Home

 

CURRICULUM VITAE: SHORT VERSION

 

David Seamon

 

Professor

Department of Architecture

Kansas State University

211 Seaton Hall

Manhattan, Kansas 66506-2901

 

Tel: (785) 532‑5953

Fax: (785) 532-6722

triad@ksu.edu

 

OCCUPATIONAL EXPERIENCE (1980-present)

1993-04          Professor, Department of Architecture, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas (promoted April, 1993); sabbatical leave, 1993-94 school year

1987-93          Associate Professor, Department of Architecture, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas (tenured and promoted April, 1987)

1988-89          Research Fellow, Design Advancement Program, National Endowment for the Arts, Olana State Historic Site, Hudson, New York; Visiting Professor, Program in Community Design, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York; academic leave of absence from Department of Architecture, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas

1988                Visiting Faculty, Master's Program in Environmental Studies, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York

1983‑87          Assistant Professor, Department of Architecture, Kansas State University

1980-83                    Visiting Assistant Professor, Departments of Architecture and Geography, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma

 

EDUCATION

B.A.     State University of New York at Albany, Albany, New York, 1970

Ph.D.   Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts, 1977 (Geography; emphasis in behavioral geography and environment-behavior research)

 

BOOKS

2001    Frederic Church’s Olana: Architecture and Landscape as Art, main essay by James A. Ryan, with contributing essays by Franklin Kelly, David Seamon, & Karen Zukowski; David Seamon, general editor. Hensonville, NY: Black Dome Press.

1998    Goethe's Way of Science: A Phenomenology of Nature, edited with Arthur Zajonc. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

1993    Dwelling, Seeing and Designing: Toward a Phenomenol­ogical Ecology, editor. Albany, New York: State University of New York Press.

1985    Dwelling, Place and Environment:  Toward a Phenomenology of Person and World, edited with Robert Mugerauer. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 1985. Reprinted in softcover by Columbia University Press, New York, 1989. Reprinted in hardcover with a new editors’ introduction, by Krieger Press, Malabar, Florida, 2000.

1984    Environmental Perception and Behavior: Inventory and Prospect, edited with Thomas Saarinen and James Sell. Chicago: University of Chicago Department of Geography Series, No. 209.

1980    The Human Experience of Space and Place, edited with Anne Buttimer. London: Croom Helm.

1979    A Geography of the Lifeworld: Movement, Rest and EncounterNew York: St. Martin's Press.

 

BOOK SERIES: EDITORSHIP

1992-- SUNY Press Series in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, Albany, NY: State University of New York Press [a monograph series of authored and edited volumes that incorporate qualitative, descriptive approaches to architectural and environmental experience.  Volumes in the series include:

·        Dwelling, Seeing, and Designing: Toward a Phenomenological Ecology, edited by David Seamon (1993);

·        Interpretations on Behalf of Place: Environmental Displacements and Alternative Responses, by Robert Mugerauer (1994);

·        In the First Country of Places: Nature, Poetry, and Childhood Memory, by Louise Chawla (1994);

·        Goethe's Way of Science: A Phenomenology of Nature, edited by David Seamon and Arthur Zajonc (1998);

·        Safeguarding Our Common Future: Rethinking Sustainable Development, by Ingrid Leman Stefanovic (2000);

·        Landscapes of Betrayal, Landscapes of Joy: Curtisville in the Life of Its Teenagers, by Herb Childress (2000).

 

ARTICLES

2004    Grasping the Dynamism of Urban Place: Contributions from the Work of Christopher Alexander, Bill Hillier, and Daniel Kemmis, to be published in Tom Mels, editor, Understanding Place, forthcoming.

2002    Physical Comminglings: Body, Habit, and Space Transformed into Place, The Occupational Therapy Journal of Research, 22: 42S-51S.

2000    A Way of Seeing People and Place: Phenomenology in Environment-Behavior Research. In S. Wapner, J. Demick, T. Yamamoto, and H Minami (Eds.), Theoretical Perspectives in Environment-Behavior Research (pp. 157-78).  New York: Plenum.

2000    Concretizing Heidegger's Notion of Dwelling: The Contributions of Thomas Thiis-Evensen and Christopher Alexander, in Building and Dwelling [Bauen und Wohnen], edited by Eduard Führ. Munich, Germany: Waxmann Verlag GmbH; New York: Waxmann, 2000, pp. 189-202.

