EDITORIAL: TRANSDISCIPLINARITY, PEOPLE-ENVIRONMENTS, AND DESIGN RESEARCH

Abstract

This issue marks the beginning of the third year of Archnet-IJAR life. In the first two years, over 85 quality contributions by 70 scholars, academics and practitioners from 27 countries have been published after a rigorous review process followed by leading journals. Due to the high demand on Archnet-IJAR, the issue is divided into three refereed sections in addition to the review and trigger articles section. This issue is thus adding another dimension where many papers from countries not represented before are included to address the transdisciplinary nature of architecture, and people-environments and design research while exhibiting the international dimension of the journal. The first section accommodates 9 papers selected from IAPS 19th – the 19th conference of the International Association for People- Environments Studies, which was held in Bibliotheca Alexandrina in September 2006. The typical norm of the IAPS conferences is that complete papers are submitted for publication after the conference in a post conference book, and they are subjected to a strict review process. The scientific committee of IAPS 19 th selected 31 papers for inclusion in the post conference book. However, due to the limited size constraints mandated by the publisher, 9 papers were not included. Based on discussions of Archnet-IJAR chief editor, the scientific committee of the conference, and IAPS board the nine papers are published in this issue. The second section includes three papers on Traditional Public Baths-Hammam- in the Mediterranean, which represent a continuation of the previous special issue. Thanks to Dr. Fodil Fadli in giving those three papers the opportunity to see the light through an intensive translation and editing process since two of them were originally written in French. While the third section includes five papers submitted and refereed through the typical review process of Archnet-IJAR--offering a wide variety of topics and themes, the review and trigger articles section encompasses four submissions in the form of a review article, symposium abstracts, and book and conference reviews.