A Focus on Pedagogy

Abstract

Session Chair: Zaeem Yaqoob

Speakers: Sardar Aarish, Rohma Khan, Zain Adil

The pandemic has changed teaching in many ways in recent times. While a lot has been said about distance learning and the use of new technologies for example, less focus has been placed on what it has meant for Cross/Multi/Inter/Trans-disciplinary teaching and research practices. While collaborative works in the past have led to the establishment of experimental interdisciplinary teaching methods, the recent restrictions on working practices imposed by the pandemic have revealed multiple short comings in our modes of cross disciplinary teaching. That said, the recent crisis has also created opportunities in the fields of interdisciplinary practice and spurred us on to new innovations.

In this complex and contradictory setting this session seeks to look forward and explores how academics and professionals can, and will, continue to embrace the dynamic futures of integrated Cross/Multi/Inter/Trans-disciplinary practices. We seek to examine current social and industrial challenges in interdisciplinary work and attempt to foresee some emergent futures. We will explore how artists, designers, and architects operate across disciplines, and how they can become agents of change in multiple professional environments. We want to explore how our teaching and research reflects this, and how these approaches can support academic and professional practices.

Within this overarching framework, we welcome discussion on pedagogical methodologies across disciplines; problem-based projects across boundaries; and the role of technology in advancing teaching, research, and work that spans sectors. Furthermore, we are interested in universal and specific educational and research infrastructures; global academic experiments and initiatives on emerging modes of practice and alternative pedagogical approaches in classroom, studio, lab, or field. Our particular fields of interest are in the arts, architectural, graphic, industrial design and those disciplines that collaborate with these areas.