Introduction
Architecture 7210- Idea Seminar
This seminar is an introduction to work in the research labs in the School of Architecture and the College of Computing and Informatics at UNC Charlotte. We will visit labs the two weeksleading into the semester and on Fridays during the semester, talking about the work of the labs and viewing demos. Our goal is to gain an understanding of the similarities, differences and overlaps.Following each visit, we will meet as a class to collaborate on a post that explains the following features of each lab:
- What is the domain of each lab? That is to say, what sort of content do they deal with? Is it like the Energy Lab that deals with the flow of energy and light in commercial and institutional buildings, or more like the Human Computing Interaction Lab that deals with digital devices and users?
- What is the methodology of each lab? That is to say, what are the steps in the process for the lab (there are usually at least four or five distinct steps in any methodology)? How does one start to formulate a question, and what are the means to accomplish goals? Is it like the Digital Fabrication Lab that proceeds from models to fabrication equipment or like the Complex Systems Lab that proceeds from actors and rules leading to multiple simulations.
- What is the evaluation criteria for each lab? That is to say, how do they distinguish between good solutions and bad solutions, and decide what to do next? Is it quantitative like the Design Computing Lab or qualitative like the Interactive Architecture Lab?
- What are the definitions of terms for each lab? That is to say, what kind of world does each field of imagine? What are the elements and actions that are critical to its understanding? Is it agents and rules like the Complex Systems Lab, or high dimensional data and visual interaction like the Visualization Center?
- What is the audience of each lab? That is to say, who are the leading researcher labs and institutions? What are the leading conferences and journals? What are the sources of funding?
- Who are the foundations of this field of research? That is to say, what are the seminal works that set the working assumptions of the field? When were they published? How old is the field?
At the end of fall semester, each student will write a 5 page paper that compares and contrasts the conceptual basis and processes of these labs. The goal is to create a framework for understanding all the research within a continuum.
