| Architecture Graduate Courses |
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Spring 2008 ARCH 209X Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. One to four hours of lecture per week. Prerequisites: Second- or third-year graduate standing. Topics deal with major problems and current issues in architectural design. (F,SP) ARCH 209X Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. One to four hours of lecture per week. Prerequisites: Second- or third-year graduate standing. Topics deal with major problems and current issues in architectural design. (F,SP) Extended Course Description Synthetic Tectonics Over the last decade we have witnessed how architectural discourse and practice have overflowed with references to new geometries: complex and sensual skins, surfaces and membranes, in which complicated enclosures and envelopes act as attractive and distracting filter devices packaging simple geometries and volume masses. In addition, the widespread use of both Computer Aided Design and Computer Aided Manufacturing not only has drastically altered the industrial paradigm of mass standardization but also assured that -from a computational point of view- the potential of form generation appeared virtually inexhaustible. However, given these advances in computationally driven methods, recent production often falls short of their potential mainly because architects have repeatedly neglected formal disciplines of geometry and instead turned to reductive principles for conceiving, describing and producing seemingly complex forms. In addition to totally weakening any integrity of formal logic, this computationally aided process mistakenly assumes that, as long as it is CAD/CAM, the resultant form will gain integrity. In seeking a more open set of outcomes, this seminar will be engaging the abovementioned technologies in a way that is commensurate with their possibilities. Working with both top-down and bottom-up approaches, this course will promote the exploration of an alternative way of conceiving and producing architecture by engaging matter across a wide spectrum of scales and regimes. We will regard the contemporary surplus of computational form as a provocation to develop formal and spatial configurations that demand the development and use of new hybrid, synthetic or composite tectonics in which not only its form but also its material incarnation is integral to that particular architectural expression. Along this line of thinking, we will consider an architectural project working within a wide range of material possibilities and logistics at work: from the immediate qualities and performances of materials –weight, durability, extension, color, etc.- to directives that architects make on them together with the invisible forces that shape architecture. However, that is not to say that we will only adhere to the pragmatics of conventional continuity between form and construction and accept pure constructive determinism as in any other architectural practice. Alternatively, our interest will focus on harnessing modes of organization based upon matter as an abstract machine. The course will be designed as a workshop or testing laboratory in
tectonic studies. With equal emphasis on formal and graphic analysis,
elementary mathematical thinking and numerically controlled material
technology, the seminar will circle, in increasing tight loops, the
exploration and production of new tectonics and their material effects.
As a result, the course will develop competence in inventive tectonic
and material design and develop criteria for discussing performative
effects which are verifiable by sensing what they do and how they work
in reality, by relating them to an extended field of affects and
effects. ARCH 211 Course may be repeated for credit. Three hours of seminar per week plus individual advising. Prerequisites: 110 or consent of instructor. Explores a variety of theories which explain and document the relationship between humans and the environment they build; outlines the research methods appropriate to each theory. (SP) Extended Course Description If space is a component of what you study, this course can help you learn about different ways to analyze the role of space in social life. This course gives you the opportunity to examine different (behavioral, post-structuralist, symbolic interactionist, phenomenological, anthropological) perspectives on the relationship between people and space, and to identify your own intellectual predilections. Every week we consider a different theoretical or methodological perspective. You will learn more about which methods are appropriate to each theoretical approach and end up being able to identify your personal affinities for a way of working as a scholar or designer. This seminar aims to develop your intellectual and methodological skills in linking theory and research in an engaging way that is productive for both designers and researchers. Your may enroll for either 3 or 4 units as suits your needs, and as described further below. Even if you are writing a thesis during the same semester, this course can still help you. It can do this in several ways: place your interests and subject matter within a broader context of fellow thinker-designers, develop your capacity to operationalize concepts, improve your research design, and develop basic skills in collecting and organizing data. The seminar supports students who are planning their M.Arch, M.S., or PhD research. Each member can select a topic of specialization which might stem from studio or thesis work for short weekly writing assignments in this class, which include drawing out the design implications of concepts from social theory, a book review, and EITHER a research proposal OR documentation on a CD (not a paper) of 3-5 built architectural projects that use social theory and research to generate the design. Human-environment studies can be classified in a number of different ways not mutually exclusive: design