adelaide uni phd opportunities

International Students

Phd and masters research degrees in australia.

Are you looking to further your knowledge and become an expert in your field of interest? Start your greatest adventure with a Higher Degree by Research at the University of Adelaide.

Ranked in the top 100 of universities globally, at the University of Adelaide you will be involved in discovery, innovation and cutting-edge research. Enjoy an outstanding research environment under the wing of top-ranked researchers and establish life-long connections with industry and like-minded students. Start building your future now.

Find your degree

There is an option for every discipline. Explore our Masters and Doctorate degrees by research.

Industry opportunities

Turn theory into practice with a research internship and industry-engaged higher degree research program (HDR). Develop expertise in your chosen field and extend your professional contacts and networks.

Programs are open to applicants who are eligible for onshore study and meet the University of Adelaide’s English Language Requirements at the time of the application.

International joint PhDs

Widen your research connections and study at two high quality universities within Australia or between different countries.

You will spend time at each university and receive a single doctoral degree jointly awarded by both institutions.

Research connections

Australian institute for machine learning.

The University of Adelaide’s Australian Institute for Machine Learning is the largest university-based research group in machine learning in Australia. Research areas include agriculture, space, medicine, transport, defence, cybersecurity and advanced manufacturing.

The University of Adelaide is a founding member of SAHMRI, South Australia’s independent, not-for-profit health and medical research institute. Research areas include clinical trials, genetics, Aboriginal health, public health and medical imaging.

International scholarships

The University of Adelaide offers a range of strategic and merit-based scholarships for outstanding Higher Degree by Research applicants.

International student resources

Why study a research degree with us.

The infrastructure and supports for research students are excellent. I have enjoyed access to a range of services and courses created to promote career development. The staffs are friendly and very helpful.

Dr Withawat Withayachumnankul

Want to learn more?

Call us:  +61 8 8313 7335

Ask Adelaide (Toll free for general enquiries): 1800 061 459

Future Students

Current student enquiries, make history.

Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology

Research Degrees

Work with our world-renowned experts to find answers in science, technology, maths and engineering. Make an impact in your chosen field of research with your fresh ideas and insights.

We offer a unique opportunity for you to gain practical and theoretical knowledge through dynamic national and international research projects. Link with experts in industry and government via co-located industry partners, affiliated researchers and research institutes of international significance.

Complete a research degree with us and graduate with advanced skills and experience to tackle a range of rewarding careers.

We provide a stimulating environment for research students. Be part of a thriving research culture which promotes excellence, fosters creativity and catalyses success.

My time at the University of Adelaide has been extraordinary, challenging and life-changing. I love the social interaction and field-work component of studying earth sciences. During my undergraduate and PhD studies I have travelled around Australia and the world. I am now a part of a global community of geoscientists.

Bonnie Henderson

After completing by Bachelor of Science (Advanced) majoring in theoretical and experimental physics, I went straight into a Master of Philosophy in the field of dark matter phenomenology. I appreciated the social network I have been able to build, not only in my field but with people from a wide variety of backgrounds.

Andre Scaffidi

Scholarships.

Scholarships for research degrees are available to international and domestic students. You can increase your chances of gaining a scholarship by having an established list of published research papers in internationally recognised peer-reviewed journals.

Scholarships for domestic students   Scholarships for international students

Study options

• Higher degrees by research (HDR)
• Alternative pathways In addition to pursuing a PhD or MPhil, we offer two-year masters by coursework with major research components. The following degree may provide a pathway into PhD study:  Master of Biotechnology (Biomedical) - complete a research project under the direction of a scientific and industry mentor. You do not need to find a supervisor.
• Undergraduate research with the Bachelor of Science (Advanced)

Adelaide Graduate Research School

Scholarships

There are a range of government and University funded scholarships available to support you during your Higher Degree Research (HDR) candidature. These scholarships provide support with a range of expenses associated with undertaking HDR research including living expenses, tuition waivers, and ancillary costs associated with your research.

HDR scholarships can include one or more of the following types of support*:

• Stipend – this is a living allowance paid to the student fortnightly for the duration of the scholarship to help with living expenses. Please be aware that stipends are intended to contribute towards living expenses for the student themselves and may not be sufficient to fully cover the cost of living, particularly if accompanied by dependents.
• Fee Offset/Waiver – this pays tuition fees that would otherwise be paid by the student for the duration of the scholarship. Note: this is a financial arrangement within the university and is not paid to the student.
• Allowances – reimbursement for costs associated with undertaking HDR research such as relocation costs, and Overseas Health Cover.

* NOTE:    If you are successful in obtaining a scholarship, your offer letter will provide details of which, if any, of these types of support you have been awarded.

Search for postgraduate research scholarships

Scholarships Available for HDR Students

Research training program stipend and university of adelaide research scholarships.

The most widely awarded scholarships available to HDR students are the Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship (RTPS) and the University of Adelaide Research Scholarship (UARS) . Both of these awards provide a stipend ( living allowance ) and fee offset/ waiver for the duration of the scholarship. Detailed information about additional allowances and conditions of these scholarships are provided in the Conditions of Award .

Applications for RTPS and UARS scholarships primarily occur through the scholarship rounds held prior to the beginning of semester ( see Applying for HDR Scholarships – Opportunities i n the Competitive Rounds ).

* Information for supervisors who have a strategic scholarship to allocate can be found in Staff Resources .

