Chinatown, the Japanese Garden, the Period Room: Diasporic Architecture from East Asia

Undergraduate / Graduate

The built environment serves as a powerful connection to its time, place, and cultural origins. This course examines East Asian architecture and landscapes that have transcended their native contexts, as well as East Asian-style buildings designed for cultural others. From the bustling streets of Chinatown to the serene Japanese gardens and the meticulously curated period rooms showcasing East Asia's arts and cultures, the course explores a wide range of architectural forms, urban designs, and landscapes spanning two centuries. These structures are studied not as static artifacts but as dynamic platforms for social events, cultural debates, and political opportunities, shaped by historical and ongoing negotiations between their home and host contexts. Central to the course is the concept of diaspora, through which we investigate how the experience of living outside one's home country-sometimes in foreign or even unwelcoming environments-can be understood through the lens of the built environment. In this framework, architecture becomes a reflection of the dynamic experiences of immigration, racialization, cultural exchange, and confrontation. It is also subject to processes of representation, appropriation, modification, and reinvention. Through immersive field trips in the Chicago metropolitan area, students will critically analyze the formal language, spatial experiences, cultural symbolism, and social dynamics embedded in East Asian-style architecture and landscapes.