism and the desire for significant social change often prevents a critical space for reflection to occur.The paper concludes with some suggestions for how Freire’s writing on praxis, can improve activists important practice.

Critical Indigenous pedagogy meets transformative education in a third space learning experience

This paper explores the philosophical and theoretical foundations of a first year unit in Aboriginal Studies offered at the University of Notre Dame in Fremantle. It explains how the current approach is inclusive of transformative and critical Indigenous pedagogies and taught from an evolving ‘third space’. Each philosophical underpinning is considered briefly, with reference to informal feedback received from students in 2014. What is suggested is that AB100 is indeed transformational for students in ways that are potentially ongoing in both professional and personallives. Given the focus of the University of Notre Dame on training students for the professions this has implications for potential ways of teaching and learning that may require uncapping the usual teaching and learning frameworks to actively incorporate transformative and Indigenous pedagogies. Recommended is the need for further investigation and research into the impact of this approach to learning via an evaluation framework based upon the authors PhD outcomes

Occupant behaviour simulation for cellular offices in early design stages - Architectural and modelling considerations

Building simulation is most useful and most difficult in early design stages. Most useful since the optimisation potential is large and most difficult because input data are often not available at the level of resolution required for simulation software. The aim of this paper is to addresses this difficulty, by analysing the predominantly qualitative information in early stages of an architectural design process in search for indicators towards quantitative simulation input. The discussion in this paper is focused on cellular offices. Parameters related to occupancy, the use of office equipment, night ventilation, the use of lights and blinds are reviewed based on simulation input requirements, architectural considerations in early design stages and occupant behaviour considerations in operational stages. A worst and ideal case scenario is suggested as a generic approach to model occupant behaviour in early design stages when more detailed information is not available. Without actually predicting specific occupant behaviour, this approach highlights the magnitude of impact that occupants can have on comfort and building energy performance and it matches the level of resolution of available architectural information in early design stages. This can be sufficient for building designers to compare the magnitude of impact of occupants with other parameters in order to inform design decisions. Potential indicators in early design stages towards the ideal or worst case scenario are discussed.

Designing architectural morphing skins with elastic modular systems

This paper discusses the issues of designing architectural skins that can be physically morphed to adapt to changing needs. To achieve this architectural vision, designers have focused on developing mechanical joints, components, and systems for actuation and kinetic transformation. However, the unexplored approach of using lightweight elastic form-changing materials provides an opportunity for designing responsive architectural skins and skeletons with fewer mechanical operations. This research aims to develop elastic modular systems that can be applied as a second skin or brise-soleil to existing buildings.The use of the second skin has the potential to allow existing buildings to perform better in various climatic conditions and to provide a visually compelling skin. This approach is evaluated through three design experiments with prototypes, namely Tent, Curtain and Blind, to serve two fundamental purposes: Comfort and Communication. These experimental prototypes explore the use of digital and physical computation embedded in form-changing materials to design architectural morphing skins that manipulate sunlight and act as responsive shading devices.

Deconstructing religious identity, difference, and belonging : implications for anti-racist pedagogy

Increasing numbers of Australians identify with a multiplicity of religion groups or have no religious affiliation. Despite this, the representation of religious groups other than Christian—and the implications of this for anti-racist pedagogy in Australian schools—is seldom explored. This article interrogates the ways in which the most prominent of these minority religious groups (Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish) were spoken about in two Melbourne newspapers and considers the implications of this interrogation for multicultural pedagogy in globally integrated local school contexts, such as those in Australia. Methodologies of social cultural theory and critical discourse analysis (CDA) are used to investigate newspaper discussions from the different viewpoints of their experiential, systemic, and normative focus. I find that notions of religious identity described in the media are stylized in form and an almost-silent normative self-identity is defined against clichéd typologies made within a crucible of race, identity, and belonging.

The social network learning cloud: architectural education for the 21 century

In less than a decade, architectural education has, in some ways, significantly evolved. The advent of computation has not so much triggered the change, but Social Networks (SN) have ignited a novel way of learning, interaction and knowledge construction. SN enable learners to engage with friends, tutors, professionals and peers, form the base for learning resources, allow students to make their voices heard, to listen to other views and much more. They offer a more authentic, inter-professional and integrated problem based, Just-in-Time (JIT), Just-in-Place (JIP) learning. Online SN work in close association with offline SN to form a blended social learning realm-the Social Network Learning Cloud (SNLC)-that greatly enables and enhances students' learning in a far more influential way than any other learning means, resources or methods do. This paper presents a SNLC for architectural education that provides opportunities for linking the academic Learning Management Systems (LMS) with private or professional SN such that it enhances the learning experience and deepens the knowledge of the students. The paper proposes ways of utilising SNLC in other learning and teaching areas of the curriculum and concludes with directions of how SNLC then may be employed in professional settings.