Other HDR Scholarships

In addition to the RTPS and UARS awards, there are other opportunities available to HDR students , including externally funded major awards, supplementary scholarships ( top - up scholarships ) , industry programs and placements, allowances for operating costs, and travel scholarships. These scholarships are individually listed in the University Scholarships Database .

Most, but not all, of these opportunities are offered separately to the scholarship rounds and require a separate and specific application. You will find information about how to apply for individual scholarships attac hed to the funding opportunity listed in the database .

* Information for supervisors looking to establish a scholarship can be found in Staff Resources .

Summary of Main HDR Scholarships

See conditions of award for further details

Finding Information about HDR Scholarships of Offer

Information about all of the HDR Scholarships on offer can be found in the University Scholarships Database . The database includes scholarship opportunities for future, current and past students, such as external funding opportunities and travel scholarships.

Entries in the database include information about the background of the award, what is included, eligibility criteria, and how to apply for the award.

The database is updated on a continuous basis as awards become available. If you are seeking a scholarship, you should check the database regularly so that you do not miss an opportunity.

Applying for HDR Scholarships - Opportunities in the Competitive Rounds

Scholarships are mainly awarded in competitive rounds that align with the primary intakes of students at the start of the year and mid-way through the year. These rounds are known as the Major Round (February/March intake) and the Midyear Round (July/August intake).  

Separate major and Midyear rounds are held for domestic and international applicants. This ensures that successful international applicants have sufficient time to make the arrangements to move to Australia while also providing sufficient time for domestic students to complete any current programs before the round is held.

Scholarships Available in the Competitive Rounds

Two principal types of major scholarships are offered in the competitive scholarship rounds: Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarships and University of Adelaide Research Scholarships . Whether these scholarships are offered in a specific scholarship round is subject to the availability of scholarships at that time. The scholarship round information tables ( see Domestic Round , International Round below) identify which scholarships will be offered in a specific round.

• Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarships ( Domestic , International )
• University of Adelaide Research Scholarships ( Domestic , International ) 
• Applicants who do not hold an Honours degree, postgraduate qualifications with a significant research component, or have significant research experience and/or publications will be considered for the University of Adelaide Research Scholarship s ( Domestic , International )

Further information about eligibility for these principal scholarships is included in the Conditions of Award .

A range of other scholarships may also be offered during the competitive scholarship rounds, as permitted by funding availability. Information about any additional awards being offered during a specific scholarship round are provided in the online application system . It is recommended that applicants carefully consider the information provided about these scholarships when they complete their application, as applicants may also be eligible for these additional awards.

Domestic Round

The domestic rounds include both domestic applicants and international applicants who are current students or recent graduates of the University of Adelaide. A student is considered a 'recent graduate' if they have completed their University of Adelaide qualification within the last 2 years (4 semesters).

Please note: international students who are applying in the domestic rounds as a current or recent University of Adelaide student will need to apply as an international applicant ( see here ) within the domestic round application period.

International Round

The international rounds are reserved for international applicants only. International students who are current students or recent graduates* of the University of Adelaide should refer to the Domestic Round Dates – but will need to submit applications using the International application system.

University of Adelaide Students/ Recent University of Adelaide Graduates Rounds

The following students are eligible to apply in these rounds:

• University of Adelaide students who are in the final semester of their current program
• University of Adelaide students who have recently completed their program within the last 2 years (4 semesters)

Refer to the scholarships page for details about  Major scholarships available  in the competitive rounds.

Scholarship Selection Guidelines for the Competitive Rounds

The number of scholarships on offer in each competitive scholarship round is subject to funding availability and these scholarships are awarded based on merit. Scholarship applications are assessed based on a combination of academic merit, research experience, and alignment with the University of Adelaide’s strategic goals.  To provide yourself with the best chance at being selected for a scholarship, ensure that you include as much detail as possible in your application about:

• your qualifications
• your grades
• your publications, and
• your research relevant work experience

If you have previously studied overseas, your qualifications from any overseas institutions will be assessed in comparison to the Australian Quality Framework (AQF). If your grades do not compare with the Australian system, your results will be scaled accordingly to ensure that your application can be assessed fairly.

If you are currently enrolled as an HDR student, please note that in assessing your application consideration will only be given to work completed prior to your current HDR.

Scholarship applications from applicants who have completed a Bachelor degree and no postgraduate qualifications will be assessed using the cumulative Grade Point Average (GPA) from their undergraduate program.

Scholarships are awarded to the highest ranked applicants in the round. Whether an applicant is awarded a scholarship is determined by the quality of their application relative to the other applications in the round.

NOTE: If you are currently enrolled as an HDR student, consideration will only be given to work completed prior to your current HDR.

Applying for HDR Scholarships - Out of Round Opportunities

In addition to the competitive scholarship rounds there are other opportunities which include externally funded major awards, supplementary scholarships, industry programs and placements, allowances for operating costs, and travel scholarships. These scholarships are listed online in the University Scholarships Database . They usually require a separate and specific application and you will find this information attached to the funding opportunity listed.

Am I eligible for a scholarship?

RTPS and UARS

To be eligible for an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship or University of Adelaide Research Scholarship, you must be eligible to enrol in a full-time Higher Degree by Research (HDR) program at the University of Adelaide.  For more detailed information regarding eligibility criteria, including specific GPA requirements, program structure and a direct link to the Academic Program Rules, please see the Adelaide Graduate Research School Calendar .

