Urban Futures Symposium August 2023

Urban Futures in Transition – Approaches, Practices and Impact

The many complex shocks and ruptures occurring in the wider world have inevitable implications for urban futures. This graduate research symposium asks: what is the role of research in understanding urban change and what theories, approaches and collaborations can shed light on city transitions?

The symposium is centred around the scholarship of HDR candidates presenting on topics that stretch from the construction of new buildings to the protection of urban heritage, and across contexts from Melbourne to Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Bangladesh and Iran.

Complementing these presentations is a program of keynotes, methods workshops and industry linked conversations, plus supporting events contributed by the School of Graduate Research. Topics addressed across the week include wild hope for planetary futures, socio-technical transitions and urban experimentation, working with urban communities, innovations in spatial data and AI, and applying digital methods to urban futures. Further sessions showcase housing research within the new Post-Carbon Research Centre and recent PhD urban transport investigations from the Centre for Urban Research. A highlight of this symposium will be the poster exhibition, open to all Urban Futures HDR candidates at RMIT, with prizes awarded in various categories. 

All are welcome to join HDR scholars, supervisors, colleagues and industry partners for an exciting week of research presentations and conversations on urban futures.  

Keynotes

Indy Johar

Wild Hope: Indy Johar 

Monday 21 August, 6:30pm, The Capitol, 113 Swanston St, Melbourne

Keynote presentation by London-based social entrepreneur, architect, and visionary thinker Indy Johar.

Rob Raven

Sustainability Transitions and Urban Experimentation: Theory, Challenges and Opportunities

Wednesday 23 August, 12:30pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus

Keynote presentation by Dr. Rob Raven, Professor of Sustainability Transitions and Deputy Director (Research) at Monash Sustainable Development Institute. 


Research Presentations and Workshops

Advanced Digital Spatial Approaches for Impact in Urban Analysis 

Monday 21 August, 12pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus

Presentations by Yaguang Tao, Melanie Davern and Matt Duckham on advanced geospatial technology and open platforms for urban analysis.

Transition to a Low Carbon Housing Future

Tuesday 22 August, 12:30pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus

Priya Rajagopalan, Andrea Sharam, Mary Myla Andamon, Felipe Jara-Baeza, and Karl Jensen discuss energy efficiency approaches to aid the transition to a post carbon future.  

Digital Ethnography: Approaches and Tools

Tuesday 22 August, 3:30pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus  

Members of RMIT’s Digital Ethnography Research Centre provide examples of their research to showcase a specific research design, methodological approach, or tool. 

 


Researching with Urban Communities

Wednesday 23 August, 3:30pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus

Ellen van Holstein and David Kelly explore the dilemmas of field work and scenarios likely to be faced by emerging researchers. 

PhDs Talking Transport with Industry

Thursday 24 August 12:30pm, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus

Join recent and current PhD candidates from the Centre for Urban Research in discussion with industry experts Taru Jain and Richard Smithers. 

 

Poster Exhibition

Posters exhibited throughout the symposium, Storey Hall, RMIT City Campus  

HDR poster exhibition and competition. All Urban Futures HDR candidates at RMIT are eligible to participate. Competition winners will be announced on Thursday 24 August at 2pm. 


Higher Degree by Research Milestones

Throughout the symposium, HDR candidates from across all disciplines in RMIT's College of Design and Social Context will present their milestones. Session details for HDR presentations are available via the program below. Please note that information for milestone presenters, chairs and referees is available through the RMIT SharePoint site for HDR Milestone Presentations (RMIT login required).

Program and Registration

Monday 21 August

City planning map

Research Approaches

Advanced Digital Spatial Approaches for Impact in Urban Analysis

Monday 21 August, 12pm - 1pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

Presentations by Yaguang Tao, Melanie Davern and Matt Duckham on current practices and future opportunities in utilising advanced geospatial technology and open platforms for urban analysis.

Yaguang Tao will provide an overview and practical applications of Google Earth Engine, a powerful tool that combines large-scale satellite imagery and cloud analysis capabilities for studying urban change.

Melanie Davern will showcase the Australian Urban Observatory, a high-impact accessible online platform that integrates social and spatial data for the benefit of policy, industry, and community users.

Lastly, Matt Duckham will present on the emerging technology of Geospatial AI and its potential benefits for shaping urban futures.

Indy Johar

Keynote

Wild Hope: Indy Johar

Monday 21 August, 6:30pm - 8:30pm, The Capitol, 113 Swanston St, Melbourne

How do we create more equitable, caring and regenerative futures?

London-based social entrepreneur, architect, and visionary thinker Indy Johar of Dark Matter Labs presents a keynote address to launch the Planetary Civics Initiative at RMIT.

As we enter an age of long and interconnected emergencies, our world grapples with simultaneous challenges including climate change, biodiversity loss, pandemics, antibiotic resistance, migration, AI, and human development. What we face is not merely a disruption; it’s a planetary-scale phenomenon. Confronting this demands fresh approaches, innovative alliances and new frameworks. We must all work together to effectively and compassionately face our shared future.

