Onkar G on July 8, 2021 No Comments
The Master’s in Architecture for Architectural History and Theory (M.Arch AHT) at Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT University), Ahmedabad, will open admissions shortly. The course has been pioneering in the pedagogy for research and writing work amongst the architecture community.
AHT especially focuses on helping students develop methods of architectural inquiry and present them in authored formats. The course has hence emerged as an exclusive program in India that trains potential built environment scholars. The 2020-2021 batch’s course has been running virtually owing to COVID-19 measures. However, the AHT faculty accompanied by the alumni are spearheading the outreach to keep the unique course active among others, post the pandemic.
Selected alumni of the AHT course also become ambassadors of the program who establish relations and place the course’s values in light. Besides, the course also shapes them to represent emerging communities in architectural literature. Dr Gauri Bharat, the Program Chair for Architectural History and Theory, and Associate Professor at FA-CEPT University speaks to us about the essence of the AHT course and why it is important. Dr Gauri Bharat is also an author who recently launched her book “In Forest, Field and Factory: Adivasi Habitations Through Twentieth-Century India“.
Varun Kumar: When and how was the AHT course founded?
Gauri Bharat: We felt the need for a dedicated educational program for training architects to critically analyse, evaluate, and write about architecture. While design is a very important part of the discipline, almost equally important is the production of discourse – how do we talk about architecture? In what ways is it relevant to our individual and collective lives? What are the dominant and divergent ideas and approaches that characterize architectural practice? How have things changed over time? Where are we headed? These are all questions that can only be addressed when we take a broad view of the patterns that underlie practice and the built environment more broadly. CEPT has had a long history of research and documentation, and in 2014, we were ready to mobilise this into an educational program training the next generation of historians, educators and scholars of the built environment. We started as a M.Arch specialisation in 2014. Encouraged by students’ responses and our graduates’ innovative professional work, we developed it into a full-fledged postgraduate program in 2018.
Varun Kumar: What are the goals and vision with which the AHT course was founded?
Gauri Bharat: Our goal is to train the next generation of historians, researchers and scholars of the built environment. There is a lot of state-of-the-art research about South Asia that is being conducted in universities and research centres around the world. Within India, however, this kind of research is few and far between. It is also an extremely uneven intellectual landscape – with some institutions drawing from the latest research and delivering high quality of education while many others struggle with basics. Under these circumstances, we felt it is crucial to create educational opportunities that match global standards but are accessible to local students.
Varun Kumar: What skills does the AHT course help the students be equipped with?
Gauri Bharat: If I were to put it simply, we equip students with the abilities to investigate, interpret and communicate ideas about the built environment. To give a few examples in terms of what this means, they can research a given architectural work or place, assess the historic significance of sites or buildings, write about design projects, develop research proposals, carry out professional documentation, work with archival material, develop teaching material, curate exhibitions, or start a PhD! There is also a considerable range in terms of thematic content. Students are trained to investigate the histories of places, design practices, materials, while also engaging with contemporary debates in global and Indian architectural history. We cover this wide range in a way that balances exposure while also creating opportunities for students to dive deep into the topics that interest them and which they may wish to pursue further.
Varun Kumar: What are the professional opportunities that students will be suited for upon completion of the AHT course.
Gauri Bharat: The professional space is shaping up as we speak! Several areas of works ranging from publishing to heritage concerns and the art and cultural sector have recently emerged and are expanding. Some of our graduates are working with such organisations. The other key area that is emerging is architectural practices interested in archiving, documenting and publishing their work and processes. Some practices independently hire AHT graduates with independent commissions while others have full-fledged research and communication departments. Some of our graduates also look forward to becoming professional writers and are engaged by digital platforms and the design publishing industry, for instance. And of course, academia attracts a lot of our students. Many of our applicants originally come intending to become architectural educators. Some continue on that journey while others diversify into the opportunities I mentioned earlier. I must add here that we have a robust network of alumni and students and, to give you a small example, we have exchanged more than one hundred opportunities such as job openings and calls for research funding in the past eighteen months.
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