International applicants must also provide satisfactory evidence of meeting the minimum English language proficiency requirements for direct entry by the scholarship round closing date. Further information about what is required can be found here .

You must be eligible to enrol in a full-time Higher Degree by Research (HDR) program at the University of Adelaide.  For more detailed information regarding eligibility criteria, including specific GPA requirements, program structure and a direct link to the Academic Program Rules, please see the Adelaide Graduate Research School Calendar .

Other advertised scholarship opportunities may have additional eligibility criteria. You should refer to the relevant entry in the University Scholarships Database for further information.

How do I apply for a scholarship?

You will need to complete an online admission and scholarship application. You can find the page to apply here . Please select at the top of the page if you are applying as a domestic or international student, and the page will show you the dates for each scholarship round currently available. Work your way down the steps, read each section and you will be directed how to apply online.

Can I apply for more than one scholarship in the competitive rounds?

Yes, you can apply for as many scholarships as you would like (and are eligible for). However, please be aware that if you are successful, whether you can hold multiple scholarships is determined by the rules of award for the individual scholarship.

Where do I find a supervisor?

For information on how to connect with a supervisor, please see Step 3 of How to Apply .

I am currently completing a Master of Philosophy, and wish to apply for PhD admission & scholarship in the competitive round. What is the deadline to submit my thesis?  Domestic and onshore international applicants completing a Higher Degree by Research qualification in the same semester of application at an Australian university (University of Adelaide only for international students) will only be eligible for consideration if they have submitted their thesis for examination by the scholarship closing date. Note: examination results must be provided within 3 months of the scholarship closing date.

Will the publications and/or research experience I have gained since completing my qualification(s) add weight to my application? If you ensure that your publication(s) and/or relevant research experience is detailed in your application and uploaded Structured CV, it will be considered. However, the Graduate Scholarships Committee will pay close attention to the quality of the journal in which the work is published as well as your contribution to the publication. Research outputs are usually assessed in light of the opportunities you might have had subsequent to your initial graduation.

My previous scholarship application was unsuccessful.  Can I reapply for a scholarship?

If you have not yet enrolled in your academic program, yes you can reapply for a scholarship. If you have previously applied for admission and a scholarship, and were unsuccessful, you can reapply in any subsequent round.

If you have already enrolled in your academic program, please see the question below.

I have enrolled in my academic program.  Can I apply / reapply for scholarships?

Yes. If you are currently enrolled in an HDR and have sufficient candidature left, you can apply for scholarships. 

• For a PhD scholarship, you must have a minimum of 2 years candidature remaining as of 1 January (Major Round) or 1 July (Midyear Round) to be eligible to apply for a scholarship
• For a Masters scholarship, you must have a minimum of 6 months candidature remaining as of 1 January (Major Round) or 1 July (Midyear Round) to be eligible to apply for a scholarship.

Please note: Only the work completed prior to your enrolment in the HDR study for which the scholarship is being sought will be considered in assessing your application. 

Are there any opportunities for industry placements?

Incorporating industry engagement into your HDR program provides unique opportunities and a strong complement to your academic studies and will give you a head start in future employment opportunities.

More information about these opportunities can be found here: https://www.adelaide.edu.au/graduatecentre/career-development/industry-opportunities

Can I apply for a tuition fee waiver?

The University of Adelaide does not offer tuition fee waiver only scholarships. Tuition fee waivers are associated with major scholarships awarded to students. Please apply in a scholarship round to be considered for a scholarship. If you are successful, a fee waiver will be included as part of your scholarship offer.

When will I know the result of my scholarship application?

Domestic applicants

We will begin releasing outcomes from the date listed for the relevant competitive scholarship round on the website . You will be notified of the outcome of your scholarship application at the same time that you are notified whether you have been successful in your application for admission (i.e. in the same correspondence).

Your scholarship outcome will not be released until all of your academic results have been finalised (and you have provided appropriate evidence to the Adelaide Graduate Research School), and all aspects of your admission application have been approved. 

International applicants

We will begin releasing outcomes from the date listed for the relevant competitive scholarship round on the website . You will be notified of the outcome of your scholarship application separately from your admission outcome notification.

There may be compliance checks and other relevant approval processes that need to be completed before a scholarship outcome can be determined.  You will be advised of the outcome of your application as soon as a decision is made.

Featured opportunities

Featured opportunities.

Prestigious Scholarships

Industry Opportunities

Jointly Awarded PhDs

Indigenous Scholarship Opportunities

China Scholarship Council Opportunities

Further enquiries

For more information, please ask a question .

• Contact the Adelaide Graduate Research School
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• You are a permanent resident of Australia; or
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• You are not a citizen of Australia; or
• You are not a permanent resident of Australia; or
• You are not a citizen of New Zealand; and
• You are applying for full-time study

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School of Biomedicine

The School of Biomedicine's research is focused on the key discipline areas of addiction studies, medical sciences, and reproduction and development.

How to get started in research

If you want to challenge yourself and potentially pursue a career in research, but aren’t sure where to start, consider applying for our Bachelor of Health and Medical Sciences (Honours) . Read more about honours programs and how to apply .

The honours degree enables you to research an area of personal interest, and develop the skills required for postgraduate study at a higher level (see below). You’ll undertake a research project, prepare a report for publication, and—in the process—acquire a potential point of difference in the eyes of employers.

To get started, browse the Biomedicine HDR Students Handbook . Then find out more about applying for honours within the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences.

