A small discourse on Architectural Education

1. ….. Starting from Zero
“I'm not a teacher: only a fellow traveler of
whom you asked the way. I pointed ahead -
ahead of myself as well as you.”
George Bernard Shaw―
BINUMOL TOM

2. • Economy of India - seventh-largest in the world
by nominal GDP
- third-largest
by purchasing power parity (PPP).
• Architecture and its Construction are the most
conspicuous forms of economic activity
• In India, construction is the second largest economic
activity after agriculture.
• Investment in construction accounts for nearly 11 per
cent of India’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
• The Planning Commission of India has proposed an
investment of around US$ 1 trillion in the Twelfth five-
year plan (2012-2017), which is double of that in the
Eleventh five-year plan.
The Economics of Architecture

3. ADVANTAGE I N D I A….
INDIA GROWING YOUNGER,
CHINA and OTHERS are
AGEING….
Demographic dividend – high
– great potential for
economic gains.
Education – crucial in
transforming the collective energy
of our youngsters into mature ideas,
well developed skills, and a sense
of confidence, hope and capability.
Architecture and its Education
– very imperative
Source- ECONOMIC LIFECYCLE AND DEMOGRAPHIC DIVIDENDS:
EVIDENCE AND IMPLICATIONS FOR INDIALaishram Ladusingh, Ph.D.
M.R.Narayana, Ph.D.

4. ARCHITECTS
PRACTISE
Main Stake holders:
ARCHITECTS, ENGINEERS
CLIENTS
CONTRACTORS
SERVICE PROVIDERS
LABOURERS
EDUCATION
Main Stake holders:
TEACHERS
STUDENTS
(MANAGEMENT)
TO BE ARCHITECTS

5. How are buildings constructed? – Indian Scenario
THE IRONY

6. So is the education scenario!!
HISTORY – Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Byzantine, Gothic, Renaissance,
Industrial revolution, Modern “isms”, Post modern…. So on and so forth
Guild system – visit to places, documentation, hands own experience, practical
oriented
Theory focussed educational system – is it the axe that cuts down the life of
architectural education?????
PAPER DEGREES/ REGISTRATIONS
So is the Research
Scenario !!
Research – Is altogether a
different story – AICTE, DST,
DoE, KSCSTE (Kerala)………
- all engineering focussed.

7. So is the education scenario!!
B.Tech – after acquiring the paper degree, these days,
firms provide a ONE year training to every graduate …
reason to undo what was taught and to redo what has to
be learned!
Architecture – 1st stage of B.Arch gets over the student is
send for training (6 months to 1 year) – GOOD Practise.

8. How to teach/ learn Architecture?
PEDAGOGY, ANDRAGOGY and HEUTAGOGY

9. Story of a verdant garden
EDUCATION PRACTISE

10. How to teach/ learn Architecture?
World view Vs Regional view
We teach them to draw inspirations from styles
evolved from the past that have addressed climate,
local materials, craftsmanship and culture….
What do they learn from the practitioner’s creation in
reality?

11. How to teach/ learn Architecture?
Regional Context…
What lessons do we learn from the history of the site
and of the people who will occupy our structures?
How are we contributing to regional culture?
Or detracting from???
Aping the west!
Quite happy working in Air conditioned little boxes.
Aren’t we bombarded with false architecture…
rather cut and paste from the west

12. Well filled mind Vs Well formed mind
• Students of today – well informed
• Architectural Education – not just theoretical nor
practical
• But….. A process of exploration which end up in a
product
• Good Buildings come from Good people, and all
problems are solved by good design…
"It doesn't matter what we cover,
it matters what they discover.
Prof. Noam Chomsky
Whatever good things we build end up building US….
Jim Rohn

13. GUIDING PRINCIPLES IN TEACHING STRATEGIES
LEARNING IS AN ACTIVE PROCESS -This means that we have to actively engage
the learners in learning activities if we want them to learn what we intend to
teach.
Hands own experience …
We have to give varied activities to our students for “hands – on – minds –
on” learning.
Danielson, 2002; 75% and 90% retention rates are learning by doing.
What I hear, I forget.
What I see, I remember.
What I do, I understand.
2. The more senses that are involved in learning, the more and the better the
learning
“Humans are intensely visual animals. The eyes contain nearly 70 percent of the
body’s receptors and send millions of signals along the optic nerves to the visual
processing centers of the brain…we take in more information visually than
through any of the other senses” (Wolfe,2001).

