![]() ![]() Do we really need towers with tilted diamond-shaped tops?" Data-diagramming"Comparing Dutch architects with their American colleagues, I find it positive that those in the Netherlands at least turn more to urbanism," Boyer says. Referring to one of the final architectural proposals for replacing the Twin Towers at Ground Zero in New York City, Boyer says questioningly: "These products are too beautiful to be true. She is also critical of the dominating emphasis on aesthetics. Design practice for sure can be of influence," Boyer says. Also within the field of architecture and urbanism, again and again she refers to this 'social agenda', or rather the lack of it."Too often urban processes are considered a 'natural development’. And Boyer certainly 'inherited' some of Chomsky's social-critical views.In CyberCities, for example, which is required reading for anyone interested in the modern city, electronic technologies, or politics, Boyer issues a clarion call to reinstall a social agenda in the midst of all these technological innovations, such as the computer, Internet and virtual reality. He is generally considered to be the leading left-wing intellectual in the United States. And I must admit that my linguistics professor Noam Chomsky had been an influential figure in that decision."Beginning with his critique of the Vietnam War at that time, Chomsky has become widely known for his media criticism and politics. At that time, the Vietnam War was also going on. "That year I took the choice and the chance of learning and reading more about society, rather than taking those technical and abstract courses. One could say that Boyer truly is modern day throwback to the kind of all-round scholars that used to exist in medieval Europe! ChomskyBoyer says that especially crucial to her distinguished academic career was the opportunity she had to be a special student at MIT in 1965/1966. She followed this with a Master's degree and a PhD degree in city planning at MIT and a post-doc research position in social psychology at Harvard University. Degree in science, computer and information sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, Boyer ended up being a special student in computational linguistics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Not least of all because of her broad view on both technological as well as social issues, and her unique ability to bring these two worlds together.Boyer's academic career has been a long and fascinating one. This author is not a male!"Not only for female architecture students, but for every engineering candidate out there, Boyer is a potential source of inspiration. When first reading her famous books The City of Collective Memory (1994) and CyberCities (1996) as a student in architecture at Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara, Turkey, I recall how pleasantly surprised I was to discover that it really was possible for a woman to enter the male-dominated world of both practitioners and theoreticians of architecture.After reading her books, I still remember my first words when presenting her works in class: "Friends, be careful. All-round scholarAs a female scientist, Boyer already had a special place in my memory. And her TU Delft colleagues were also proud to have her here, even giving Boyer the nickname 'Evergreen', both for her omnipresent appearances at lectures, debates and projects, as well as for her lively and warm personality. But in terms of atmosphere, it's difficult to compare this with my own faculty in Princeton, where we have about 50 mostly native students."Of her time spent as a visiting professor at TU Delft, Boyer says: "Besides the hospitality of my friends in the Netherlands, the intellectual stimulation certainly is one of my favorite memories." What she didn't miss about Holland back home in New York? "That national Dutch dish, which I can't remember the name of now," she says, laughing.In an interview in the 'The Architecture Annual', TU Delft's architecture faculty yearbook, Boyer fondly recalled her term as a visiting professor at the Delft School of Design. ![]() "In the PhD group I was lecturing, the majority of researchers were non-Dutch, and many of them joined almost all of our discussions quite fanatically. And she now also revels in the nickname ‘Evergreen' given to her by her colleagues at TU Delft's Faculty of Architecture."TU Delft is doing quite well in attracting talented and motivated foreign students," says Professor Christine Boyer.
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