Master of Philosophy

The Master of Philosophy is offered in every faculty as the primary research master’s degree available to prospective research students, and is conducted over two years of full-time study. It will train you in research methodology and techniques, and engage you in advanced, critical evaluation of literature and results.

The School of Biomedicine also offers a number of Master of Philosophy specialisations.

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) is our flagship research award and is the standard qualification for a research career or academic position. It is a stepping stone to a range of career opportunities and involves three to four years of research for a full-time candidate.

Research project supervision

A key component of a successful postgraduate research experience is finding the right topic, and the best supervisor to help you achieve your investigative goals. Depending on your area of interest, there are two main avenues through which you can start this process.

For a comprehensive overview of research within the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, you can explore all faculty research areas . 

University Scholarships

University of Adelaide Research Scholarships (UARS) - Domestic Students

The University of Adelaide Research Scholarships are provided to support full time PhD or Masters students who are commencing research in any field.

Information and application dates here apply to domestic students . For information about University of Adelaide Research Scholarships for international students , please see this entry .

Eligibility:   Applicants must be Australian Citizens, New Zealand citizens or permanent residents of Australia who are acceptable as candidates for higher degree by research at the University of Adelaide .  PhD a pplicants must have completed and been awarded a relevant Bachelor Degree with Honours or equivalent.

Detailed information about eligibility criteria, stipend and allowances, the enrolment deadline for recipients and scholarship conditions can be found in the Conditions of Award . Scholarships must be taken up within the round deadlines.

Enquiries : Contact the Adelaide Graduate Research School via [email protected]

Applying : The awards are allocated as part of the Major Round of scholarship applications, and Midyear Round (subject to funding). When open, applications must be submitted using the Online Application Form .

Please refer to the Applications Round page for application dates and more information on how to apply.

School of Humanities

PhD Students

English, creative writing and film, creative writing.

Current HDR Candidates

Em Koenig – Queer Ecologies and Contemporary Poetry

Dancey Gordon – Metafictional Television: an Exegesis Investigating How Metafictional Techniques Can Add to the Quality Or Sophistication of a Television Comedy, Plus a Creative Work (Comedy Television Series) About a Creative Writing Student’s Life In a Postgraduate College

Glenn Diaz –Into the Forest: Historical Imagination in Philippine Fiction

Angela Kingston – Epistolary Novel about the Influence of Enid Blyton on Australian Cultural Identity

Olujide Adebayo-Begun – Iya Kafayat: A Novel (Creative Component) A Grammar of Play in a Postcolongy of a Postcolony (Exegesis)

Lyn Dickens – A Prose Fiction Project on Colonel William Light

Juliet Paine – Exerting Machines

Delana Carbone – Superfiction

Gemma Parker – The Blackness of the Sun: An Exploration of Nihilism and Meaning in the works of Albert Camus and Samuel Beckett

Jennifer Molloy – Beyond the frame: Assumptions and silences in ST Gill's utopian visions of Colonial South Australia

Stephen Abram – Tattoos as Ekphrastic Narratives of Otherness in Crime Fiction

Jane Turner Goldsmith – Motivations to Read in the Time of the Virus – ‘Psychological First Aid’ and the Composite Novel

Verity Oswin – A Woman is a State (Poet as Vandal): An intersectional feminist reading of Major Mitchell’s Australia Felix expedition and the production of a colonial poetics to legitimize dispossession

Natalie Le Beau – Notes from the Pyrocene

Susan Hazel – Longpela Gut Bai: A Braided Narrative of Privilege and Loss

Nadia Roberts – Writing a war from within a war: Explorations in traumatic Bosnian war memory

Bronwyn Lovell – Astronaut Adaptations: What reboots and revisions reveal about shifting attitudes toward astronauts and space exploration

Gillian Hagenus – Writing the Australian Suburban Gothic

Alex Sutcliffe – No Promises: Literary Language and Late Capitalism

Jane Costessi – Tracing Charlotte Jay: The Geraldine Halls Project

Recently Completed

Mark Anthony Cayanan – Major Work: Unanimal, Counterfeit, Scurrilous; Exegesis: "Expiation, For, the, sin, of, Nothing": The Politics of Form in Queer Philippine Poetry in English

Gretta Mitchell – kookaburra: anti tales of laughing doom (PhD)

Anj Foley – Narratives of Child Abduction in Nazi-Occupied Eastern Europe: Volume 1: Novella; Volume 2: Exegesis (MPhil)

Emily Palmer – Volume 1: Scapegrace; Volume 2: The (Absent) Female Body: Cross-dressing Narratives in Young Adult Fantasy Fiction (PhD)

Paul Turley – The Poetic Invitation: Exploring manifold experience in easy poems (MPhil)

Phillipa Martin – Volume 1: My Killer Secret; Volume 2: 'Literary' Crime Fiction - an Analysis (PhD)

Ngoc Thu Hoang – Vietnam to the World, a Magical Connection: 'Embers of Time' (a novel) and 'Bridging Disparate Realms' (an exegesis) (PhD)

Current Candidates

Benjamin Kearvell – English – Deleuzian Difference and Disability

Owen Everitt – Mapping the Murray: a Bioregional Approach to Character and Narrative

Darryl Do – A Literary Study of Classical Influences on Milton's Theodicy in Paradise Lost

Najla Alyabis – Muslim Women's Identity in a Changing World: the Fiction of Leila Aboulela