Comparisons in representational media use in design studios between Hong Kong and Australia

Representational media-analogue, physical, digital, or virtual-are employed by students in the conception, development and presentation. In 2013 a survey at two architectural schools was conducted to study the current representational media use in design studios. The survey examined the role digital and physical media play in students' design work and how students use the various media to generate and communicate their designs. This study presents its importance through the shift in architectural education whereby digital tools are not taught per se any longer, however expected to be mastered throughout the course. Yet students' learning experiences are strongly dependant on the successful acquisition of skills and its transfer to deep learning. Especially architectural design studios build upon the premises that re-representation leads to a better acquisition of knowledge. Architectural educators may use the study to revisit their studio and reposition the role of media as well as align learning outcomes, deliverables and communication tools with the actual workingand learning-styles of students. © 2014, The Association for Computer-Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia (CAADRIA), Hong Kong.

Toward a pedagogy of feeling: understanding how museums create a space for cross-cultural encounters

In this chapter I engage with two developments – a growing understanding that citizenship involves political activity on the part of citizens in the public sphere and that affective relationships are an important aspect of this activity – to engage with the increasing use of affective interpretation strategies within exhibitions. I argue that the use of these strategies can be understood as the beginning of a new moment in museological practice that is concerned not so much with finding ways to become more pluralistic in who is represented within museums but with building opportunities for cross-cultural encounters in ways that question established relationships between self and other. I call this new moment “a pedagogy of feeling,” marking it as distinctive from both “a pedagogy of walking,” a term used by Tony Bennett to encapsulate the specific exhibition strategies that supported evolutionary narratives, and “a pedagogy of listening,” which I suggest marks the moment when exhibition practices were concerned with finding ways to increase the number of voices found in museum exhibitions as part of a civic program to encourage greater degrees of tolerance. Central to a pedagogy of feeling is, I argue, the idea of a “terrible gift” (as Roger Simon calls it), which is enacted through an exhibition syntax that uses a wide variety of affective or sensorial interpretation strategies.

Imagination, performance and affect: a critical pedagogy of the Holocaust?

Based on video testimony interviews held in the Shoah FoundationInstitute’s Visual History archive and the Melbourne JewishHolocaust Centre’s archive, this paper examines Holocaust survivortestimony as it relates to their return to the sites of atrocity,particularly Auschwitz-Birkenau. It analyses how survivor’s (re)encounters with material and imaginative landscapes revealsconceptions of, inter alia, agency, community, absence andbelonging in the performance of self. It uses these tensionsbetween landscapes of the past and present to develop thetheoretical relationship between performativity and ideas ofaffect. In doing so, it explores how these ideas can be used toengage students in a critical pedagogy of the Holocaust throughanalysis of survivor video-testimony and in visiting landscapes ofthe Holocaust.

Visual communication design as a form of public pedagogy

This paper identifies visual communication design as a form of public pedagogy. Communication design practices aim to achieve the successful transmission of a message to a recipient in a visual mode. Understanding the theories and practices of visual communication design can assist in enhancing the reception of the communication, as these practices become a tool to increase the effectiveness of learning in a public space. To demonstrate this, I will use the example of museums as an informal place of public learning, and argue design, and in particular visual communication design strategies, are extremely important in the creation of successful learning. If participants are not engaged or entertained, their capacity for learning will diminish. Engagement depends on the representation of the information and the successful interpretation of that information by the visitor. Further, this paper will emphasize the vital role communication design plays in all forms of public pedagogy, not just within the museum context. However, non-designers create many public learning environments and although this paper argues the benefits of communication design to increasing the effectiveness of learning, it recognizes the narrow opportunities of applying this knowledge.

Eight very vary(s): towards a program of mistakes-on-purpose

In 2007, I spent eight weeks in Residency at the Architectural body Research Foundation (Houston Street, NY, NY) with Arakawa and Madeline. In addition to discussion current projects, meeting researcher practitioners and students who would come by the office or talking to people on the phone who had just written or done something of interest, reviewing texts and discussing pressing ideas, Madeline had started work on an Encyclopaedia of Mistakes prompted by the mistakes on Purpose procedure. Every afternoon we would spend three hours or more at the end of the day working on the spectrum and placement of mistakes on the spectrum, lists of mistakes and refinement of what the role of mistakes might be across the organism-person-surround and the potential for perceptual knowing. As the work is an unfinished 31 page manuscript, I will not cite it directly but rather speak about it and the thinking process that went into the many many versions and amendments that produced in February and March of 2007.