Milestone Presentations and Research Plus Seminars

Monday 21 August

Presentations may be given in-person, online or in hybrid mode. Refer to the location column for details. 

Time Candidate or Seminar Name Presentation Title Location
9.00 - 10.30 Yukun Zang (2MR) Investigation of fire safety strategies of buildings with BIPV external walls 16.07.07-08 and Teams (online)
10.00 - 11.30 Sinead McKinlay (2MR) Ordinary Australian's sense-making of the anthropocene world Teams (online)
1.30 - 3.00 Mojtaba Zokaee (CoC) Overcoming Language-Related Barriers in the Access of CALD Clients with Dementia to Health and Social Services through Interpreters Teams (online)
2.00 - 3.30 Research Plus Seminar Practical research integrity: Using iThenticate Online. HDRs view on Research Plus.
2.00 - 3.30 Research Plus Seminar Gaining and Maintaining Human Research Ethics Approval at RMIT: CoBL Online. HDRs view on Research Plus.
3.00 - 4.30 Budur Atiah Allah K Alsulami (CoC) The Saudi Arabia 2030 Strategy: Translation reception and translator readiness 16.07.07-08 and Teams (online)
3.00 - 4.30 Shinjita Das (CoC) Apartment Living, Green space and Well-being 22.03.02 and Teams (online)

Tuesday 22 August

Housing retrofit

Panel Discussion

Transition to a Low Carbon Housing Future

Tuesday 22 August, 12:30pm - 2pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

Improving energy efficiency of both existing and new housing is a critical opportunity area for low energy and net zero carbon transition. Though considerable research exists about the potential to radically reduce energy, there has been limited uptake of energy retrofits and lack of progress towards wider adoption, indicating a pressing need to overcome significant barriers. Energy retrofitting that takes into account indoor environmental quality is essential for enhancing comfort, health and well-being for the occupants. A comprehensive assessment of energy and indoor environmental performance is fundamental for the retrofitting process.

This session will address housing retrofit as an approach to transition of the built environment to a post carbon future. It will discuss the importance of building performance assessment in the decarbonisation journey and the provision in building standards and guidelines. This session will also discuss asset management in the context of social housing and some of the technologies used in decarbonisation.

This event will be chaired by Professor Priya Rajagopalan in discussion with panel members Dr Mary Myla Andamon, Felipe Jara-Baeza, Dr Andrea Sharam and Karl Jensen.  

Digital map of world

Research Approaches

Digital Ethnography: Approaches and Tools

Tuesday 22 August, 3:30pm - 5pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

Ethnography is a research approach that values conducting immersive and exploratory qualitative inquiry in naturalistic situations. Since the advent of the internet, digital ethnography has become an approach that applies ethnographic sensibilities and tools to understanding life in the digital age, how humans use and make sense of digital technologies, how communities develop around or through different types of digital platforms, and other aspects related to the practices and infrastructures of digital transformations in societies. The field of Digital Ethnography is wide and diverse. 

In this session, each speaker will describe the approach and present an example of their research to showcase a particular research design, methodological approach, or tool. All presenters are core members of RMIT’s Digital Ethnography Research Centre (DERC).

Speakers:

  • Ingrid Richardson: Techniques for studying mediated embodiment
  • Kelsie Nabben: Digital ethnography of hardware
  • Dan Harris: Video as digital ethnographic method
  • Annette Markham: Multi-agent mapping as digital ethnographic method

Milestone Presentations

Tuesday 22 August

Presentations may be given in-person, online or in hybrid mode. Refer to the location column for details. 

Time Candidate Name Presentation Title Location
9.00 - 10.30 Alejandra Nunez Madrigal (3MR) Circular economy pathways for PV waste management in Australia 16.07.07-08 and Teams (online)
10.00 - 11.30 Cristina Hernandez Santin (3MR) Letting Nature Speak 80.08.09 and Teams (online)
10.30 - 12.00 Thuy Dam (3MR) Identity (re)construction in bilingual children: the interplay between ESL and EFL contexts Teams (online)
1.00 - 2.30 Lucie McMahon (CoC) Trade Secret 22.03.02
1.30 - 3.00 Hamid Taheri (CoC) Iranian cinema and the 'modest woman' 09.04.32
2.30 - 4.00 Tharushi Samarasinghalage (CoC) Optimizing BIPV design Teams (online)

Wednesday 23 August

Rob Raven

Keynote

Sustainability Transitions and Urban Experimentation: Theory, Challenges and Opportunities

Wednesday 23 August, 12:30pm - 2pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

Keynote presentation by Dr Rob Raven, Professor of Sustainability Transitions and Deputy Director (Research) at Monash Sustainable Development Institute and visiting professor at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development at Utrecht University.

