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American Roundtable is a new Architectural League initiative, bringing together on-the-ground perspectives on the condition of American communities and what they need to thrive going forward.
How can we see with fresh eyes the condition—the successes, failures, and opportunities—of the American landscape? How can we more deeply understand the relationship of individuals and communities to their environments and the constraining and empowering impacts that the built environment has on daily life, and the trajectories of lives? These are the questions asked by American Roundtable, a new initiative of The Architectural League that brings together on-the-ground perspectives on the condition of American small to mid-sized communities and what they need to thrive going forward.
For the project, The Architectural League commissioned reports exploring nine communities and regions across the United States. Reports include essays, interviews, oral histories, photography, graphics, mapping, video, and other media, structured around five main topic areas: Public Space, Health, Work and Economy, Infrastructure, and Environment. In parallel with the publication of reports, the League will present a series of public programs, creating opportunities for extended discussion on the communities explored, as well as on topics and issues that cut across multiple communities and have relevance to the national conversation.
The editorial teams leading the work were selected through an open, national call for proposals. The communities are: Africatown, Alabama; Along the Lumbee River, North Carolina; Appalachia, West Virginia; Brownsville, Texas; Cheyenne River Reservation, South Dakota; Lower Rio Grande, New Mexico; River Valley, Maine; South Beach, Washington; and Youngstown-Warren-Lordstown, Ohio.
The reports reveal the myriad ways by which place forms identity. By providing a platform for individuals, groups, and organizations too often overlooked or ignored in the past, and by asking how design and an understanding of the built environment can empower communities, American Roundtable hopes to find new ways for Americans to connect with empathy across boundaries of geography, history, and contemporary condition. Our goal is an amplified, embracing national conversation that imagines a better future for all.
American Roundtable will launch on January 12, 2021 with online reports published biweekly through early spring.
My team consists of me and my co-editor, Aaron Cayer (ethnographer, historian, and educator of architecture at the University of New Mexico); and our team: N.B. Aldrich (artist); Elizabeth Kaney (art director, artist, designer); Nina Elder (artist); John Freeman (author, editor, poet, book critic); Steve Norton (media artist); Tom Leytham (artist).
Learn more about American Roundtable here!