Research Departments

Global Humanosphere

Area

Urban Environmental Studies, Urban Environmental History, Regional Spaces Theory

Research Interests

Mid-twentieth century planning history and theory in Japan, Comparative studies of urbanization and landscape change in Asia and Latin America,
Global urban studies

From a background in architecture and urban design – with a focus on participative, bioclimatic and environmental friendly oriented methods – an intellectual interest for clarifying the values behind the planning and design of modern living spaces emerged at the core of the research path developed up to now. During the 1960s period an important conceptual transition occurred in the planning theories developed since the late 19th century. It was the moment when the mainstream values of a rational physical planning theory were submitted to criticism and reassessment. From that moment, gained relevance a systemic thinking approach that emphasized the connections between local, regional and territorial scales within a large range of disciplinary viewpoints. The physical aspect of cities as the main focus of planning and design lost its pivotal relevance in order to give place to new comprehensive views to spatial transformations, which were sensitive to everyday needs and the reality of living at the local level. Following, architect-planners began to share the task of planning and design of cities with the community, and with other academic disciplines, such as, geography, agriculture, economy, sociology, anthropology, among others. In this process also gradually arouse the awareness that universal city making theories/models had limited applicability at local contexts. The criticism to the limited scope of universal theories has led to a renovation in the practice and theory of urban and regional planning towards a recent appreciation of how particular features of planning cultures developed across the world. However, among the fields that treat the history and theory of planning and design — specially those closer to architectural history, and with less incidence within planning history — it is still possible to perceive the maintenance of academic traditions of knowledge production heavily based on: analysis circumscribed to national contexts; an Euro-American perspective to universal theory; and extremely specialized viewpoints.

Brazil-Japan Seminar on Cultural Environments

-Kyoto University, CSEAS