Our cities and underpinning socio-technical systems are in need of transformation to achieve better social and environmental outcomes such as articulated in the Paris agreement and the SDGs. 
Real-life experimentation has become a ubiquitous approach in sustainability governance and practice, including in cities such as in urban living labs. In this talk, Prof. Raven will first position experimentation in the scholarly work on sustainability transitions. This literature conceptualises experiments as protective spaces and seed-beds for radical change in the context of system-level path dependencies and windows of opportunities for shifts towards sustainability. Examples of recent and ongoing projects with living lab and urban experimentation approaches involving PhD students will then be provided. To conclude, reflections on the challenges and opportunities of urban experimentation will be offered, pointing towards future research.   

Crowd of people connected via technology

Workshop

Researching with Urban Communities

Wednesday 23 August, 3:30pm - 4:30pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

In this session participants will explore the dilemmas of the field when working with marginalised or hard-to-reach communities, as well as communities sceptical of researchers. Through a reflection on in-the-field moments and scenarios likely to be faced by emerging researchers, we ask the 'so what' question. We will stage productive encounters for participants to interrogate the reasons for their research agendas and why they require the labour and participation of over-intellectualised communities.

Speakers: Ellen van Holstein and David Kelly

Milestone Presentations and Research Plus Seminars

Wednesday 23 August

Presentations may be given in-person, online or in hybrid mode. Refer to the location column for details. 

Time Candidate or Seminar Name Presentation Title Location
9.00 - 10.30 Loeurt To (CoC) ​​Leadership Behaviour Towards Quality Education in Cambodian Higher Education ​A Study of Sustainable Development in a Postcolonial Nation State Teams (online)
9.00 - 10.30 Julia English (3MR) Collaborations for Remake: Participation in Practice 514.01.06 (Brunswick campus) and Teams (online)
11.00 - 12.30 Sara Pishgahi (CoC) Circular Economy volume homebuilding; prospects for transition 22.03.02
1.30 - 3.00 Benedicte O'Leary Rutherford (CoC) The Reparative-Drawer: A New Critical Approach to Reading Comics in a Time of Crisis 22.03.02
2.00 - 3.30 Research Plus Seminar  Gaining and Maintaining Human Research Ethics Approval at RMIT: STEM Online. HDRs view on Research Plus
2.00 - 4.00 Research Plus Seminar Three Minute Thesis (3MT): RMIT Final Event Hybrid event. Register via Research Plus.
3.30 - 5.00 Natasha Karner (2MR) Dehumanising War: The Governance Challenges of Lethal Autonomous Weapons (LAWS) and the UN CCW Teams (online)

Thursday 24 August

Aerial view of roads

Panel Discussion

PhDs Talking Transport with Industry

Thursday 24 August, 12:30pm - 2pm, Green Brain conference rooms, Storey Hall, Building 16, Level 7, RMIT City Campus

Joint presentation by the Urban Futures Symposium and the Centre for Urban Research Talking Transport series. 

This seminar profiles graduate research undertaken by current RMIT scholars and recent graduates exploring the challenges of urban transport

Chair: 
Professor Jago Dodson, Director, Centre for Urban Research, RMIT 

PhDs:

Ms Helen Rowe, Dr Luisiana Paganelli, Dr Eric Keys, Dr Afshin Jafari, Dr Thami Croeser, and Mr Mehdi Alidadi.

Industry respondents:

  • Dr Taru Jain, Manager of Research, Department of Transport and Planning, Victoria State Government
  • Mr Richard Smithers, Manager Transport Strategy, City of Melbourne

Lunch will be provided following this session, accompanied by award of the HDR poster competition prizes. 

Milestone Presentations and Research Plus Seminars

Thursday 24 August

Presentations may be given in-person, online or in hybrid mode. Refer to the location column for details. 

Time Candidate or Seminar Name Presentation Title Location
9.00 - 10.30 Pradip Sankar (WiP) Role of Digital Technologies in Indian Hip Hop Culture: An Examination of Cultural Production, Circulation, and Networking 22.03.02
10.30 - 11.30 Research Plus Seminar Researcher Profiles to set you Apart: ORCiD, LinkedIn and More Online. HDRs view on Research Plus
2.00 - 3.30 Emily Wotherspoon (2MR) Displacing Heterocentrism in Adaptation: Making New Space for Textural Queerness 22.03.02 and Teams (online)
3.30 - 5.00 Amos Atkinson (CoC) How connecting to Country, Culture and Identity can heal First Nations people Teams (online)

Friday 25 August

Milestone Presentations

Friday 25 August

Presentations may be given in-person, online or in hybrid mode. Refer to the location column for details. 

Close up of crystal globe resting on grass in a forest - environment concept

This symposium is a collaboration between the College of Design and Social Context and the Urban Futures Enabling Impact Platform.

aboriginal flag
torres strait flag

Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business - Artwork 'Sentient' by Hollie Johnson, Gunaikurnai and Monero Ngarigo.

aboriginal flag
torres strait flag

Acknowledgement of Country

RMIT University acknowledges the people of the Woi wurrung and Boon wurrung language groups of the eastern Kulin Nation on whose unceded lands we conduct the business of the University. RMIT University respectfully acknowledges their Ancestors and Elders, past and present. RMIT also acknowledges the Traditional Custodians and their Ancestors of the lands and waters across Australia where we conduct our business.