Public Health, Architecture & Urbanism Dialogues

As the world’s economies open cautiously in the wake of the biggest global challenge since the Second World War, it is clear that the pandemic has forced us all into thinking about the complex relationships between health and our built environments. Issues of density, system design, clean air, healthy buildings, transportation links and sanitation are an integral part of public health. Conversations between healthcare and built environment professionals are critical, particularly in the developing world, where healthcare systems, local knowledge and access to resources is often limited. But our understanding of the term “public health” is also changing. In 1948, the World Health Organisation (WHO) defined health with a phrase that modern authorities still use: “a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” Some 40 years later, the term was amended to being “a resource for everyday life, not the objective of living. Health is a positive concept emphasizing social and personal resources, as well as physical capacities.” In other words, individual health is a resource that supports an individual’s function in wider society, not an end in itself. Public health can therefore be understood as a resource that supports a society’s function in the wider world.

How can architects and architecture support this ambition? What tools are required by architects to understand “health” in more nuanced ways? We carry both history and historical trauma in our bodies—how might new languages and tools of resilience and repair help societies heal? If we accept a wider and richer understanding of the term “body” (“body politic”; “body-as-capital”; “historical bodies”; “bodies of culture”), what might the implications be for both architects and healthcare professionals as they seek to find new ways to work together and new languages that speak across disciplines, rather than within them? How might the pairing of public health and built environment disciplines extend and enrich our understanding of both?

The AFI has joined forces with Ensign Global College in Kpong, Ghana, to host six key speakers in its Public Health, Architecture and Urbanism Dialogues, launching on December 14, 2021. Speakers in the inaugural series are Prof Nisha Botchwey (Associate Dean, Georgia Tech and Adjunct Professor, Emory University), Prof Jennifer Newsom (Adjunct Professor, Cornell University College of Architecture, Art, and Planning and co-founder of Dream the Combine), Prof Shawn L Rickenbacker (Director, J. Max Bond Centre for Urban Futures, The Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture, CCNY), Prof Tolullah Oni (MRC Epidemiology Unit, University of Cambridge; Research Initiative for Cities Health and Equity, University of Cape Town; and UrbanBetter), Prof Roshanak Mehdipanah (School of Public Health, University of Michigan) and Prof Andy Hong (Department of City & Metropolitan Planning, University of Utah and Co-Founder of the Healthy City Futures).

Held in-person in Accra, or virtually, all talks are free and open to the public via registration, in accordance with COVID protocols. For those unable to attend in person, our talks are uploaded to our Vimeo and YouTube platforms no less than 72 hours after the event.

“We are pleased to be joining with the African Futures Institute to highlight the important link between public health and architecture. The built environment we shape deeply influences our well-being, yet too often this impact is underappreciated. Through the Public Health, Architecture and Urbanism Dialogues, we will enjoy engaging with provocative thought leaders who will challenge our perspectives on how our environment creates both opportunities and impediments for optimal health. We are honoured to join Professor Lokko and her team at AFI to make this series possible.” —Professor Stephen C. Alder, President, Ensign Global College