1998    Goethe, Nature, and Phenomenology: An Introduction, in Goethe's Way of Science: A Phenomenology of Nature [see books above].

1997    Environment [Phenomenology and], in Encyclopedia of Phenomenology, Lester Embree et al., eds. (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers), in press [an international encyclopedia on the history and practice of phenomenology; includes entries by some 100 contributors--all key figures in phenomenological research].

1996    To Open Feeling: Phenomenology, Emotional Experience, and Humane Habitats, Laboratorio di Geografia e Letteratura [Studies in Geography and Literature], 1 (1): 15-21.

1994    The Life of the Place: A Phenomenological Commentary on Bill Hillier's Theory of Space Syntax, Nordisk Arkitekturforskning [Nordic Journal of Architectural Research], 7, 1: 35-48.

1994    A Thiis-Evensen Interpretation of Two Churches by Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright (co-authored with Yuan Lin), in R. M. Feldman, G. Hardie, and D. G. Saile, eds., Power by Design: EDRA Proceedings 24, Oklahoma City: Environmental Design Research Association, pp. 130-142.

1993    Dwelling, Seeing and Designing: An Introduction, in Dwelling, Seeing and Designing: Toward a Phenomenol­ogical Ecology, pp. 1-21, [see books above].

1993    Promoting a Foundational Ecology Practically Through Christopher Alexander's Pattern Language: The Example of Meadowcreek (co-authored with Gary J. Coates), in Dwelling, Seeing and Designing: Toward a Phenomenol­ogical Ecology, pp. 331-55, [see books above].

1993    Different Worlds Coming Together: A Phenomenology of Relationship as Portrayed in Doris Lessing's Diaries of Jane Somers, in Dwelling, Seeing and Designing: Toward a Phenomenol­ogical Ecology, pp. 219-46, [see books above].

1992    A Diary Interpretation of Place: Artist Frederic Church's Olana, in Geographical Snapshots of North America, edited by Donald G. Janelle. New York: Guilford Press, pp. 78-82 [a collection of 93 essays commemorating the 27th Congress of the International Geographical Union and Assembly in Washington, D. C., August].

1991    Toward a Phenomenology of Citiness: Kevin Lynch's Image of the City and Beyond, National Geographical Journal of India, 37 (March-June): 178-188.

1991    Toward a Phenomenology of the Architectural Lifeworld, in Architecture: Back..to...Life (Proceedings of the 79th Annual Meeting of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture), edited by John Hancock & William Miller. Wash., D. C.: ACSA Press, pp. 3-7.

1990    Architecture, Experience, and Phenomenology: Toward Reconciling Order and Freedom, paper no. 1, Person-Environment Theory Series, edited by R. Ellis. Berkeley: Center for Environmental Design Research, University of California, Berkeley.

1990    Using Pattern Language to Identify Sense of Place: American Landscape Painter Frederic Church's Olana as a Test Case, in Coming of Age: Proceedings, EDRA, 1990, edited by R. Selby. Urbana-Champaign: University of Illinois, pp. 171-179.

1990    Awareness and Reunion: A Phenomenology of the Person-Environment Relationship as Portrayed in the New York Photographs of André Kertész, in Place Images in the Media, edited by Leo Zonn. Totowa, New Jersey: Roman and Littlefield, pp. 87-107.

1989    Humanistic and Phenomenological Advances in Environmental Design: The Case of Genius Loci, The Humanistic Psychologist, 17 (Autumn): 280-293.

1988    Towards a Phenomenology of Environmental Meaning: The Example of Flowforms, The National Geographical Journal of India [special issue on Environmental Meaning and Aesthetics], 34 (March): 65-74.

1987    Phenomenology and the Clark Experience, Journal of Environmental Psychology [special issue on Clark University as a center of innovation for research in environment and behavior], 7 (December, 1987): 367-377.

1987    Phenomenology and Environment‑Behavior Research, in Gary T. Moore and

            Ervin Zube, eds., Advances in Environment, Behavior, and Design, vol. 1. New York: Plenum, pp. 3-27.

1987    Phenomenology and Vernacular Lifeworlds, in David Saile, ed., Architecture in Cultural Change. Lawrence, Kansas: School of Architecture, University of Kansas,pp. 17‑24 [reprinted in The Trumpeter, 8, 4 (Fall 1991): 201-206].

1987    Christopher Alexander and the Nature of Architecture, Orion Nature Quarterly, 6, (Spring): 20‑33 (co-authored with Gary J. Coates and Susanne Siepl).

