Urbanism Concentration
Urbanism is the study of cities and city life, including the cultural, political, social, economic and geographic implications of urban centers and their hinterlands. This field of inquiry has become a vital one in our increasingly populated world. Understanding the dynamics of large-scale communities and their outgrowths is imperative to shaping viable, just and sustainable metropolitan areas that serve the needs of those who depend upon them.
Arizona State University's School of Human Evolution and Social Change offers a concentration in urbanism that provides doctoral students with a solid, transdisciplinary foundation in this field.
The urbanism concentration is available in the following degree programs:
Students who graduate with a concentration in urbanism may find work in a diversity of fields, including urban planning, community development and advocacy, environmental planning and consulting, sustainability, urban management, and urban development and design. In addition, the concentration prepares students for academic positions in urban studies, urban planning, environmental studies, urban sustainability, urban design, and housing policy and development.
Program Description
The past two decades have witnessed a surge of scholarship and professional interest in urbanism. However, there is a tendency for disciplines concerned with urbanism to be disconnected from one another. While powerful analytical and technical knowledge has been created within each field, the resulting specialized approaches to the study of urbanism present an impediment to understanding the nature, function and shaping of the human habitat. The concentration in urbanism will be a mechanism for organizing varied perspectives on urbanism into a collective body of scholarship. The study of anthropology will be enriched by grounding it in a comprehensive understanding of the characteristics of urban context and the dynamic forces that shape them.
The concentration in urbanism will leverage the varied interests in urbanism and help emerging scholars as they attempt to compare, contrast and take stock of urbanism. Working with faculty from across a range of departments and programs at ASU, doctoral students will be able to capture the creative tensions that scholarship on urbanism has inspired in order to stimulate a provocative, constructive kind of inquiry. Academic units students might engage with to fulfill the requirements of the urbanism concentration include:
- Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts
- School of Community Resources & Development
- School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning
- School of Government, Politics and Global Studies
- School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies
- School of Human Evolution and Social Change
- School of Sustainability
Course Requirements
- Natural environment
- Built form
- Institutions and governance
- Culture and society
Students without a master's degree apply to phase I of the program, where they will receive a master's-in-passing. During this phase, students develop a research skills portfolio and present one of their papers in a school-wide research symposium. A formal evaluation is then completed to determine the student's readiness to enter phase II of the program.
Students with a master's degree in anthropology or a related field begin in phase II of the doctoral program, where they receive training to become expert scholars able to contribute not only to their chosen field, but to finding solutions to humankind's greatest challenges.
For more information, please contact shescgrad@asu.edu or (480) 965-6215.
