Handbook home
Urban Environments (ENVS10007)
Undergraduate level 1Points: 12.5On Campus (Parkville)
About this subject
Contact information
Semester 2
Overview
Availability | Semester 2 |
---|---|
Fees | Look up fees |
To understand why cities have become the most common living environment today, this subject will be built around three questions: what is ‘the urban' and why have cities formed and expanded?; how do we analyse the environments of contemporary cities?; and how might we create better urban futures? Looking to the past, special attention will be paid to cities of different times and places (the early Middle East, Industrial Revolution Europe and North America, rapidly urbanising contemporary China, for example). We will consider the cities' design, political and economic reasons for their development and form, and their dependence on local physical environments and resources. Analytically, approaches to city morphology, socio-economic differentiation and environmental auditing will be investigated and evaluated, linking these matters to contemporary globalisation. Student experience of different local urban environments within Melbourne will form the basis of some tutorial and assessment tasks, raising questions about how better urban outcomes could be planned for the future.
Intended learning outcomes
At the completion of this subject students should have developed the following skills:
- observation of urban environments
- recording and analysis of real world urban environments
- evaluation of the influence of different factors on the urban environment
- recognition of the variety of opinions on the way urban environments are shaped
- ability to debate alternative approaches to improving the urban environment
Generic skills
At the completion of this subject students should be able to:
- observe and record historical, physical and social aspects of urban environments
- engage in critical reading discussion
- understand geographic and planning aspects of urban analysis
- undertake library research
- research for and write an academic essay
- present an academic argument in written and spoken forms.
Last updated: 12 December 2024