as communication, the social-psychology of users and designers, design as contest and control, programming and POE, action research, design as a manifestation of cultural values leading to analysis and criticism. The studies could also be categorized according to major methodological decisions. Since these formulations are not mutually exclusive, most studies in the field being interdisciplinary and using multiple methods, this course focuses on the texts themselves. As a theory course, students will read a mix of classic and newer texts in the field of human environment relations. As a research course, students will learn how to operationalize concepts, construct research designs, and practice basic skills in observing, interviewing, and surveying. To gain direct experience the class as a group will conduct a short (2 week) research project on a public library in Oakland. Once theoretically framed, each author had to operationalize, that is, make measurable, the central concepts of the problem under study. Each made strategic decisions about research design--longitudinal or comparative, case study or sample. Appropriate data collection techniques follow from these prior decisions; since most behavior can be observed directly, it lends itself to observation techniques, while most attitudes, opinions and beliefs are internal, requiring interviews or questionnaires. Studies also vary in the extent to which they seek to effect actions, including policy and design decisions. Theory, research design and data collection techniques, and the ultimate purpose and intended audience of a publication are interlocked. Through a fast paced schedule (at least one book per week), students gain facility in decomposing and re-composing research projects with the ultimate goal of learning how to assemble their own architectural research proposals. In order to develop intellectual skill in linking theory and research, students will link social theory to empirical research methods through a series of exercises: identify hypotheses and independent and dependent variables in each theory; cast various design issues as descriptive, comparative or longitudinal research designs; finally, choose appropriate data collection techniques. Qualitative methods, especially ethnography, will be placed within the context of all major social research methods. Other topics covered include programming research, post occupancy evaluation research, action research, and focus groups. An underlying premise of the course is that design can be improved by deepening our understanding of the social and cultural processes that shape it. You will learn how your research can contribute to the ongoing evolution of person-environment relations. This course strongly recommended to Masters students whose interests
include a social or evidence-based approach to design, and especially
those who plan to write a thesis or professional report. The course
invites students from Berkeley’s Institute of Design (BID), Information
Science, Hass School of Business, Architecture, Landscape Architecture,
and City and Regional Planning; it is a requirement for all Ph.D.
students who specialize in the Social Processes in Architecture and
Urban Design and who should take the course for the full 4 unit credit.
Others can choose to take 4 or 3 units. Those who enroll for 3 units
will do 25% less work, reporting on only one book per week. Those who
enroll for 4 units will alternate between reporting on one and two
books per week. Further, those who enroll for 3 units will pursue the
documentation option (above), rather than the research proposal which
requires 3 drafts is will be required of those enrolled for 4 units. ARCH 212 Three hours of seminar per week. This seminar prepares students to evaluate and design environments from the point of view of how they interact with the human body. Tools and clothing modify that interaction. Semi-fixed features of the near environment, especially furniture, may have greater impact on physical well being and social-psychological comfort than fixed features like walls, openings, and volume. Today, designers can help redefine and legitimize new attitudes toward supporting the human body by, for example, designing for a wide range of postural alternatives and possibly designing new kinds of furniture. At the urban design scale, the senses of proprioception and kinesthetics can be used to shape architecture and landscape architecture. This course covers these topics with special emphasis on chair design and evaluation. The public health implications of a new attitude toward posture and back support are explored. The course heightens students' consciousness of their own and others' physical perceptions through weekly experiential exercises. Students produce three design exercises: shoe, chair, and a room interior. (SP) ARCH 219A Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Formerly 211 and 219A through 219G. Selected topics such as social policy and building form, environments for special populations, for birth and death, social form and housing form, personal and societal values in design, participatory design, and urban parks. ARCH 219B Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Formerly 211 and 219A through 219G. Selected topics such as social policy and building form, environments for special populations, for birth and death, social form and housing form, personal and societal values in design, participatory design, and urban parks. Extended Course Description Mid-Rise Urbanism City building is becoming a lost art. In making pieces of a city -- highways and streets, parks and buildings -- our current design culture strives for a degree of formal autonomy from surrounding circumstances. Architecture is often reduced to a commodity that finds its value in how explicitly the piece can separate itself from the city, expressing its own content and adding little to the larger place. The experience of a city becomes a cacophony of competing markers. The experience of the textures of neighborhoods, the orientation of districts, and the collective practices of dwelling disappear as our design practices increasingly lose the tools to make them. Housing design is city design. Too often, a top down hierarchic approach to urbanism assumes decisions at higher levels control lower ones, thus the room is controlled by unit, units by buildings, buildings by the street and block, and so on. The seminar proposes that dwelling and urbanism have reciprocal relations where housing forms and is informed by the character of the city. Urbanism, the study of the life of cities, has become too narrowly focused on the public life alone. In this myopic view, urban design focuses on streets, parks, and walkways. The complexity of architecture is reduced to footprints on a plan or masses in a model, losing the potential of integrating the finer grain contribution of collective spaces, individual spaces, and indoor spaces in a city. To address this contemporary trend toward splintering urbanism, the seminar will explore strategies that bring coherence and continuity back to the city, without losing the potential for choice and diversity. In particular, this course will focus on mid-rise, higher-density urbanism and the potential and difficulties of this scale of fabric to contribute to the form of cities. The course will be organized in case studies and design exercises to explore criteria for evaluating and designing the contextual, quantitative, cultural, and systemic qualities of dwelling. The case studies will revolve around four cities: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Beijing, and New York. (Other cities will be entertained.) In the first part of the semester, we will explore the form of settlement, the roles of different agents on the form of the city and the regulations and representations of these agencies. We will then look at the built fields of particular neighborhoods, historical and cultural patterns of occupation, and the ability of the housing stock to support change. Design exercises will parallel the cases studies as a way to test and challenge the capacity, variation and density potentials in mid-rise urbanism. Graduate students from all departments are welcome to join. ARCH 219X Fifteen hours lecture/seminar per unit per semester. Prerequisites: 210 or consent of instructor. Extended Course Description Architecture and Identity: Latin America Spain and Portugal retained control of their colonies in Latin America for a longer period than some other European colonial powers in various parts of Africa or Asia. What remained after the departure were hybrid civilizations that anticipated many of the synthetic trends in contemporary Western society, and a vibrant architectural and urban heritage that resulted from the mixing of indigenous and European cultures. Using Latin American city planning and architecture as a frame of reference, this seminar will explore topics of interest in current architectural discourse including modernism and its regional variants, architecture as an expression of cultural identity, relationships between housing and urbanism, formal expression and the architectural hybrid, and the impact of new technologies on representational form in late twentieth and early twenty-first century architecture. At the beginning of the twentieth century, many Latin American capitals sought to create progressive identities through Haussmanian transformations that drastically changed their structures. After Le Corbusier's first visits to Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil in 1929, the introduction of International Modernism was employed to achieve similar ends. Oscar Niemeyer's pavilion for the 1939 World's Fair demonstrated that Latin America was capable of producing Modern Movement architecture with its own distinct flavor. The construction of new university campuses - ciudades universitarias - in Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela and Mexico, along with industrial and residential complexes, expanded the influence of modernism as Latin American leaders across the political spectrum embraced its symbolic associations with progress, order, and the concept of a strong nation state. While similar to other regional adaptations of modernism, the Latin American version was notable for the strength of its ambition to express a sense of independence by eliminating all formal and stylistic references to colonial architecture in favor of rational forms symbolic of a new progressive era that would eradicate the social inequities of the past. Link to UC Berkeley Center for Latin American Studies ARCH 229A Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Prerequisites: Designated section of 129. Selected topics such as issues of project development and professional practice, construction law, materials and specifications, construction management, marketing and management, professional writing, issues in community development and public policy. ARCH 230 Forty-five hours of lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: 130A or consent of instructor. Design and planning methods, their theoretical foundations and practical applications. ARCH 235 Course may be repeated for credit. Three hours of seminar per week. Must be taken on a satisfactory/unsatisfactory basis. Required for doctoral students in this study area. (F,SP) ARCH 239A/ARCH 139X Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. (SP) Extended Course Description Metropolis of the Mind: Designing Virtual Worlds Virtual worlds were once the province of science fiction authors, like Gibson (Neuromancer, 1984), Stephenson (Snow Crash, 1992), and Wachowski (The Matrix, 1999). The advent of on-line, multiplayer games like World of Warcraft, and ‘alternative’ worlds like SecondLife, made them reality. Virtual worlds are digital, three-dimensional, immersive, interactive environments that mimic existing, bygone, or fantasy worlds. They are populated