1985    Dwelling, Place and Environment: An Introduction, co‑authored with Robert Mugerauer, in David Seamon and Robert Mugerauer, eds., Dwelling, Place and Environment [see books above], pp. 1‑12.

1985    Reconciling Old and New Worlds: The Dwelling‑Journey Relationship as Portrayed in Vilhelm Moberg's "Emigrant" Novels, in David Seamon and Robert Mugerauer, eds., Dwelling, Place and Environment [see books above], pp. 227‑245.

1984    Heidegger's Notion of Dwelling and One Concrete Interpretation as Indicated by Hassan Fathy's Architecture for the Poor, Geosciences and Man, 24 (April): 43‑53.

1984    Emotional Experience of the Environment, American Behavioral Scientist, 27 (July/August): 757‑770.

1984    Phenomenologies of Place and Environment, Phenomenology and Pedagogy, 2: 130‑135.

1984    Toward a Phenomenology of Place and Place‑Making: Interpreting Landscape, Lifeworld and Aesthetics (co‑authored with Gary J. Coates), Oz, 6 (May): 6‑9.

1984    Philosophical Directions in Behavioral Geography with an Emphasis on the Phenomenological Contribution, in Environmental Perception and Behavior: Inventory and Prospect, co‑edited with Thomas Saarinen and James Sell. Chicago: University of Chicago Department of Geography Series, No. 209, pp. 167‑178.

1983    Creativity: Center and Horizon, in Anne Buttimer, ed., Creativity and Context (Lund, Sweden: Gleerup), pp. 54‑64. 

1983    A Soft‑Spoken Hero: The Phenomenological Contribution to Architectural Education, in N. Harm and J. Kudra, eds. Proceedings: Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture, West Central Regional Conference, 1982 (Norman: University of Oklahoma College of Environmental Design, 1983), pp. 128‑136.

1982    The Phenomenological Contribution to Environmental Psychology, Journal of Environmental Psychology, 2 (June): 119‑140.

1982    Heidegger, Environment and Dwelling, Environment and Planning A, 14 (March): 419‑423.

1981    Newcomers, Existential Outsiders and Insiders: Their Portrayal in Two Books by Doris Lessing, in D.C.D. Pocock, ed., Humanistic Geography and Literature (London: Croom Helm), pp. 85‑100.

1980    Market Place as Place Ballet: A Swedish Example (co‑authored with Christina Nordin), Landscape 24 (October): 35‑41.

1980    Body Ballets, Time‑space Routines and Place Ballets, in The Human Experience of Space and Place [see books above], pp. 146‑65.

1980    Afterward: Community, Place and Environment, in The Human Experience of Space and Place [see books above], pp. 188‑96.

1979    Phenomenology, Geography and Geographic Education, Journal of Geography in Higher Education, 3 (Autumn): 40‑50.

1978    Goethe's Approach to the Natural World: Implications for Environmental Theory and Education, in David Ley and Marwyn Samuels, eds., Humanistic Geography: Prospects and Problems (Chicago: Maaroufa Press), pp. 238‑50.

1976    Phenomenological Investigation of Imaginative Literature, in G.T. Moore and R.G. Golledge, eds., Environmental Knowing: Theories, Research, and Methods (Stroudsburg, PA: Dowden, Hutchison and Ross) pp. 286‑90.

1976    Extending the Man‑Environment Relationship: Wordsworth and Goethe's Experience of the Natural World, Monadnock, 50: 38‑50.

1975    The Phenomenological Investigation of Lived‑Space, Monadnock, 49: 38‑45.

1972    Environmental Imagery: An Overview and Tentative Ordering, in W.J. Mitchell, ed., Environmental Design: Research and Practice (Los Angeles: School of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of California, Los Angeles) pp. 7‑1‑1‑‑7‑1‑7.

 

INTRODUCTIONS, COMMENTARIES, AND DESIGN REPORTS

2000    Series Editor's Introduction, in Ingrid Stefanovic, Safeguarding Our Common Future  [vol. 5, SUNY series in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, David Seamon, series editor], Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

2000    Series Editor's Introduction, in Herb Childress, Landscapes of Betrayal, Landscapes of Joy [vol. 4, SUNY series in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, David Seamon, series editor], Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

1996    A Singular Impact: Ted Relph's Place and Placelessness, in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology Newsletter, 7, 3: 5-8 [special issue on the 20th anniversary of Relph's book].

