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Transformative Practices: Seminars on Design Research - An Introduction Conducted by Dr Mark Raymond and Dr Dorotea Ottaviani This seminar series to be held in October will, through conversations and presentations, address the topic of design research. The seminars will be valuable preparation for anyone considering registering for advanced research at the GSA in the MArch (Design, Theory and Practice) and/or PhD programme. GSA staff are particularly encouraged to attend.

Exploring Education in Design and Planning in African Schools of Planning and Architecture: A Bottoms-Up Approach Convened by Dr Finzi Saidi, Acting Head of School at the GSA, this webinar brings together academics from African universities to share their teaching experiences in architecture and planning disciplines. The aim is to bring to the fore teaching and learning strategies that academics employ in ensuring meaningful and responsive learning for their students. We believe that by talking about lived experiences of academics we can ‘unearth’ innovative teaching strategies that provide important lessons for transforming the curriculum.

VOL 2, Noir Radical, will be launched on September 4th, hosted by Lesley Lokko and Caroline Wanjiku Kihato. FOLIO VOL 2 Features work from 38 contributors from Africa and the African Diaspora, including current and former graduate students from @happeningatthegsa and supported by a grant from @grahamfoundation. Published with assistance from @whatsonatssa.

Join us for a celebration of student award winners of the GSA-CWGC competition held in February this year. Open to all GSA past and present students and staff! Wednesday 19th August 2020 4pm The Commonwealth War Graves Commission South African Memorial Design competition was created to invite new and innovative ideas for the design of a new standalone memorial for South Africa. Through the competition, the CWGC seeks to source a diverse range of responses that commemorate, by name, the sacrifice of the fallen and reflects the culture of the South African people. Designs were invited, that were to be site-sensitive, affordable and respond to a contemporary South African context, sited in Cape Town. They were undertaken by student groups at the Graduate School of Architecture, UJ, to inform the eventual memorial to be created by a South African architect. Keep watch on our social media channels for an announcement of the winning 3 finalist student submissions!

On the 28th of July we kick off the extended architectural history and theory Talks Series Online for semester 2. Building on provocative and insightful talks in Q2, this term we have a brilliant line-up of inter-discplinary speakers who will talk about their research focused on Angola, Ghana, Mozambique, Uganda, South Africa and beyond. Topics range from questions of pedagogy to museography, leisure, archives and spatio-political reflections on the contemporary moment we find ourselves in. This lecture series is part of the Architectural History and Theory course for Honours students at the GSA. In light of Covid-19, this series is now online and open to all. Zoom meeting ID: 990 039 7159 Email htayob@uj.ac.za for the password.

Convened by Prof. António Tomás, the GSA is offering for the second year a Master of Architecture (Degree in Design, Theory and Practice) that intends to equip students with skills and knowledge to enable them to pursue professional careers within and beyond architectural practice, in government, NGO’s, research institutions and in academia. The programme is also geared towards preparing candidates for studies at PhD level. The programme focuses on a key number of areas of interest such as architectural theory, history of architecture, urban design, urban social theory and processes of urbanisation in Africa. Click here for more information!