School of Architecture, Design and Planning

Dr Manu P. Sobti

Senior Lecturer in Architecture
School of Architecture, Design and Planning
+61 7 334 61215
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Researcher biography

Dr. Manu P. Sobti is a landscape historian and urban interlocutor of the Global South with research specialisations in South Asia, South East Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East. Within the gamut of the Global, the Islamic, and the Non-Western, his continuing work examines borderland transgressions and their intertwinement with human mobilities, indigeneities, and the narratives of passage across these liminal sites. From his perspective, 'land-centered' and 'deep' place histories replete with human actors serve as critical and de-colonizing processes that negate the top-down master-narratives wherein borders and boundaries simplistically delineate nation states and their scalar range of internal geographies. He was previously Associate Professor at the School of Architecture & Urban Planning (SARUP), University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee USA (2006-16). He has a B.Dipl.Arch. from the School of Architecture-CEPT (Ahmedabad - INDIA), an SMarchS. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Cambridge - USA), and a Ph.D. from the College of Architecture, Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta - USA).

As a recognized scholar and innovative educator, Sobti served as Director of SARUP-UWM's India Winterim Program (2008-15). This foreign study program worked intensively with local architecture schools in Ahmedabad, Delhi and Chandigarh, allowing students and faculty to interact actively, often within the gamut of the same project. He also set up a similar, research-focused program in Uzbekistan, engaging advanced undergraduate and graduate students to undertake field research at sites, archives and cultural landscapes. In partnership with the Art History Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and SARUP colleagues, Sobti also co-coordinated the Building-Landscapes-Cultures (BLC) Concentration of SARUP-UWM's Doctoral Program (2011-13), creating opportunities for student research in diverse areas of architectural and urban history and in multiple global settings. He served as the Chair of SARUP's PhD Committee between 2014-16, leading an area of BLC's research consortium titled Urban Histories and Contested Geographies.

Sobti's research has been supported by multiple funding bodies, including the Graham Foundation of the Arts (USA), the Architectural Association (UK), the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research (USA), the French Institute of Central Asian Studies (UZBEKISTAN), the US Department of State Fulbright Foundation (USA), the Aga Khan Foundation (SWITZERLAND), the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (USA), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), the Centre for 21st Century Studies University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (USA), the Institute for Research in the Humanities University of Wisconsin-Madison (USA), Stanford University (USA), in addition to city governments in New Delhi/Chandigarh/Ahmedabad (INDIA), Samarqand/Bukhara (UZBEKISTAN), Erzurum (TURKEY) and New Orleans (USA). He has also served as a United States Department of State Fulbright Senior Specialist Scholar and received 7 Research Fellowships at important institutions worldwide. He is a nominated Expert Member of the ICOMOS-ICIP (Interpretation and Presentation of Cultural Heritage Sites) International Committee, responsible for debate and stewardship on contentious cultural heritage issues globally.

Publications

Book (1)
Book Chapters (12)
Journal Articles (5)
Conference Papers (2)

Book

Sobti, Manu P. (1993). Urban form & space in the Islamic city: a study of morphology & formal structures in the city of Bhopal (central India). Ahmedabad, India: Vastu Shilpa Foundation and School of Architecture - Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology CEPT.

