Architecture and Empire

In this episode we talk about Architecture and Empire. Our contributors discuss how the legacies of imperialism are manifested in the built environment from London to India and Beirut. We talk about the spectacular buildings of the state and the mundane buildings of bureaucracy, as well as temporary displays of imperialism and the educational institutions built by missionaries.

You can listen to this episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.

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Fig 1: Campus of the Syrian Protestant College, 1914, Courtesy of: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-matpc-07116.

Contributors: 

Elsie Owusu OBE is a Ghanaian-born British architect, a founding member and the first chair of the Society Black Architects. She co-led the refurbishment of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom in 2009. She has been an elected Member of the RIBA Council since 2014 and was the founding vice-chair of the London School of Architecture.

Shahmima Akhtar is a historian of race, migration and empire. She is lecturer in history at Royal Holloway University of London. She is currently working on the book Exhibiting Irishness: Empire and Identity, 1851-1970 to be published with Manchester University Press in September 2022.

Tania Sengupta is Associate Professor at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. Her research explores architectural and urban histories and theories of South Asia, with a focus on colonial and postcolonial contexts and questions.

Your hosts were Dr Jessica Kelly and Matthew Lloyd Roberts, and this project was devised with Neal Shasore. This episode is produced by Front Ear Podcasts.