WiD is involved in an ongoing collaboration with gender and equity groups from ETH Zurich, EPFL, TU Munich and TU Wein through frequent conversations, events and symposia. This initiative brings together students and faculty from the five schools to form a network of support and activities. See below for upcoming and past events.

Partners:

ETH Zurich Parity Front (Instagram), EPFL Drag Lab, TU Munich Parity Group, TU Wein Claiming Spaces.

Parity Talks: What’s Good

March 10, 2021

It’s been 6 years since the first Parity Talks at the ETHZ began a discussion around gender and diversity in architecture and planning. This year together with four other institutions we will reflect on how the situation has evolved for planning disciplines. A day-long event on the 10th March hosted by the Parity Group at the ETHZ will be a collective questioning of ‘What’s Good?’.

Together we will discuss our current understanding of good practice, who decides what is good, and the problems of education based on ideas of excellence. The Parity Talks 6 will be acting as the departure point for a season of digital events across the five institutions, propelling further debates on gender, equity, inclusion and belonging.

March 10, 2021 Program (all times in CET)

08:30 Welcomes

09:00 Meike Shalk (Anna Boyksen Fellow) – Rethinking Institutionalized Patterns
Introduced by the Parity Board TUM

09:45 Katarina Bonnevier (MYCKET) – Architecture as Drag
Introduced by the DRAG lab EPFL

10:45 Eric Robsky Huntley – ‘Up, Down, Around: Figuring Perspectives for Feminist Pedagogy’
Introduced by Charlotte Malterre-Barthes (Harvard GSD)

11:30 Afaina de Jong – A Space of Freedom
Introduced by Claiming Spaces from TU Wien

12:15 Cruz Garcia and Nathalie Frankowski (WAIThinkTank) – Collective Forms of Care
Introduced by the Parity Group ETH

13:00 Round Table – Tastemakers with TU MUNICH + EPFL + ETHZ  

Following the guest presentations of the morning, this discussion aims to delve deeper into institutional structures, systems of taste, value and power, and what affects the standards of excellence held up by institutions have on the mental health of both students and staff. Students and staff from TU Munich, EPFL and ETHZ will join our guest speakers from the morning, providing a range of voices and perspectives on these topics.

Featuring: Meike Schalk + Katarina Bonnevier MYCKET + Cruz Garcia + Nathalie Frankowski + Els Silvrants-Barclay + Regine Keller + Josiane Schmidt + Marion Fonjallaz + Morgane Hofstetter + Dieter Dietz + Tom Emerson (tbc) + Leonie Wagner + Olga Cobuscean and moderated by: Vera Sacchetti

15:30 Round Table – Curriculum Change: Learning/Unlearning Taste with GSD + TU WIEN

Curriculum changes are the order of the day in many architecture schools. Who is included in the change making process and  gets a say in what comes and what stays? Do these changes go far enough to sustain equity, decolonize, and depatriarchize our age-old canonical syllabi? While some teaching formats are quick to change, some seem impossible to dispel. How can institutional activism help and steer consistent and meaningful change in architecture education and beyond? Online black activist Rachel Cargle speaks about the "Great Unlearn." Can we teach to unlearn? We will discuss the possibilities of radical changes in content and form within design institutions, (un)learning and listening to one another.

Featuring:  Lisa Haber-Thomson + Jenny French + Afaina de Jong + Christian Kühn + Mo Hartmann + Bernadette Krejs + Eric Robsky Huntley + Shira Grosman + Lauren Janko and moderated by: Marlene Wagner

16:45 Concluding Discussion – What’s good?

DRAG lab EPFL asks the Parity Group ETH, Claiming Spaces from TU Wien, Harvard GSD, and Parity Board TUM about their experiences of good practice in institutional activism.

18:00 Alexandra Lange – Looking for Role Models in All the Wrong Places

Keynote Lecture as part of the Wohnforum Athena Lecture Series with Welcome by Marie Glaser

19:00 Q&A with Alexandra Lange & students

Parity Talks: Actions and Accountability

October 6-7, 2020

WiD participated in the workshop Global networks of solidarity: beyond the school. Departing from the Parity Group as a movement internal to the school, this workshop seeks to expand the parity conversation beyond ETHZurich school, to other schools, the profession and other disciplines. To consolidate connections with other groups and institutions but also into offices and the construction industry at large, both in Switzerland and abroad, the aim is to create new global networks of solidarity and common strategies. This workshop will address parity beyond the school at several levels: in other architecture schools, in the profession, in other disciplines. Co-hosted by the Parity Front (Charlotte Malterre-Barthes), Els Silvrants-Barclay, Elena Chiavi, Juliette Martin, Senta Fahrländer and Petra Van Brabandt.

See the full program and watch record lectures here.