Samuel Cox – A Search for Country in Australian Literature

Laura Hamilton – Reading-as-Witnessing in the Trans-Indigenous Literacy Archive: a Study of Lee Maracle and Alexis Wright

Celine Zerna – 'The Other in Ourselves': The Ethics, Aesthetics, and Epistemologies of Feminist (Auto) Ethnography

Jacob Sunter – Beach Bodies: Cruising the Shore in Fire Island Literature

Jana Norman – LGBT Bound for South Australia: The role of gender and sexual diversity in migration and mobility to South Australia 1950-1999

Meg Madden – Fragments of Self: Contemporary Women's Life Writing

Clare Charlesworth – Revisionary Practices in American Literature: A Study of Walt Whitman, Henry James, and Willa Cather

Theodora Galanis – Figuring the Sea, Inland: Oceanic Imaginaries in Contemporary Australian Literature

Azadeh Feridoun Pour – “. . . a story in an obscure corner of the front page . . .” American White Women Novelists: New Recognitions (1950s-1965)

Matthew Couper – Fishing in Moby-Dick, Omeros, and Carpentaria

Taylor Westmacott – Violence, Boredom, Extinction: Artist Depictions of Symbolic Death and Masculine Deliquency

Ruby Niemann – From Zero Hour to Kudzucene: Reading Margaret Atwood's Post-Millennial Novels under the Auspices of Anthropocene Thought (PhD)

Patrick Moritz – ‘A lightness that is both new and a return’: Nekyia and katabasis in twenty-first century receptions of the Iliad (MPhil)

Kate Bowen – The Masks That Wear Men: The Representation of Masculine Masquerade In 1990s American Action Cinema (PhD)

Brydie Kosmina – We are the granddaughters of the witches you couldn't burn’: Feminist Afterlives of the Witch in Popular Culture (PhD)

Charlotte Kelso – Bound by Narrative: 'Reading' the Female Body and Genre in Nineteenth-Century British Literature (MPhil)

Jane Nelson – Shakespeare and Christian Hermetism: religio mentis a Study of Esoteric Thought in Four Plays (PhD)

Jessie Bryne – Just Desserts: Reading, Writing and Rewarding Australian Women’s Crime Fiction (PhD)

Kezia Perry – Shadow of The Archers and Crossing Over: Writing Young Adult Fiction and Finding the Contemporary Reader

Alison Coppe – Notes from Above Water: Fictocriticism as Queer Creative Research Practice (PhD)

European Languages and Linguistics

French studies.

Current HDRs

Debra Hoadley – French Studies - Collaboration in Photographic Art Works (Sophie Calle and Mathieu Briand)

Freya Davies-Ardil – French Studies - Geographies of Francophone Pacific Literature - Mapping Place, Writers and Writing

Lauren Twine – French Studies - Exploring Artistic Responses to Far-right Populism in Contemporary France

Melanie Maillot – French Studies - Poetics of Neutrality and the Question of Being in the poetic work of Andrée Chedid and Jeanne Benguigui

Marianne Braux – French Studies - Parole De Narrateurs: Figures De L'Enonciation Dans Le Recit Francais Moderne (PhD)

German Studies

Mary Quigley – German Studies - Learning German in English-Speaking Tertiary Contexts: Identity, Social Strategies and Language Use

Linguistics

Quang Le – Linguistics - Time-marking words in Vietnamese - from fallacious tense-aspect-mood markers to modal particles of sequentiality

Yumei Cui – Linguistics - Semantic Preference in Chinese Business English Words: a Corpus-based Study

Teuku Auwal – Linguistics - A Study of Young Acehnese-lndonesian Bilingual Adults in Aceh

Christopher Venning – Linguistics - Linguistic Classification in the Daly River Languages

Caryn Rogers – Linguistics - Rhetorical Structure and Persuasion in Classical Hebrew

Elise Westin – Linguistics - Unburied Memories: Exploring the Cultural Trauma Process through Holodomor Survivor Literature

Susie Greenwood – Linguistics - A Comparative Study of Breton and Cornish

Hakeem Beedar – Linguistics - Ainu Revitalisation in Japan: a comparative study

Ingrid Kerrigan – Linguistics - Reconstruction of Barngarla Lexicon from Primary and Secondary Sources

Chloe Castle – Linguistics - Co-option of Grammatical Resources from Foreign Languages (a Focus on English and Czech)

Eve Kheir – Linguistic - Codeswitching as an Index and Construct of Sociopolitical Identity: The Case of the Druze, Christians and Muslims in Israel (PhD)

Penelope Cashman – Linguistics - International Best Practice in the Teaching of Lyric Diction to Conservatorium-Level Singers (PhD)

Historical and Classical Studies

Art history.

Sarah Gibson-Walker – Art History - The Visual Culture of Suffrage in Australia and New Zealand

Heather Lee – Art Histor - Australian sculptor Ian Bow and the plurality of mid-century Modernism

Alexandra Mowbray – Art History - The Contemporary Nude in The Digital Age

Alexandra Nitschke – Art History - The History of the Contemporary Arts Organisations Australia (CAOA) Network

Ralph Body – Art History - Behind the Scenes: Hans Heysen's Art World Networks (PhD)

Susan Woodburn – Art History - Alexander Schramm (1813-64) and the Visual Representation of Aboriginal People in Mid-Nineteenth Century Colonial Australia (PhD)

Nerina Dunt – Art History - Investigating the Aesthetic Character of Australian Urban Indigenous Art: A Socio-Political Fusion (PhD)

Gemma Neal – Classics - (Mis)translation of Sexual Violence in Ovid's Metamorphoses

Greg Macpherson – Classics - From Magic to Medicine: The dynamics of faith and science in drug development in antiquity.

