This panel unites educators who question and work to update systems that do not give ample weight to histories of culture in contexts such as Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Oceania relative to North American and European frameworks of viewing the world. What if these contexts held keys to overcoming so many contemporary challenges of race, environmental justice, and new forms of urbanism? What if developing new networks and pedagogies could inform and inspire the global North on how to embed diversity, equity and inclusion at the heart of education? Taking case studies from the newly formed African Futures Institute in Ghana and online, as well as transversal programs such as Cornell University’s Institute for Comparative Modernities, UCL’s Worlding Public Cultures: Arts and Social Innovation program, MAHASSA, and others, this panel aims to point to what is missing in art and architecture education today in hopes that the field will update its syllabi to equip students to address the challenges of the 21st century with expanded lessons from the past.

Sean Anderson, Director of the Bachelor of Architecture program at the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning Cornell University, New York, USA; Trustee Africa Futures Institute, Accra, Ghana 

Iain Chambers, anthropologist, sociologist and expert in cultural studies, Naples, Italy

Iftikhar Dadi, Professor and Chair of the Department of History of Art and Director of the South Asia Program at Cornell University, New York, USA 

Jerome Haferd, Co-founder of Harlem-based design practice BRANDT : HAFERD and Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, New York, USA

Mpho Matsipa, Educator, Researcher, Curator, Leob Fellow ’22 Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, Board of Academic Advisors, Africa Futures Institute, Accra, Ghana 

Ming Tiampo, Professor, Co-Director Centre for Transnational Cultural Analysis, and Co-Principal Investigator of Worlding Public Cultures, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada