At the Science Engineering and Technology Group of the KU Leuven, the Department of Architecture, Research Unit Architecture & Society we are looking for an enthusiastic, creative and communicative Post-Doc researcher (100 %) for the 2-year project '(Re)Setting the Agenda of History and Theory for (Interior)Architecture and Urbanism'.
The researchproject is embedded in the Research Unit Architecture and Society (Campus Brussels/Ghent) (head: Prof. dr. Rajesh Heynickx).
The Department of Architecture is responsible for the research on Architecture, Interior Architecture, Urbanism and Spatial Planning at the Faculty of Engineering Sciences (campus Leuven) and the Faculty of Architecture (campuses Brussels and Ghent). The department is an international expertise center in these domains and houses some sixty international PhD-students (www.architecture.kuleuven.be).
The Faculty of Architecture groups the academic master programmes in Architecture (Interior Architecture, Architecture, Urbanism and Spatial Planning) of the campuses Sint-Lucas Brussels/Ghent. The faculty is responsible for the teaching activities (www.arch.kuleuven.be).
As a postdoctoral researcher, you will carry out the project '(Re)setting the Agenda of History and Theory for (Interior)Architecture and Urbanism'. This project should result in a series of international seminars and a conference. These initiatives have to form the basis for a special issue of an IT-journal and give an impetus to future project proposals. These tasks and planned activities will result under the research unit Architecture & Society which is a part of the special unit of Architecture, Campusses Sint-Lucas Brussels/Ghent of the Department of Architecture. This research unit approaches (interior)architecture and urban design as a cultural phenomenon: a form of material culture which is embedded in changing political, social, religious and economic contexts. Interiors, buildings and cities are studied as entries to the ideas and practices people used, and still use, to shape reality in different ways.
'(Re)Setting the Agenda of History and Theory for (Interior)Architecture and Urbanism': During the two last decades, most departments of architecture in Europe invested considerably in the section 'History and Theory'. Besides the development of working instruments (readers, reprints), platforms (doctoral programs and conferences) or different types of publication (exhibitions, book series and journals), a lively dialogue with innovative tendencies like 'Research by Design' emerged. Parallel with this continual methodological and thematic expansion, 'History and Theory' became more and more a single and unified whole. Yet, during this process of consolidation the question how different types of architectural knowledge should interact blurred. And although the transnational and global connections between architectural forms and meaning became more paramount, time to reflect on the methodologies and techniques needed mostly lacked.
This project wants to fill in these lacunae by assembling expertise on a European level. This will be done by developing a series of topics (architecture and intellectual history, theory of the interior, urban materiality, ...) within the Research Unit 'Architecture and Society'. This unit clusters research groups which a double agenda: 1) contextualising and dissecting the economic, ecological, sociological and philosophical transformations of the built environment in the past. 2) developing critical methodologies and techniques to render current debates on the built environment more transparent, often in direct relation with the past.
You support the head of the Research Unit Architecture & Society.
You provide support in education of the doctoral programme of the Faculty of Architecture.
You have:
We are offering a full time employment (100%) as a dr. assistant for 2 years in a creative work environment within a young and dynamic research team, and with challenging assignments.
For more information please contact Prof. dr. Rajesh Heynickx, Head of the Research Unit Architecture and Society, tel.: +32 2 242 00 00, mail: rajesh.heynickx@kuleuven.be or Prof. dr. ir. Yves Schoonjans, Vice Chair Department of Architecture, tel.: +32 9 225 10 00, mail: yves.schoonjans@kuleuven.be.
You can apply for this job no later than December 31, 2015 via the online application tool of the KU Leuven