Theories of the Urban (TotU). Collaborating with more than humans: AI in the classroom
An open event exploring co-creation methodologies
IAAC’s Master in Advanced Urban Planning & Data Analytics (MUPD), within the framework of the PENCE project, invites you to an open discussion on collaborative design for the future of cities in the face of the climate crisis and ongoing neoliberal urbanization.
What role do AI and emerging technologies play in reimagining urban futures amid climate change? How can we regenerate city imaginaries by critically engaging with the entangled roles of designers, complex statistical models, and training datasets through co-design methodologies?
Curated and guided by Mariano Gomez-Luque and Neslihan Gülhan, this session will explore experimental collaborations between humans and intelligent technologies, aiming to co-create speculative visions for the future of cities. It will present a series of reflections on emerging practices of co-creation with AI, developed within the Theories of the Urban seminar, a triptych course embedded in IAAC’s MUPD program.
This event will encourage discussions on how to critically and speculatively mobilize a range of epistemological lenses and media formats to decode the increasingly synthetic landscapes and ecologies of the contemporary urban world. The session will feature contributions from Nikos Katsikis, Eduardo Rico-Carranza, Mathilde Marengo, and Ethel Baraona Pohl.
About “Theories of the Urban”:
The seminar mobilizes different theoretical lenses across a multidisciplinary gradient of critical discourses (design, critical urban theory, literary studies, political ecology) in order to unravel and make sense of the manifold layers of planetary urbanization, understood as a socio-spatial process operating across multiple, interwoven scales: from that of the body to that of the building, from that of the city to that of the territory and, ultimately, the planet itself.
Acknowledging the growing presence of artificial intelligence in both academic and everyday contexts, the seminar incorporates AI chatbots as collaborative agents in the learning process. Students are asked to sustain a critical engagement with AI—exploring new forms of textual analysis, conceptual brainstorming, and hybrid modes of writing, culminating in the production of a collection of multi-format micro-essays and an extended class glossary. In parallel to these open-ended explorations, they are tasked with articulating methodological notes to post-rationalize their workflows, evaluate their potential, and construct novel writing protocols. This approach seeks to cultivate critical awareness of AI’s accelerating affordances and embedded ideological constraints, seeking to open up new pedagogical vistas and avenues of critical thought.
The seminar’s pedagogical approach emphasizes active, multimodal engagement with course materials, extending well beyond conventional textual analysis. Students are invited to critically and synthetically “read” not only texts but also built environments, building forms, and (new/emergent) urban subjectivities, treating these as transcalar modalities constitutive of planetary-scale urbanization.
Come think, speculate, and co-create this conversation with us!
Schedule
2.15 - 2.30pm - Registration
2.30 - 2.50pm - Collaborating with more than humans: AI and other technologies, Mariano
2:50 - 3:35 pm - AI and the city, presentation by Francisco Ferrer da Costa Lopes de Oliveira, Michał Modelski, Sutirtha Das Gupta and Valeria Paz Villanueva Aguilera
3:35 - 4:20 pm - SF as ‘ecological critique’, presentation by Luisa Torre Varas, Maria Jose Schmidt and Sanjaykumar Venkateshbabu
4:20 - 4:40 pm - Break
4:40 - 5:25 pm - The role of urban theory in the Anthropocene, presentation by Brooke Ulmane, Josefina Ovalle Parot and Maja Delali Mawusi
5:25 - 6:10 PM - The future of the urban world, presentation by Daniela Rodriguez Mattos, Lakshmi Narayanan Vadamalai Kannan and Luis Ángel Martínez Reyes
6:10 - 6:30 pm - Final Remarks
The initiative is part of the PENCE – Power Europe Narrative for Civic Ecology project which has received funding from the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values Programme, under the European grant agreement No. 101147563. The goal of PENCE is to accelerate Europe’s ecological transition toward climate neutrality by leveraging the expertise and participation of citizens and professionals of the Creative Sectors and Industries (CCSI) to drive impactful climate action.
