Anyone concerned with the history, tradition, and culture of our built environment will sooner or later come across the term ‘Public Humanities’. At the interface between an academic discipline and the media-oriented culture industry, Public Humanities is established as a field of inquiry in the US and is increasingly becoming so in Europe too.

Whether this field of research remains a product of Western culture will only become apparent in the coming years. However, linking architectural debate with the humanities is an important concern of the papers collected here.

These essays on architectural theory provide academic food for thought while encouraging reflection on the discipline of architecture and stimulating urban design in the twenty-first century. The lectures collected here are from a class on Public Humanities at Brown University.