We are seeking applications from PhD Students and Candidates and Graduate Research Students in Architecture and allied fields in Canada and abroad to participate in one of three masterclasses held at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 from 10h00 to 18h00 EDT. The masterclasses are led by Dr. Aya Nassar (Durham University), Dr. Samia Henni (McGill University), and Dr. María González Pendás (Cornell University), as part of the international symposium, Mediating Matter(s): Architecture and Bodily Affects.
Mediating Matter(s): Architecture and Bodily Affects brings emerging, mid-career, and established scholars and researchers together around the question: How does the mediation of matter(s) through architecture and by architects (broadly understood) normalize certain modes of being while undermining others? Expanding contemporary discussions on how the scales, movements, animacy,and vibrancy of matter unevenly affect and act on, through, and between diverse bodies as well as how such bodies are objectified, reduced, and transformed into a labour force, our goal is to engage in a conversation that probes architecture’s complicity in rendering “some beings as more human than others,” (Singh, 2018: 4) and marking all of us who “cohabit in the space of the undercommons,” (Moten and Harney, 2013: 6) as ontologically empty. Over the course of the symposium and its ancillary programming, we hope to explore how architecture’s “orderly arranging of materials and bodies” (Mbembe, 2024: xii) affirm the discipline’s violent legacies of exclusion and how bodies that fall beyond dominant norms of the human disrupt these configurations through non-normative entanglements with matter.
The masterclasses are an opportunity for doctoral and graduate research students to receive feedback on their ongoing research. Graduate students whose research topics align with the symposium’s themes and the research areas of the keynotes are especially encouraged to apply.
Application process
To apply for one of the masterclasses, please send a 200-word abstract of your dissertation or thesis topic, a short bio, your rankings of which of the three sessions you would most like to participate in (Dr. Aya Nassar’s masterclass, Dr. Samia Henni’s masterclass, or Dr. María González Pendás’ masterclass, ), and whether you plan to attend the masterclass in-person in Ottawa or remotely to cripticcollab@gmail.comby 23h59 EDT on Monday, June 30, 2025.
We will be able to accommodate a maximum of 3 students per workshop. Participants will be notified of selection by Wednesday, July 30, 2025.
Format and preparation
Drawing on their own research and in alignment with the thematics of Mediating Matter(s), participants are asked to prepare and give a 10- to 15-minute presentation before receiving 30 minutes of feedback from the scholar leading the masterclass. Selected participants will be asked to submit an updated presentation abstract and full paper (between 2,500 and 3,000 words) by Wednesday, September 10, 2025. The presentation and discussion will be held on Wednesday, October 22, 2025 from 10h00 to 18h00 EDT, in English at Carleton University. Participants are also encouraged to attend the Agora III international symposium: Mediating Matter(s) programming, which takes place on Thursday, October 23 and Friday, October 24, 2025 at the same venue.
