Teaching the Young Ones Transformative Encounter: Critical Methodology, Practice and Living for Z African Urbanists

Abstract

Cities in Africa are not just growing, the nature of their evolution is highly dynamic, at a kind of socio-political, demographic and spatial warp speed. Approaches to teaching prospective urban planners who are trained to intervene in a myriad of physical and social spaces need to figure out two things fairly quickly in this regard, how distinguish and decipher the change and then how to develop methods for documenting what is seen when it has never been seen before. This constitutes a pragmatic take on the pedagogy of transformative change and the inter-generational conversation that has ensued in a research studio over the past four years. A philosophical and practice reflection on how training in the twenty-first century can integrate ‘classic’ research modalities with ‘new’ technologies and approaches. The paper is essentially structured in three parts. The first involves a study of project brief formulation, how an instructor charts the process of content direction and analytical guidance, how to sensitively integrate the languages and idioms of encounter. The second is a reflection on the pragmatisms of pedagogy – teaching big ideas in small timeframes, giving intelligent depth and resonance to the voices and experiences of students and how to manage the generational milieu. The final sections traverse the spatialities of transformation – where the studio, the city and the device converge. Examining the ways in which university instructors think through in collaboration [and contestation] with their students how and what these ‘spaces’ can reveal about the facets, attributes, nature and movement of change in cities and the planning profession.