Emily Chambers – Classics – Free speech in the Roman world

Mary Harpas – Classics – The Hippocratic Understanding of the Living Body (MPhil)

Tamas Preston – Classics - Dissimulation and Veiled Criticisms in Seneca’s Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (MPhil)

Tiana Blazevic-Bastow – Classics – The Ascent to the Hidden One: The Reception of the Egyptian One God in Neoplatonism and the Greek Magical Papyri

Benjamin Nagy – Classics – Carmen et Standard Error: Computational Methods of Stylistics in Latin Poetry

Tamara Bremert – Classics – Sex in Suetonius: Sexual Material as a Characterisation Device for Tyrannical Emperors (MPhil)

Judith Bailey – Classics – Fleecing the Pious: The Palmers' Guild of Ludlow in the Central and North Welsh Marches 1400-1530 (PhD)

Alex Antoniou – Classics - Divine Emperors and Italy: Emperor Worship in the Italian Peninsula (Excluding Rome) (MPhil)

Janice Lee – Classics - Silius Italicus' Punica 8. 1-241: a Commentary (MPhil)

Rebekah Harms – History - Building the Innovation Economy: the Development of Science and Technology Policy in South Australia, 1980 - 2020

Grace Waye-Harris – History - Henrician Fashion Diplomacy

Megan Nattrass – History - Princess Mary and the Performance of Loyalty, 1516-1547.

Michael Heim – History - Precarious Accounts: Britain 1700-1850

Alexander Parsons – History - Australian Protestant Church Responses to the Threat and Reality of War, 1931 - 1945

Tamika Gloutfsis – History - Interpreting History in Interactive Media, with Particular Focus on Video Games

Emma Carson – History - Intimacy, Power, and Separation: The Impact of Military Service on Marital Relationships in World War II

Jessie Lewcock – History - Documenting Suicides by Australian First and Second World War Veterans

Jack Crawford – History - The rise of industrial unionism in South Australia, 1908-22

Jodie Vanderpeer – History - South Australian Art Needlework 1876-1909.

Tess Watterson – History - Gender, History and Magic: The Witch in Video Games

David Milazzo – History - Conflicting Histories: The Memorialisation of Frontier Violence

Julian Kusabs – History - Indigenous Civic Literacy: A Comparative History of Education in Australia and New Zealand

Cathy Chua – History - How conflict between online social network platform providers and users develops and is resolved

Natalie Ciecierska-Holmes – History - Raw Feeding for Dogs in the UK and Australia: A Social and Ethical Cross-Cultural Comparison

Caitlin Merlin – History - The New York City Theatrical Community’s Response to the 1980s and 1990s HIV/AIDS Crisis

Elijah Winters – History - Australia and the Apollo Program

Tatiana Sazonova – History - Merchants of pre-revolutionary Russia: their role in the life of the empire and influence on society

Kelly McKinley – History - History of Community Attitudes and Activism in Australia Around The Emergence and Development of GM for Food and Agricultural Purposes, 1970s- Present

Karina Burns – History - Animal Ethics in Psychological Research in Australia from 1900 to Present

Daniella Pilla – History – Migrant Hostels

Jasmin Parasiers – History - Early Modern Sermons and Religious Culture

Selina Kuo – History - Neither Bread Nor Cake: Ersatz Foods and The Spirit of Full Disclosure

Virginia Baker – History - Science at the Interface: Community Engagement and The Promise and Transdisciplinarity

Lisa Hunt – History - 'Blackboxing' Australian Science? Understanding Popular Perceptions of Science in Australia, 1939- 1963

Adam Scorgie – History - Australia's Pivot from the UK to the USA in the Twentieth Century

Lachlan McCarron – History - Politics and Emotion in Jacksonian America

Alexander Pring – History - Roman Catholic Missions in the Americas and East Asia in English Anti-Catholic Discourse, 1558-1660

Courtney Davis – History - Th evolution of memory politics in Scotland, 1979-2016

Madeleine Sallis – History - Examination of the relationship between white settlers and the local Aboriginal population in the Cooper Creek region

Robert Bartnik – History - Boleslaw Bierut and Stalinism in Poland, 1944-1956

Emma Grimes – History - ‘A Floating Home’: The emotional lives of nineteenth-century emigrants voyaging to Australia

Jade Ryles – History - The War at Home: Australian Children and their Families during World War II

Benjamin Nicholls – History - The Piano and Colonisation in South Australia

Elizabeth Bor – History - Responses to Bushfires in Colonial South Australia

James Hurst – History - Two Australian colonists, the 2nd Life Guards and the defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte: Private Thomas Playford and Lieutenant Richard Meares in England, Portugal, Spain, Belgium and France during the Peninsular Campaign and the Hundred Days.

