The dissertation plays an essential role in the development of students’ intellectual capabilities and resources, and forms an important vehicle through which the skills of scholarship and research are cultivated and tested. It provides students with the opportunity to develop their own architectural interests through the pursuit of research, scholarship and written argument. The preparation and presentation of a dissertation of around 10,000 words provides the opportunity to take this study to some depth.
Students begin work on their dissertations within small groups that are aligned to a stated theme or methodology, and progressively develop their individual critical abilities, data collection abilities, and authorial voice. Thanks to their work on a dissertation, students increase their architectural vocabularies through exposure to, and discussion of, a wide range of issues relating to the built environment, and histories and epistemologies of architecture.