Book Chapters

Sobti, Manu P. and Rad Yousefnia, Ali (2024). Beyond Water: Step Wells and Community Hydraulics in Modern India. Rethinking Stormwater Management through Sustainable Urban Design. (pp. 273-292) Singapore: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-981-97-4924-9_14
Sobti, Manu P. (2020). Re-eimagining Eurasia: past Flatland stories of urban and landscape heritage. The Routledge handbook on historic urban landscapes in the Asia-Pacific. (pp. 80-97) edited by Kapila Silva. Abingdon, Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9780429486470-4
Sobti, Manu P. (2019). Eurasia’s historical space of palimpsest—desert, border, riparian and steppe. Architecture on the borderline: boundary politics and built space. (pp. 15-35) edited by Anoma Pieris. New York, NY USA: Routledge. doi: 10.4324/9781315103419-2
Sobti, Manu P. (2017). Transforming ruralities and edge-ness in global urbanities. Chandigarh re-think: transforming ruralities and edge(ness) in global urbanities. (pp. 10-37) edited by Manu P.Sobti. Novato, CA, United States: ORO Editions.
Sobti, Manu and Hosseini, Sahar (2016). Persian civitas: revised readings on networked urbanities and suburban hinterlands in Erich Schmidt’s flights over ancient cities of Iran. The Historiography of Persian Architecture. (pp. 14-40) edited by Mohammad Gharipour. New York, NY, United States: Routledge.
Sobti, Manu P. and Gharipour, Mohammad (2015). Mobile urbanism: tent cities in medieval European travel writings. The city in the Muslim world: depictions by western travel writers. (pp. 22-56) edited by Mohammad Gharipour and Nilay Ozlu. Abingdon, Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge.
Sobti, Manu P. and Gharipour, Mohammad (2011). The hues of paradise: examining color design in the Islamic garden. And Diverse are Their Hues: color in Islamic art and culture. (pp. 304-325) edited by Sheila Blair and Jonathan Bloom. New Haven, CT, United States: Yale University Press.
Sobti, Manu P. (2010). Migration, urban form, and the courtyard house: socio-cultural reflections on the Pathan Mohallas in Bhopal, India. The courtyard house: from cultural reference to universal relevance. (pp. 65-81) edited by Nasser O Rabbat. Abingdon, Oxon, United Kingdom: Routledge.
Sobti, Manu P. (2009). ON DIRT: Figuring the Urban Ground Workshop + Urban Ecotone Design Competition 2007. Calibrations 3: positions. (pp. 58-60) Milwaukee, United States: School of Architecture &​ Urban Planning, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
Sobti, Manu P. (2003). Dwellings in the Steppes and Deserts of Inner Asia. Asia’s Dwellings: Tradition, Resilience and Change. (pp. 393-430) edited by Ronald Knapp. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
Sobti, Manu P. (2003). The Oases Settlements of Central Asia. The Interaction between Land and People in Central and Inner Asia. (pp. 145-173) edited by Michael Gervers and Uradyn Bulag. London, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
Sobti, Manu P. (2002). Urban metamorphosis and change in the central Asian region after the Arab invasions: an analysis of archaeological findings, literature and scholarly writings. Continuity and Change in Central and Inner Asia. (pp. 199-233) edited by Michael Gervers and Wayne Schlepp. Toronto, Canada: Joint Centre for Asia Pacific Studies.

Journal Articles

Sobti, Manu P. and Scriver, Peter (2022). Personal journey or tectonic practice: thick descriptions of curated residential interiors by four Indian architects. Fabrications, 32 (1), 82-109. doi: 10.1080/10331867.2022.2091838
Sobti, Manu P. (2022). Withering public space in Chandigarh: Transforming retail and social choreographies in the neoliberal Indian mall. Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review, XXXIII (2), 47-58.
Sobti, M. Manu Prithvish (2021). Suburban cities and fluid boundaries: Stories beyond the walls of Islamic urbanities in Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. Hespéris-Tamuda – Journal of the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of Rabat Morocco, LVI (4), 237-263.
Sobti, Manu P. (2011). The Last Apples of Kazakhstan: Modernity, Geo-Politics and Globalization in Central Asia. Global Currents Bi-annual Bulletin, 7 (2), 8-9.
Sobti, Manu P. (2010). Reflections on the Indian City: SARUP-CCA Urban Mapping Workshop 2009. Indian arch'09: annual NASA convention 2009-10, 56-63.

Conference Papers

Sobti, Manu P. (2021). Seljuq cities and architecture within and beyond the city – macro and micro perspectives. Uluslararasi Selcuklu Tarihi Cografyasi Suriye – Irak – Filistin Sempozyumu Bildiri Kitabi, Unknown, 2020. Konya: NEÜ Yayınları.
Sobti, Manu P. (2009). City in Suburbia – Metamorphosis and Change in Central Asian Cities after the Arab Invasions. ESCAS IX, Krakow, Poland, 2005. Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom: Cambridge Scholars.

Areas of research

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