by avatars representing individuals participating online in social, economic, educational, and other activities. Virtual worlds are based on principles borrowed from architectural theory, game technology, and filmmaking, blended and adapted to support specific objectives. They can be used to design and test new places (buildings, cities, etc.), to re-create culturally significant but destroyed places, and to create new types of combined physical/informational places that can only exist in Cyberspace. Starting with architectural place-making, game design theories, and filmmaking principles, the course will introduce the principles of designing virtual worlds, through readings, discussions, and exercises. Working in groups, students will design of an actual SimVenture (simulation/adventure) of their own choice (e.g., a virtual museum, a virtual learning environment, a virtual cultural heritage, etc.). The course project will be implemented in Virtools (a commercial web-based game engine), which will be taught in class. (PhD students can substitute the course project with a research paper on a related topic.) The course is open to graduate and undergraduate students, from all departments. Prior knowledge of gaming, programming, or architectural design are desired, but not required. ARCH 239X/1 Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Prerequisites: 130A or consent of instructor. (F,SP) Extended Course Description Architectures of Globalization: Over the last four decades the world's cultures, political economies, and built environments have been drawn into new relationships by the wide-ranging changes associated with globalization. At the most general level, globalization describes the enlargement and reorganization of world markets, and the "compression" of space produced by advances in information technology and the acceleration of travel times. Cities have acted as important contexts for these processes, through their strategic roles in an increasingly interdependent world economy. As a consequence, much of the critical writing on globalization shares an implicit or explicit frame of analysis: the globalizing city and its built environments. This course will provide a comprehensive introduction to this research, as it has emerged in disciplines extending from architecture, anthropology, urban sociology, and geography to comparative literature and cultural studies. We will seek to understand the diverse and contradictory positions that characterize this rapidly expanding field, and explore its relevance to architectural education, research and professional practice. In this respect, "architectures of globalization" refers not only to the contested spaces and social processes of the global city, but the theoretical perspectives, modes of representation and political positions that enable us to understand them as such. The course themes consider the world as a set of interdependent social and spatial conditions, and in doing so, question the status of urban and architectural spaces (as well as cities and nations) as discrete, bounded entities. As the course proceeds, we will explore the theoretical assumptions that inform the understanding of diverse "city worlds", and explore the contradictions and interrelationships between them. The course examines the global, but highly differentiated influence of neoliberalism on cities and citizenship as the connecting issue that links diverse cases together. ARCH 239X/2 Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Prerequisites: 130A or consent of instructor. (F,SP) Extended Course Description Utopias and Heterotopias Open to students in the Department of City Planning The purpose of this seminar is to examine two modes of thinking about space, its creation and its influence on civil society. The first mode ¬utopian thought¬ has been around for long time and, at least since the industrial revolution, has been a key influence on urban design and planning. The Socialist Utopians of the 19th century have offered mental images and examples of different and better societies largely relying on different spatial organizations and configurations. The first part of this course will focus on these attempts and on the influence that they still have on present days urban planning and design. Beginning with a discussion on the concept of utopia aimed at identifying its main characteristics, the class will then look to some historical 'concrete utopias', and will end up by examining the influence of utopian thought in several contemporary urban design and planning projects. The second mode of thinking is suggested by the recent emergence of the concept of heterotopia. While utopias deal largely with physical space, this concept points at the existence of "other spaces" that coexist and overlap with the physical environment and create a multiple layering of spatial meanings, conflicts, and uses. Taking heterotopia as its starting point, in the second part of the seminar we'll discuss the characteristics of this social space and look for examples of it. ARCH 240 Forty-five hours of lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: 140 or consent of instructor. This course covers thermal and solar design. Extended Course Description Energy Analysis Tools for Sustainable Building Design Minimizing energy use is a cornerstone of designing and operating sustainable buildings and attention to energy issues can also lead to greatly improved indoor environmental quality. For designers, using computer-based energy analysis tools are important not only to qualify for sustainability ratings such as LEED, or energy codes such as California's Title 24, but also to develop intuition about what makes good buildings. This course will present quantitative and qualitative methods for assessing energy performance during design of both residential and commercial buildings. Students will get hands-on experience with various state-of-the-art software - ranging from simple to complex - to assess