Lani Gerbi – History – Socio-sexual scripts and erotic literature in eighteenth-century Britain (MPhil) – under examination

Claire Morey – History – “I will not maintain you”: Understanding men’s desertion and failure to provide as economic abuse in colonial South Australia (MPhil)

David Chadwick – History – Hear the Lion Roar: Trade unionism at General Motors-Holden’s in South Australia, 1931-1981 (PhD)

Jessica Jocher – History - The Solidarity Wave: Settlement Experiences and their Influence on the Identity of Polish Migrants Arriving in Australia During the 1980s (PhD)

Linda Haines – History - The Bounty of the Suburbs. Home Food Production and Preservation in Adelaide Suburban Yards 1945-1995 (PhD)

Emily Ireland – Law/History - Married Women’s Litigation in the English Court of Chancery, 1698-1758 (PhD)

Stephanie Thomson – History - Women, Piety, and Patronage in Reformation England, c.1530-1558 (PhD)

Jessica McCandless – History - Mysticism and Emotional transformation in a Seventeenth-Century English Convent (PhD)

Thomas East – History - Anglo-American Responses to German War Technology in World War II (MPhil)

Rachel Caines – History - "Their Glory Shall Not Be Blotted Out": The Acknowledgement of Indigenous First World War Service in Australian and New Zealand National Commemorations, 1918-2019 (MPhil)

Rachel Harris – History - In a State of War: Women's Experiences of the South Australian Home Front, 1939-45 (PhD)

Melissa-Ellen Dowling – History – Writing Russia: Anglophone Historians Discursively Constructing AnOther Nation (PhD)

John Davey – History – Legalised Trade Unions, Compulsory Primary Schooling, Enhanced Higher Education - the Legacies of Anthony John Mundella, 1825-1897 (PhD)

Margaret Boult – History -  Epilepsy in the Lunatic Asylums of South Australia (1852 – 1913) (MPhil)

Emily Buddle – History - Australian Meat Consumers' Understandings of Farm Animal Welfare (PhD)

David Milazzo – History - Commemorative Days and the Negotiation of National Identity (MPhil)

Karen Agutter – History - More than Just a Roof over Their Heads: Migrant Accommodation Centres and the Assimilation of "New Australians" 1947-1960 (PhD)

Tania Cammarano – History - Ideas of Italy and the Nature of Ethnicity: A History of Italian Food in Australia with Case Studies (PhD)

Matthew Gray – History - 'Baptism, No Wall of Division': Seventeenth-Century Particular Baptists and Dynamics of Toleration (PhD)

Jade Riddle – History - Emotions in Place: The Creation of the Suburban 'Other' in Early Modern London (PhD)

Kelly Birch – History - SLAVERY AND THE ORIGINS OF LOUISIANA’S PRISON INDUSTRY, 1803-1861 (PhD)

Alexander Parsons – History - 'Everybody's Favourite Fascist': An Examination of the Figure of José Antonio Primo de Rivera within the Historiography of Spanish Fascism (PhD)

Amy Morrison – History - Communist Women's Resistance in Occupied Paris: Engagement, Activism and Continuities from the 1930s to 1945 (PhD)

Jennifer Caruso – History - Dream-Phantasy of a Utopia The Making of the Methodist Overseas Half-Caste Mission of Croker Island: A Personal History (PhD)

Peter Whellum – History - The Administration of Justice in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands: A Front Line in Tensions between Traditional Aboriginal Culture and the Criminal Law (PhD)

Stefania Chiro – History - For The Sentiment: Emotions as Practice in the Development of Eighteenth-Century British Abolitionism (PhD)

Current HDRs PhD

Anne Nattembo - Investigating Effectiveness of Social Networking Sites in Influencing Mental Health Promotion Among Young People

Alexander Beare - Moments of crisis: Tracking 21st century masculinity through complex television

Kari Seeley - Positioning Audio Description in Media Theory: an Australian Context

Caitlin Adams - Media Mimicry - How fictional videos emulate user-generated content in online stories

Amy Brierley - The Evolution of Romance in Digital Games

Robert Boucat - ‘Oscar Bait’: exploring links between the perceived Oscar-worthy film and Academy Awards controversies.

Marisol Da Silva - Household Experiences of Reducing Waste: Moving Towards Circular Economy Futures

Sebastian Morrison - Non-Normative Gender Identity in the Australian Video Games Sector

Philippa Dore - The Revolution Will Be Televised: Audio-visual content in the era of streaming and “peak TV”. An investigation of industry change, content trends, and globalisation post the digital revolution

Sophia Fluin - A Multifaceted Perspective on Hallyu and its Impact on Ethnic Identity Amongst Asian-Australian Youths

Idris Martin - Historical Memory and Malay Media

Thanh Nguyen - Identity and belonging negotiation through social media during the process of integration among Vietnamese international students in Australia

Sami Dannaoui - Design Cultures in Conflict: An Analysis of User Experience Design Standards in Social Media Smartphone Apps ( )

Guillaume Vetu - Beyond the Tree of the Living-dead: a Rhizoanalysis of Japanese Cinematic Zombies ( )

Muhammad Imran - Media Portrayal of Ageing: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Media Discourses in Australia and Malaysia (PhD)

Rukia Nzibo - Reporting on Terror: Assessing the Viability of Peace Journalism in the Kenyan News Media (PhD)

Ayodeji Aiyesimoju - Remediation or Replacement: Masthead Stakeholders' Perception of News Digitalisation in Nigeria (PhD)

Amy Nancasrrow - The Art of Selling Arts: Marketing Culture Using Digital Media at Fringe Arts Festivals (PhD)

Brigitte Everett - Temporal Passage: Dynamic Experiences and the B-theory (MPhil)

Rebecca Randell - Beyond Dualism: The Challenge for Feminist Theory (MPhil)

