SCI 4

SCI 4 2006 focused on the discipline of architectural history. Participants explored the promises of new information technologies to represent more accurately the visual and spatial domains of the built environment. They also grappled with the following challenges:

• inadequate technological skill sets among faculty and students;
• tools for research that do not yet have the sophistication necessary for deep inquiries;
• the difficulties of project scoping when searching in an abundance of sources which, rich as they are, are insufficient in number, resolution, or accessibility through local systems; and
• a print-based journal that disadvantages this image-based discipline.

Participants acknowledged the intellectual and social imperative to “engage the digital,” because most culture is now created digitally (especially architecture during the design phase); because all students are digital natives; and because the future of the field in many ways depends on its ability to keep current with technological developments. That said, the conservative culture of the academy has put a brake on electronic publishing, and the stifling effect of copyright practices today on research and dissemination have exacerbated this.