Master of Advanced Studies in Architecture
O V E R V I E W
The School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture’s Master of Advanced Studies in Architecture Program [MASA] supports students in advanced independent research-based studies characterized by close collaborative links with a faculty member working within one of a select set of research themes/threads. The successful applicant will work within one of these research themes. The areas of research interest supported in the MASA program are directly related to the diverse range of investigations currently pursued by faculty members.
For a variety of reasons, not all faculty members supervise MASA students each year. For the 2012/2013 school year, the potential supervisors will be John Bass, Ray Cole, Joe Dahmen, Mari Fujita, AnnaLisa Meyboom, Sherry McKay, Oliver Neumann, Inge Roecker, Blair Satterfield, and Matthew Soules.
The research themes and their associated faculty are:
· Environmental Imperatives
- Environmental and sustainable issues in building design (Cole)
- Sustainable urban habitation (Roecker)
- Resource use and the infrastructure that supports it (Dahmen]
· Cultural Studies, including:
- Contemporary and modern architectural history, encompassing post colonial history and theory (McKay)
- Contested landscapes and the production of space (Bass)
- The Pacific Rim and globalization (Fujita)
- Localized cultures of construction and housing (Macdonald)
- intersection of ecology and design, the Metropolitan Project, and questions of architecture's relationship with popular culture and politics. (Soules)
· Advanced Design Research explores the agency of professional activity and academic
investigation (Bass, Dahmen, Fujita, Macdonald, Roecker, Neumann, Satterfield, Soules)
· Advanced Research in Digital Applications and Emerging Technologies including:
- Fabrication technologies including digital technology and the building process (Neumann)
- Impact of digital production and fabrication techniques on housing and the urban landscape (Satterfield)
- research and teaching focuses around the integration of engineering and architecture(Meyboom)
A detailed description of the research areas of faculty members are described in their sites on this website.
The degree provides an opportunity for those who wish to redefine their professional or academic aims to immerse themselves in a focused research environment. Working closely with a mentor, students are encouraged to utilize the resources of the wider University community while engaging in individual research. This intense research program is situated within the dynamic interdisciplinary context of the Architecture and Landscape Architecture programs and is able to draw upon related disciplines such as Community and Regional Planning, Civil Engineering, Geography, and Art History, Visual Art and Theory. The program is also enriched by an intimate milieu that encourages the exchange of ideas and research among students of an internationally diverse background.
The MASA program is intended for qualified applicants with a graduate or undergraduate degree in architecture or a related discipline that exhibit a capacity for independent research. As such, the main criterion for admission to the program is a well-defined proposal for independent research that is supportable by faculty expertise. Students of the MASA program will develop their thesis via direct critical engagement with a primary faculty mentor who will in due course serve as their Thesis Committee Chair.
Applicants interested in the MASA program are encouraged to contact individual faculty members to discuss their goals and proposed research topic area in advance of the application deadline. An interview is not required but is strongly recommended.
The Thesis Committee Chair will establish a supervisory committee in consultation with the student.
RESEARCH THEMES AND PEOPLE:
Ray Cole, Joe Dahmen and Inge Roecker are researchers in the area of Environmental Imperatives. Architecture offers a significant site for investigations of environmentally responsible design and building practice. Although an environmentally responsible ethic framing all aspects of architectural endeavour is a defining characteristic of the Program and the School, it is the specific research focus of Cole, Dahmen and Roecker. This urgent mandate frames research in building technology, informs a variety of explorations at the scales of conventional architectural production, and extends to considerations of urban design and regional, national and global policy concerns. Research efforts within the Program have focused on the dissemination of information to the widest possible professional and public constituencies, particularly areas of energy use and sustainable building practice.
John Bass, Mari Fujita, Christopher Macdonald, Sherry McKay, Inge Roecker and Matthew Soules are faculty researching in the area of Cultural Studies. Whether historically or practice based, research dedicated to understanding the architectural consequences of social, political and cultural transactions affords significant insight into the present. Colonial and post-colonial interests, concerns with globalization, cultural resistance and hybridity, or the traditions of public institutions provide a compelling focus for research that is relevant to both global and local architectural production. Underlying research with a cultural studies emphasis is a general preoccupation with social practice as it intersects with architecture. It offers the opportunity for engaged community activism, in particular the exploration of the implications of an expanded constituency of public interests in the contemporary urban milieu.
While most faculty members are committed to Advanced Design Research, Oliver Neumann, Inge Roecker and Matthew Soules are particularly interested in MASA research in this area. Through the agencies of active professional activity as well as more deliberative active academic action, the Program is committed to making a substantial contribution to the discourse of a contemporary environmental agenda, deliberate concern for conditions of locale and situation, and the active exploration of the manners of construction.
Advanced Research in Digital Applications and Emerging Technologies has various manifestations in the faculty research of AnnaLIsa Meyboom, Oliver Neumann and Blair Satterfield. While the impact of new media is felt in all arenas of research activity, new and emerging digital media and production techniques are particularly compelling research endeavours. Neumann's research explores direct prototyping that challenges the conventional orthodoxy of manufacturing processes and explores possible implications for the processes of building construction more generally. Satterfield focuses on the impact of digital production and fabrication techniques on housing and the urban landscape. Meyboom research and teaching focuses around the integration of engineering and architecture.
CURRICULUM
To obtain the MASA degree, a student must successfully complete thirty credits of study including a twelve-credit Thesis and a three-credit core course, ARCH 568: Research Methods in Architecture. The fifteen credits of elective coursework are structured on an individual basis and elaborated through discussion between students and their faculty mentors. In addition to agreed interdisciplinary coursework in academic units throughout the University, MASA students engage with other students from the program and upper-level MArch students through seminars and coursework.
Elective Coursework
Students are to prepare individual curriculum in consultation with their faculty mentor. The interdisciplinary nature of architectural research encourages coursework from outside the School. It is not unusual to undertake directed studies in which specialist research, often in anticipation of the thesis work, are closely supervised by School faculty. In addition, advanced level seminars delivered with the MArch program constitute an important source of coursework.
Degree Requirement: 30 credits:
If the applicant declares their interest in pursuing a design or academic research project their program can be tailored more specifically to their needs, with a most efficient and effective preparation for their research project. In addition, expectations for the research could be clearly delineated. In that both assign 12 credits to the thesis project parity between design and academic research projects needs to be determined.
Design Thesis Stream:
Term 1: Studio (related to the research and with the supervisor) (6 credits)
Directed study dedicated to the research proposal (3 credits)
Presentation of research proposal
Written Thesis Stream:
Term 1: Methodology (3 credits)
Course (3 credits)
Course (3 credits)
Presentation of research proposal
Design Thesis and Written Streams:
Term 2: Course (3 credits)
Course (3 credits)
Term 3: Thesis
Review of Thesis
Term 4: Thesis (12 credits)
Graduation (16 months)
Other Requirements
Progress reports at the end of every term.
In addition to the internal protocols of thesis topic presentation and defense, students are encouraged to present their work in peer reviewed conferences and publications. The program can be completed in sixteen months, including two terms of required full-time residency.
Additional enquiries and requests for applications should be addressed to:
Chair, MASA Graduate Program
School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture
University of British Columbia
Room 402- 6333 Memorial Road
Vancouver, BC Canada V6T 1Z2
t. 604.822.2779
f. 604.822.3808
e. architecture@sala.ubc.ca