Architecture Education for World Citizenship

Abstract

This paper presents findings from fourteen qualitative interviews conducted with students of architecture from eleven schools of the Nordic Baltic Academy of Architecture (NBAA) and from numerous conversations conducted with students in architecture at my home institution, Iceland University of the Arts (IUA). The findings of these conversations reveal that students consider a meaningful architectural education one that helps them make ethical design choices. To do so, respondents indicated that schools should help students find their inner compass, develop their professional skills and ethical attitudes, think independently, and make a difference in society and beyond. Four narratives emerge that describe the multiple roles of an architect in our society: the dissident intellectual, the ethical professional, the storyteller, and the caregiver of the world. Based on these findings, and with the support of the work of Henry Giroux’s “Critical Theory and Rationality in Citizenship Education” and Martha Nussbaum’s “Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism,” a framework referred to as Cosmopolitan Citizenship Architecture Education (CCAE) was developed.