The Institute of Comparative Literature and Society and Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture
Event Co-Sponsor(s)
Center for Science and Society, Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture, Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Society of Fellows and Heyman Center for the Humanities, Department of English and Comparative Literature, and the Department of Medical Humanities and Ethics.
“Home Sick”: Reimagining Indoor/Outdoor Space in the Pandemic
April 27, 6 PM EST
Speakers Annmarie Adams (Social Studies of Medicine, McGill University) and Charles Branas (Epidemiology, Columbia University), moderator Reinhold Martin (GSAPP and Buell Center, Columbia University) and respondent Laura Kurgan (GSAPP, Columbia University)
Annmarie Adams is the Chair of the Department of Social Studies in Medicine at McGill University. Educated as an architect and architectural historian at UC Berkeley, she is jointly appointed in McGill University’s School of Architecture and the Department of Social Studies of Medicine. Professor Adams is the author of Architecture in the Family Way: Doctors, Houses, and Women, 1870-1900 (McGill-Queens, 1996), Medicine by Design: The Architect and the Modern Hospital, 1893-1943 (U Minn Press, 2008) and co-author of Designing Women: Gender and the Architectural Profession (UTP, 2000). Recent awards include the Faculty of Engineering’s Christophe Pierre Award for Research Excellence (2016) and the President’s Award for Excellence in Media (2017) from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada. Professor Adams’ research focuses on how medicine, gender, and architecture intersect, mostly in houses and hospitals. Her current work includes a SSHRC-funded spatial biography of cardiologist and museum curator Maude Abbott and she is overseeing the future re-use of the former Royal Victoria Hospital site in Montreal.
Charles Branas is the Chair of Epidemiology at Columbia University. Dr. Branas has conducted research that extends from urban and rural areas in the US to communities across the globe, incorporating place-based interventions and human geography. He has led win-win science that generates new knowledge while simultaneously creating positive, real-world changes and providing health-enhancing resources for local communities. His pioneering work on geographic access to medical care has changed the healthcare landscape, leading to the designation of new hospitals and a series of national scientific replications in the US and other countries for many conditions: trauma, cancer, stroke, etc. His research on the geography and factors underpinning gun violence has been cited by landmark Supreme Court decisions, Congress, and the NIH Director. With community partners, Dr. Branas led the first citywide randomized controlled trials to transform vacant lots and abandoned buildings as sustainable solutions to improving health and safety, including reductions in gun violence. He has worked internationally on four continents and led multi-national efforts, producing extensive cohorts of developing nation scientists, national health metrics, and worldwide press coverage.
Laura Kurgan is Professor of Architecture at the Graduate School of Architecture Planning and Preservation at Columbia University, where she directs the Center for Spatial Research and the Visual Studies curriculum. She is the author of Close Up at a Distance: Mapping, Technology, and Politics (Zone Books, 2013), and Co-Editor of Ways of Knowing Cities (Columbia Books on Architecture, 2019). From 2004 through 2015, she founded and directed the Spatial Information Design Lab at GSAPP. Her work explores the ethics and politics of digital mapping and its technologies; the art, science and visualization of big and small data; and design environments for public engagement with maps and data. Her work has been exhibited internationally, at the Chicago Architecture Biennial (2019) and at the Biennale Architettura di Venezia 2018, among others, and it is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City and the Fondation Cartier in Paris. Current topics of her research at CSR include justice mapping, conflict urbanism, spatial inequality, algorithms and social justice, and historical New York City.
Co-sponsored by the Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture and the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society.
This event is a part of our “Medical Humanities and Pandemic Urbanisms” series celebrating the launch of our new Medical Humanities major. Learn more about the major here.
Columbia University makes every effort to accommodate individuals with disabilities. Please notify the ICLS office at icls@columbia.edu at least 10 days in advance if you require closed captioning, sign-language interpretation or any other disability accommodations. Alternatively, Disability Services can be reached at 212.854.2388 and disability@columbia.edu.
