The Seminar "Urban Studies Revisited. Perspectives from planning, design and the arts" is offered by an interdiciplinary team to doctoral students and advanced master students in urban studies (¿Stadtforschung¿) and related discplines, with the overall aim of providing an opportunity for the participants to discuss their thesis projects as additional support in the development of their research theories and methods. The course is organized through informal group discussions of the students¿ research projects. In particular, the seminar aims to help the students critically review, clarify, and receive constructive feedback on their own research projects, their aims, objectives, concepts and methods; learn about a range of theories and methods in urban research; develop the capacity for and engage in critical assessment of similar research projects; develop a friendly and supportive group of researchers who can benefit from knowing about each other¿s work during the seminars and even afterwards.
Contemporary urban theory has developed apace over the last decade to consider the complex urban processes and issues that have risen as a result of globalisation, diversification of the economy, socio-demographic shifts, neo liberal political agendas, migration and growing concerns around the environment amongst many other salient issues. Urban studies now concerns itself also with new theoretical agendas which focus on questions of theorizing everday life and discussing emerging epistemologies of collective acts of appropriation of (public) urban space.
Further, there is a growing interest in cities of the Global South, which has led to new ways of analysing the cities of the Global North which have been more significant in urban analysis to date. The seminar will have a particular emphasis on urban culture and public space, but contributions on other subjects are eligible. Master and doctoral students at any stage of their work from architecture, spatial planning, and more widely from social sciences, humanities and the arts, who are researching into urban issues are welcome to attend.
The seminars will be interactive, delivered through several concentrated blocks in the winter semester. After a general introduction and depending on the number of attending students, each participant will be allocated a 30-minutes slot, in which his/her work is discussed in the group by the seminar tutors and other students. The students will prepare a text of 4-6 pages about their research and upload it on the course website at least one week in advance, so that the tutors and fellow students can read it in preparation for the session. In their allocated slot, the students first present their work (approx. 10 minutes), describing the subject of their research, their aims and objectives, their theoretical framework, their research methodology, and the results of their work so far. Students will be expected also to relate their research to contemporary urban theory through selected readings from the designated course text. The tutors and fellow students will then engage in a discussion about these points with the students, helping to clarify and develop the concepts and methods of the research project. The nature of the seminars is developmental, designed to help the students with constructive feedback. Furthermore, the students will benefit from the range of issues that are covered and discussed. The development of a friendly group atmosphere is an essential part of the course, and so it is important that all participants attend all the sessions and engage in supportive discussion of one another¿s work.This thesis seminar will be developed by a teaching cooperation between Vienna University of Technology and the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna.
Depending on the number of interested master and PhD students interest in thesis writing, applicants might be asked to hand in an abstract of their research project in order to select up to max. 22 seminar participants from both universities (in total)
The seminar will be held in blocked format on the following dates
7th October (2 units: 11am to 3pm) (TU Group)
Unit 1 ¿ Introduction to Thesis Seminar (Sabine Knierbein/Emanuela Semlitsch)
Unit 2 ¿ Writing a master or PhD Thesis (Sabine Knierbein)
11th November (3 units: 9am to 3pm both days) (TU and Academy Group)
Unit 3 ¿ Teaching Inputs (Elke Krasny/Sabine Knierbein/Emanuela Semlitsch)
Unit 4 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny/Sabine Knierbein/Emanuela Semlitsch)
Unit 5 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny)
12th November (3 units: 9am to 3pm both days) (TU and Academy Group)
Unit 6 ¿ Teaching Input (Elke Krasny)
Unit 7 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny)
Unit 8 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny)
2nd December (3 units: 9am to 3pm) (TU and Academy Group)
Unit 9 ¿ Teaching Inputs (Elke Krasny)
Unit 10 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny)
Unit 11 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Elke Krasny/Emanuela Semlitsch)
3rd December (2 units: 9am to 12:30am) (TU Group)
Unit 12 ¿ Students short presentations (e.g. 3x10min, joint discussion afterwards)* (Sabine Knierbein
Unit 13 ¿ Thesis Seminar Closing (Sabine Knierbein/Emanuela Semlitsch)