1994    Series Editor's Introduction, in Louise Chawla, In the First Country of Places: Nature, Poetry, and Childhood Memory [vol. 3, SUNY series in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, David Seamon, series editor], Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

1994    Series Editor's Introduction, in Robert Mugerauer, Interpretations on Behalf of Place: Environmental Displacements and Alternative Responses [vol. 2, SUNY series in Environmental and Architectural Phenomenology, David Seamon, series editor], Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

1993    "Seeing with New Eyes": Phenomenology and the New Millennium," in Voices on the Threshold of Tomorrow, Georg Feuerstein and Trisha Lamb Feurstein, eds., Wheaton, Illinois: Quest, pp. 84-87. Reprinted in The Scientific and Medical Network Newsletter, 53 (December): 11-13.

1992    Presenting Sense of Place to the Public: Planning an Introductory Multi-Media Exhibit for American Landscape Painter Frederic Church's Olana, Final Report, National Endowment for the Arts, Design Arts Program, March (Grant No. 91-4216-0038).

1991    Humanistic Geography, in Modern Geography: An Encyclopedic Survey, Gary S. Dunbar, ed., New York: Garland Publishing (vol. 1197 in Garland Reference Library of Humanities), pp. 81-82.

1989    Recommendations for a Visitors' Center at Frederic Church's Olana Based on Christopher Alexander's Pattern Language, Final Report, National Endowment for the Arts, Design Arts Program, January (Grant No. 87-4216-0152).

1989    Phenomenology & Pedagogy: A "Repository for the Romantic and Nostalgic"? Phenomenology & Pedagogy, 7: 257-260.

1984    Design Plans for Meadowcreek: Promoting a Foundational Ecology Practically through Christopher Alexander's Pattern Language (co‑authored with Gary Coates and upper‑level design students at Kansas State University), in Meadowcreek Notes, 7: (Fox, Arkansas: Meadowcreek Project), pp. 2‑10.

1984    The Question of Reliable Knowledge: The Irony and Tragedy of Positivist Research, Professional Geographer, 36: 216‑218.

1983    Response to Sixsmith's Comments on the "Phenomenological Contribution...," Journal of Environmental Psychology, 3: 199‑201.

1980    Concretising Phenomenology: A Response to Aitchison, in Journal of Geography and Higher Education, 4: 89‑92.

1978    Landscape and Literature: A Response to Thrift, in Environmental and Planning A, 10: 729‑30.

 

EXHIBIT WRITING

2000    Thomas Cole and Cedar Grove [panel texts for a permanent visitors’ exhibit at the Catskill, NY home of 19th-century landscape artist Thomas Cole; wrote the text and selected visual images for the exhibit, a series of ten 5 x 7-foot panels].

2000    Historic Catskill Point: Gateway Between River and Mountains [panel texts for a permanent visitors’ exhibit at the Freightmaster House, Historic Catskill Point, Catskill, New York].

1992    Landscape Artist Frederic Church's Olana [panel texts for the permanent visitors' exhibit at Olana, New York State Historic Site], co-authored with James A. Ryan, Site Manager, Olana Historic Site, Hudson, NY.

 

CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS (1990-present only)

2002    Connections That Have a Quality of Necessity: Goethe’s Way of Science as a Phenomenology of Nature, paper presented for the annual meetings of the International Association for Environmental Philosophy, Chicago, October.

1997    Toward a Phenomenology of Sacred Architecture: Natural Symbols and Architectural Archetypes as Illustrated in LeCorbusier's Ronchamp Chapel, co-authored with Yuan Lin, "Making Sacred Places" conference, College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning, University of Cincinnati, October.

1996    Thomas Thiis-Evensen's Phenomenology of Architectural Archetypes: The South Wall of Le Corbusier's Ronchamp Chapel as an Example, paper prsented at the annual meetings of SPHS (Society for Phenomenology and Human Sciences), Washington, DC, October.

1995    Toward a Phenomenology of Environmental and Architectural Wholeness: Christopher Alexander's Contribution, paper presented at the national meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), Boston, March.

1995    Goethe's Prism Experiments as Phenomenological Seeing, paper presented at the national *meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), Boston, March.

1994    To Open Feeling: Emotional Experience, Environmental Design, and Humane Habitats, paper presented at the national meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), San Antonio, March.

