Symposium: “Revitalizing Rural Environments”

REVITALIZING RURAL ENVIRONMENTS SYMPOSIUM: REGIONAL TO GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES
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Massive migration from rural lands to urban centers is destabilizing small villages and towns all over the world. At a time when information technology has the potential to distribute knowledge and resources in more egalitarian ways than ever before, it is ironic that today’s unsustainable urban congestion often recalls the problems of the Industrial Revolution more than two centuries ago: pollution, lack of medical care, squatter housing, overburdened infrastructure, tensions between demographic groups, to name a few.

These events are open to the public.

Thursday, March 29

• 12:00–1:00 p.m. | Spark G45
  Dr. John Tomkowiak, Dean of the WSU Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine, interview on rural health, with Sue Lani Madsen, WSU Architecture.
• 4:00–5:00 p .m. | Art and Architecture South 2nd floor Gallery, University of Idaho
  Wendy McClure, Professor Emeritus of Architecture, “Townmaking and Transformations in the Intermountain West.”
• NEW TIME: 5:00–6:30 p.m. | Art and Architecture South 2nd floor Gallery, University of Idaho
  Keynote: Jeffrey Johnson, Chair of Architecture at the University of Kentucky, “Superblocks and the Return to Rural Places.”
  Jeffrey Johnson is a scholar on China, cofounder of SLAB, and the founding director of China Megacities Lab, an experimental research unit at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University, where he formerly taught.

Friday, March 30

• 1:30–3:00 p.m. | Spark 227
  Mini Presentations.
  Xinmin Liu, Associate Professor of Chinese, WSU, “Rural Dwellings and Planetary Retreats.”
  Mike Jobes, Principal at Miller Hull Architects, “Land-based Tourism.”
  Jolie Kaytes, Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture, WSU, “Rural Matters.”
  Robert Krikac, Associate Professor of Interior Design, WSU, “Revival.”
• 3:10–5:00 p.m. | Spark 212, 227, 327, 339
  Breakout Sessions.
• 5:00–6:30 p.m. | Spark G45
  Keynote: Liu Jiaping, Ph.D., Director of Green Architecture Research Center at the Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology, “New Vernacular Architecture and Ecosophy Inheritance.”
  Liu Jiaping is an internationally known scholar and one of the few architects who hold the title of yuan shi (national scholar) in the China Academy of Engineering.

Saturday, March 31

• 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. | Carpenter Hall Gallery
  Student Charrette.

And a special thanks to our sponsors:
WSU School of Design and Construction
WSU Asia Program
WSU Honors College
WSU Humanities Institute
WSU Medical School
Confucius Institute of the State of Washington (CIWA)
Integrus Architecture