the performance of building components and whole-building designs. Students from other departments are encouraged to enroll. ARCH 243 Forty-five hours lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: 140, 242 or consent of instructor. Course focuses on a wide range of passive cooling strategies, including solar control, natural ventilation, radiation, evaporation and earth-contact cooling and their treatment in architectural design. (SP) Extended Course Description Natural Cooling: Sustainable Design for a Warming Planet Building energy use represents 38% of U.S. carbon emissions, and cooling and ventilation account for 33% of U.S. commercial building electricity consumption. Reducing a building's cooling energy is therefore a critical aspect of sustainable design, and this will become increasingly more important in the face of global warming. Climate-responsive buildings minimize the use of energy and its associated ecological impacts, and allow people to have a greater degree of interaction with their environment. This person-centered design approach can create comfort and delight within the indoor environment, and be healthier, more connected to place, and more sustainable than sealed structures that rely almost completely on mechanical systems. How can you determine the carbon footprint of your building design and operation? How does comfort and climate contribute to an experiential aesthetic, while simultaneously reducing energy use? How can one design for low-energy cooling, and particularly natural ventilation in commercial buildings? What are the design opportunities for mixed modebuildings that combine mechanical and natural cooling a growing trend in Europe which is receiving increasing attention here in the U.S. What LEED guidelines are most relevant for low-energy cooling and design for hot climates? Throughout the course we will use case studies and design exercises as tools for exploring these questions. Students will also use the Building Science Wind Tunnel to explore design solutions for natural ventilation, using real-world projects. ARCH 259X Course may be repeated for credit as topic varies. Fifteen hours of lecture per unit per semester. Prerequisites: Consent of instructor. Special topics such as experimental structures and architectural preservation. (F,SP) ARCH 271 Sixty hours of lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: Doctoral candidate or consent of instructor. (SP) ARCH 279X Sixty hours of lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: Doctoral candidate or consent of instructor. (SP) Extended Course Description Sex and the Single Building "Sex and the Single Building" is a 20th-century
architectural-history seminar on gender and space. The main intention
is to explore a series of everyday places in which diverse body/space
relationships are played out. Our starting point will be the
documentation of highly-charged sites of sexuality: bath houses, spas,
gyms, clubs, bars, brothels, hotels/motels, amusement parks, pools, and
beaches, as well as spaces of specialized body care, such as birthing
centers, hospitals, health clinics, wellness centers, beauty salons,
cemeteries, and crematoria. Students will learn how to analyze space
through primary-source documentation and hands-on fieldwork, while
reviewing a range of readings on sexuality and space. How does
architecture shape sexual identities and stereotypes? Where do feminist
and queer theories intersect? What does the study of architectural
typologies—the “single building”—tell us about gender? ARCH 279X Sixty hours of lecture/seminar per semester. Prerequisites: Doctoral candidate or consent of instructor. (SP) Extended Course Description Rethinking Suburban History Recent historical research about American suburbs demonstrates that
they are much more varied and complicated than previously imagined.
Descriptions of “the suburbs,” as a generic environment are no longer
convincing. We are now aware of African-American, working class,
industrial and agricultural suburbs. Continuing exurban development is
currently producing phenomena as different as gated communities,
ethnoburbs, lifestyle centers, and restructured rural towns. With more
than half of the U.S. population now residing outside of central
cities, even the name “suburb,” implying dependence on a central city,
must be questioned. This seminar will examine, using both scholarly and
popular explanations, the economic, social, and cultural debates that
have shaped our interpretation of this form of urban development.
Topics will include the following: defining the suburb (metropolitan
region vs. “shrinking city;” the historiography of the suburb; cultural
representations of suburbia (films, novels, comics, popular music and
video); comparative exurban development (zwischenstadt, citta diffusa,
etc.); race and the suburbs; gender and the suburbs; suburban building
and planning typologies; designed vs. vernacular suburbs; exporting
suburbs. Students will be expected to conduct original research on a
suburban topic of their choice. ARCH 300 Extended Course Description This class is intended to support and enrich the experience of being a Graduate Student Instructor in the Department of Architecture. Seminars will cover the philosophies of teaching, valued techniques, pitfalls and concerns, how to be more effective and find greater satisfaction in classes. This class, or similar classes offered university-wide, is required as a prerequisite for all teaching assistants; the differences between the university-wide classes and the one offered within the department revolve mostly around the specifics of our diverse classroom settings and in links to the profession that will be discussed, such as accreditation and continuing as an educator after graduation. At its best, teaching is enormously rewarding; when things go wrong, it can be very stressful and frustrating. These discussions should help you become better at making the teaching experience a positive one. |