14. Cutting stones?????
Building Taj Mahal
T
H
E
A
T
T
I
T
U
D
E

15. COMMANDMENTS
OF
ARCHITECTURE
THAT
I
TRY TO COMMUNICATE
TO
MY STUDENTS

16. Society and Architecture
Not just another drop of water in the ocean but is the ocean itself….
No architect can stay as an outsider
Architect should understand the stress experienced in the societies…
Employing foreign architects? Case of Chandigarh….
Administration – understands the implication of the doings of Architects on people,
society, civilization??
More funding for research and development!
Society needs a good image of itself. That is the job of an Architect.
(Walter Gropius)

17. Spirituality and Architecture
• Indian life is so filled with spirituality… reflected even in our
gestures, why not feel it in the spaces we create?
• We as humans inhabit Earth and we build structures because that’s
our shelter, that’s our places of work and to support our lives.
• In a way that there’s this triangle of human, structure, and Earth.
“Only work which is the product of inner compulsion can have
spiritual meaning” (Walter Gropius)

18. Dance and Architecture
• Like how a dancer creates a
particular spatial configuration
heavily dynamic, an architect with
the help of animate and inanimate
elements of nature creates dynamic
spaces….
• Does Architecture still be quoted as
FROZEN MUSIC ?? Or something
more???
• Architecture is a conscious sculpting
of dynamic habitable spaces similar
to that of the spaces crafted by a
trained dancer…
• Responding to the wealth that
exists in our movement

19. History and Architecture
• If you like history… embrace it
• If you don’t like history… please don’t rebuke it
To provide meaningful architecture, is not to parody history
but to articulate it (Daniel Libeskind)

20. Equality and Architecture
• Access to opportunities to develop ourselves to do things in life that bring joy
for everyone….
• Can’t right Architecture and Planning contribute to be the cause of equality
amongst all people?
• Ancient India – Vastushastric Planning – Chaturvarnyam – was it an attempt
to bring a balance in society?
• Fairness and Justice? Still miles away
• Laurie Baker on slums… (A SLUM is a shame and a disgrace, not to those who
live in it, but first to those in authority, then to planners and builders and
then to all of us who pass by on the other side of the road and pretend that
no slum exists)
• Do such values impinge on how we design human settlements?
• Can our design skills act as channels and paths of access and opportunity for
others?

21. Engineering/ Technology and Architecture
• Buildings must be true to the technology and
materials and craftsmen from which they
emerge.
• Truthfulness in Architecture
Architecture begins where engineering ends.
(Walter Gropius)

22. Corruption and Architecture – A bad story… oops reality
• Architecture is a public
art - A DYNAMIC &
INSEPERABLE FUSION OF
ART &TECHNOLOGY
• WHO in our society
complains about the
corrupted architecture.
why?
• Is it due to lack of
design literacy: may be
they think that it has
little effect on his day
to day life, financially
out of reach,
intellectually irrelevant
• Relevance of
Architectural Criticism

23. Invention and Architecture
The process followed in Architecture is one’s own path of discovery
and invention…
Hence the essence of education is not transfer of knowledge…. It
puts responsibility for study in the student’s own hands and minds.
Architecture is invention …
Oscar Niemeyer

24. Nature and Architecture
“What, O earth, I dig out of thee, quickly shall that grow again: may
I not, O pure one, pierce thy vital spot, not thy heart!”
(Atharva veda, 12.35)
Architecture should not be reduced to just styles that passes away
with times…. But should be heightened as SOCIAL COMMITMENT..
My own contradictions and confusions of the so called GREEN/ ECO
Architecture!!

25. NATURE BUILDS!
BIRDS & INSECTS ARE THE
PROFICIENT BUILDERS IN
NATURAL WORLD.
WHO TAUGHT THEM TO
BUILD?

26. HUMAN BUILDS
HUMAN BEINGS ALSO LEARNED ARCHITECTURE BY
INSTINCT.
IT EVOLVED AS A NATURAL PROCESS OF SATISFYING
PRIMARY NEED BY ONESELF WITH THE HELP OF
SOCIETY ONE LIVES
GREED…. Maslow’s hierarchy of need!!
Let us mould less “ego” architects, and more “eco”
architects (Jamie Lerner)

27. Winter always turns to spring….
But the quality and quantity of flowers and fruits of the spring will depend on
how hard the gardener works during the winter!!!

28. The Secret key to Success

29. THANKYOU