Marcia Pereira
Heriot-Watt University, School of the Built Environment, Faculty Member
- Architecture, Research Methodology, Knowledge Management, E-learning, Urban Studies, Educational Research, and 57 moreCritical Pedagogy, Interaction Design, Design Research, Pedagogy, Mobile Learning, Community Engagement & Participation, Urban Regeneration, Curriculum Design, Computer-Based Learning, Design Theory, Lifelong Learning, Constructivism, Digital Divide, Design Methods, Design education, Educational Inequalities (class; race; gender etc), Computer Aided Design, Collaboration, Active Learning, Creativity studies, Information Architecture, Globalisation and Development, Information & Communication Technology, Urban Design (Urban Studies), Design for Social Innovation, Participatory Design, Design Creativity, Reflective Practice, Virtual Environments, Transformative Learning, Academic curriculum, Urban Development, Design practice, Digital Media, Device, and Software Interface Design, Tacit Knowledge, Ecological Design, Design Research Method (Architecture), Paulo Freire, Dialogue, Educational Development, Didactics, Group Creativity, Continuing Professional Development, Design, Ethics, and Responsibility, Slums, Favelas, and Shanty-towns, Sustainable Urban Environments (Architecture), Context Aware Technology Enhanced Learning, Regeneration, Politics And Planning In Cities In Deveveloping Countries, Digital empowerment, Empowerment (Computer Science), Intelligent Cities, Urban Design, Environmental Sustainability, Sustainable Design, Multidisciplinary design practices, and Epistemology of space, semiotics of space, ontology of architectureedit
- As an architect and urban designer, I am interested in people and how they interact with and within environments, lea... moreAs an architect and urban designer, I am interested in people and how they interact with and within environments, learning and collaborating with each other. How to design and maintain spaces which encourage, support and sustain constructive experiences within a critical and sustainable framework is the big challenge.
Present global urban challenges (rapid urbanisation & re-sctructuring + globablisation effect) and how urban design and development respond to these are also important aspects that I am interested in investigating. New approaches & technologies to encourage and develop knowledge exchange & learning, with a distinct need for North-South and South-South collaborations, developing an understanding of, and appropriate contextualised responses to, these global urban challenges are needed. Within this context: sustainable urban design; urban development and social transformation; wider governance and participation in urban issues; urban design education and skills; new communication and information technologies and their effect on knowledge exchange, governance and transparency, as well as the opportunities and challenges they can pose to urban development.
In general: architecture, urban design, sustainability, learning, user participation, ethics, education, critical pedagogy, constructivism, reflective practice, organisational learning, collaborative work and technologies which support all these are key themes in my practice.
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Having studied Architecture and Urbanism in Brazil, I worked as a practitioner on the design of mainly university and residential buildings as well as worked on the planning and conservation of areas of cultural interest in the city of Belo Horizonte.
I did my Master and PhD at the School of Architecture at the University of Sheffield, investigating how architecture could make the best use of rapid technological online developments in practice and education. This generated a strong interest in knowledge capture, management and exchange as well as in collaborative work and learning.
After the PhD, I lectured architectural design at the University of Dundee and Robert Gordon University, becoming thereafter more involved in the design and development of online environments for learning and collaboration.
From 2001 to 2003, I was a postdoc member of staff at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH-Zurich) in both, the Computer-Aided Architecture Design group and the Centre for Product Development.
I then moved into private practice, working for Armadillo Media in Lucerne on the design and development of an online platform and of online courses for ecological engineers.
Subsequently, I returned to work at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, this time at the Spatial Planning and Development chair of the Institute for Spatial and Landscape Planning (IRL).
Moving back to the UK in mid-2007, I became a researcher at the ScotMARK research centre of the Edinburgh College of Art, investigating user participation on the architectural design process. Since November 2008, I am a researcher at the School of the Built Environment, HWU, where I also contribute to teaching Urban Design in different modules and supervise postgraduate students.
My main research project at the moment is the "Making Places Profitable, Public and Private Open Spaces" (MP4) - a project funded through the European Union Interreg IVB programme for the North Sea Region. Involving 9 project partners in 6 countries, the MP4 project focuses on innovative approaches for planning and designing, maintaining and using public and private open spaces, with a special emphasis on "place-keeping". More information on the project website: http://www.mp4-interreg.eu
--- About my PhD (2000)
University of Sheffield, 2000
Supervisor: Professor Bryan Lawson
Title:
A framework for the use of C&IT in learning and teaching technical subjects in architectural education
The work combined architecture and urbanism theories, educational theories and information technology to inform the design of virtual learning environments, with special focus on technical subjects in architectural education. Combining reflective practice, constructivist learning theories and critical pedagogy an educational model is proposed. The design studio is used as a metaphor, where knowledge coming from different disciplines is analyzed and synthesized, within a recurrent reflective process. The methodology explores the design process combined with activity theory, in a participatory process. The proposed framework was used to develop a prototype, which was tested in architectural schools in England and Scotland. After the PhD, the framework was applied on the design of different virtual environments for learning and collaborative work, within the realm of disciplines such as architecture, ecological engineering, product development, as well as for C&IT staff development.edit
ABSTRACT