Study Architecture 
ProPEL 
Author(s): Zaneta Hong
These past few years have challenged and altered every one of us. To recollect the innumerable racial and social injustices, the rise of devastating natural disasters from climate change, and the Covid-19 pandemic with the ensuing economic recession is to recognize how much we—as a collective society—have endured and continue to endure in the struggles and hardships issued upon us each day. Nearly every city has taken the brunt of upheavals or revolutions, with episodes continually exploding in local townships and municipalities across the country and around the world. Whether one lives in a booming metropolis or a small town, it is evident that communities that implement creative and empathetic interventions—in response to these events and transformations—can catalyze profound effects to the built environment and the human experience. Students in an urban design studio at Cornell University were asked to take a stand – a stand on their work and position of manifesting ideas from concept development to design intervention, from position to proposition. The studio asked students to answer what is the value of design and what is the role of the designer? Alongside conversations on climate change, social equity and design empathy, how does conjuring the unknown, speculating upon possibilities, and imagining constructed futures all occur without a voice? How can one hold onto their values and position, while engaging others through the intricate, and sometimes elusive, design process?
https://doi.org/10.35483/ACSA.AM.110.65
Volume Editors
Robert Gonzalez, Milton Curry & Monica Ponce de Leon
ISBN
978-1-944214-40-1