1993    A Thiis-Evensen Interpretation of Two 20th-Century Churches: Le Corbusier's Ronchamp Chapel and Frank Lloyd Wright's Unitarian Church (co-presented with Yuan Lin) at the national meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), Chicago, April.

1992    The Inhabiting Body: Environment, Design, and a Phenomenology of Embodiment, paper presented at the national meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), University of Colorado, Boulder, April.

1991    Toward a Phenomenology of the Architectural Lifeworld, paper presented at the national meetings of ACSA (Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture), Wash., D. C., April.

1990    American Landscape Artists Frederic Edwin Church's Olana: Creating Harmonious Place Through Landscape Design, invited paper presented at the international conference, "The Artist's Home," University of Paris, October [co-presented with James Ryan, Director, Olana State Historic Site, Hudson, New York].

1990    Using Pattern Language to Identify Sense of Place: American Landscape Painter Frederic Church's Olana as a Test Case, paper presented at the national meetings of EDRA (Environmental Design Research Association), University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, April.

 

INVITED LECTURES AND PRESENTATIONS

2002    The Habitual Stratum of Architectural and Environmental Experience, Keynote lecture for “Soundings” seminar, organized by Juhani Palaasma, Washington University, St. Louis, January.

2001    Body, Habits, and Place: Toward a Phenomenology of the Habitual Stratum of Human Experience., Keynote address for the conference, Understanding Habits in Context, sponsored by the American Occupational Therapy Association, Asilomar Conference Center, Pacific Grove, California, February.

1994    Christopher Alexander's Pattern Language as a Way to Understand Frederic Church's Olana, a presentation to the planning committee for an art exhibition, "The Center of the World: Contemporary Views from Olana," Albany Institute of History and Art, Albany, NY, March.

1990    The Conceptual Approaches of Christopher Alexander, Karsten Harries, and Thomas Thiis-Evensen as a Way to Understand Sense of Place: American Landscape Artist Frederic Church's Olana as an Example, invited lecture and seminar presented at the Departments of Geography and Architecture, University of Texas, Austin, November.

1989    Phenomenology, Architecture, and Environmental Design Research, invited seminar presented at the Department of Architecture, University of Michigan, April.

1988    Community Design: Place as Art and Art as Place, Poughkeep­sie, New York, December; part of a fall lecture series on public art organized by the Dutchess County Arts Council.

1988    Phenomenology as a Paradigm for Environment-Behavior Research, invited lecture, Graduate Program in Environmental Psychology, City University of New York, October.

1986    Phenomenology, Design, and Environment‑Behavior Research, a lecture given for the "Invited Speakers" program, Department of Architecture, Clemson, University, Clemson, South Carolina, September.

1986    The Phenomenological Approach to Architecture as Place‑Making, an invited lecture, College of Architecture and Design, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, May.

1985    Phenomenology and Environment-Behavior-Design Research, an invited lecture, Department of Architecture, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, April.

 

STUDENT AWARDS

2002    Enku Assefa, winner of the Kansas State University John Helm Award for outstanding Architecture master's thesis.

2000    Amit Ramani, winner of the Kansas State University John Helm Award for outstanding Architecture master's thesis.

1997    Sarita Apachu, winner of the Kansas State University Award for outstanding Architecture master's thesis in Environment-Behavior Research.

1992    Yuan Lin, winner of the Kansas State University John Helm Award for outstanding Architecture master's thesis.

1989    Robert Habiger, winner of the Kansas State University John Helm Award for outstanding Architecture master's thesis.

 

COURSES TAUGHT, Kansas State University 

ARCH 301      Appreciation of Architecture (lecture course taught both fall and spring terms; approx. 250 students/semester)

ARCH 325      The Designed Environment and Society (required course, spring semester, for all sophomore Architecture majors, starting 1994; approx. 70 students per year)

ARCH 703      Environmental Aesthetics (graduate and undergraduate seminar taught fall, 1990-01; approx. 25 students)

ARCH 715      Qualitative Approaches to Place, Environment and Architecture (graduate and undergraduate seminar taught spring term, approx. 25 students)

ENVD 220      Theory of Environmental Design I (Human Aspects of Design; lecture course taught fall term, 1983-92; approx. 250 students)

ARCH 846      Upper‑level Design Studio, co-taught spring 1983-85, (approx. 14 students)

PLAN 745       Theories of Urban Design (graduate and undergraduate seminar taught fall term 1987-89, approx. 15 students)

 

Top of page