William McCarthy - Contested Kingdom: The Role of Online Media in the Relationship between Disney and Fans over Disneyland (PhD)

Varunika Ruwanpura - Crafting true stories: an interpretation of four Australian journalists' nonfiction writing practices (MPhil)

Linh Chung - South Australian Film-makers' Perspectives on Policies: State and Federal Film Policies and the Representation of Cultural Diversity in Australian Films (MPhil) Robert Farquharson - The Role of Analog Computation in Path Integrating Behaviour of the Desert Ant: A Defence of the Explanatory Credentials of Connectionism in Cognitive Science (MPhil)

Robert Palmer - Adapting communication conventions: Helping vulnerable people in Adelaide learn about climate change and adaptation (PhD)

Hongyan Zou - Western China on Screen: Cinema and Urban Exploration as Thirdspace (PhD)

Dook Shepherd - Philosophical Theories of Mind, Cognition, and The Status of Representation: Veridicality and Combination in Biological Sciences

Matthew Nestor - A Structuralist Account of Dynamical Mental Representation in Recurrent Connectionist Networks

Victoria Vazquez Troitino - The Mind's Representing Vehicles and Their Contents ( Phil of Mind, Theories of thought)

Patrick Keeley - Schopenhauer's Theory of Aesthetics

James Vlachoulis - A Defence of the B-Theory of Time with Respect to Temporal Passage and Our Experience of Temporal Passage

Riley Harris - Normative Uncertainty and Information Value

Timothy Nailer - Praise, Blame and Holding Oneself Responsible

Henry Phillips - To Blame or Not to Blame: Respect and the Ethics of Blame

Nicholas Smyth – 17 th /18 th century philosophy

Jessica Pohlmann - Reality's Hierarchical Structure: On the Foundations of Asymmetric Dependence Relations

Margaret Penhall-Jones - Self-Deception and Wilful Ignorance. Self-induced, purported ignorance?

Elinor Pryce - The Morality of Procreation and Our Duty to Rescue Others From Harm

Anthony Bishop - Underdetermination and theoretical values

Adam Townsend - Representation in Neural Networks

Danny Wardle - Opening a Can of Spacetime Worms: The Metaphysics of Persistence

Atheer Al-Khalfa - The Referential/Attributive Distinction: Its Status and Scope (MPhil)

Michael Lazarou - Vindicating Vague Objects (MPhil)

Robert Farquharson - The Role of Analog Computation in Path Integrating Behaviour of the Desert Ant: A Defence of the Explanatory Credentials of Connectionism in Cognitive Science (MPhil)

Karen Bland - The Good, the Right and the Exigencies of Life: John Dewey and the Value of Moral Disagreement (PhD)

MA & PhD in Architecture

Ucla architecture and urban design offers two academic graduate degrees: the master of arts in architecture (ma) and doctor of philosophy in architecture (phd)..

The programs produce students whose scholarship aims to provoke and operate within architecture’s public, professional, and scholarly constituencies. Both programs are supported by the Standing Committee, made up of five faculty members: Michael Osman (interim program director), Cristóbal Amunátegui , Dana Cuff , Samaa Elimam , and Ayala Levin . A number of visiting faculty teach courses to expand the range of offerings.

Applications for the MA/PhD program (Fall 2024 matriculation) are completed via the UCLA Application for Graduate Admission , and are due January 6, 2024. Candidates will be notified of decisions in March 2024; admitted candidates who wish to accept the offer of matriculation must submit their Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) by April 15, 2024.

All MA and PhD students are required to enroll in a two-year colloquium focused on methods for writing, teaching, and researching in the field of architecture. The six courses that constitute the colloquium train students in the apparatus of academic scholarship. Over the two-year sequence, students produce original research projects and develop skills in long-format writing.

Research Opportunities

The intellectual life of the students in the MA and PhD programs are reinforced by the increasing number of opportunities afforded to students through specialized faculty-led research projects. These include cityLAB-UCLA and the Urban Humanities Institute .

MA in Architecture

This program prepares students to work in a variety of intellectual and programmatic milieus including historical research, cultural studies, and interdisciplinary studies with particular emphasis on connections with geography, design, art history, history of science and literary studies, as well as studio and design based research.

Beyond the core colloquium, MA students take a series of approved courses both at UCLA AUD and across campus. The MA program is a two-year degree, culminating in a thesis. The thesis is developed from a paper written by the student in their coursework and developed in consultation with the primary advisor and the standing committee. In addition to courses and individual research, students often participate in collective, project-based activities, including publications, symposia and exhibitions.

The program is distinguished by its engagement with contemporary design and historical techniques as well by the unusual balance it offers: fostering great independence and freedom in the students’ courses of study while providing fundamental training in architectural scholarship.

Recent MA Theses

• Jacqueline Meyer, “Crafting Utopia: Paolo Soleri and the Building of Arcosanti.”
• Joseph Maguid, “The Architecture of the Videogame: Architecture as the Link Between Representational and Participatory Immersion.”
• Meltem Al, “The Agency of Words and Images in the Transformation of Istanbul: The Case of Ayazma.”
• Courtney Coffman, “Addressing Architecture and Fashion: On Simulacrum, Time and Poché.”
• Joseph Ebert, “Prolegomena to a Poiesis of Architectural Phenomenology.”
• Jamie Aron, “Women Images: From the Bauhaus Weaving Workshop to the Knoll Textile Division.”
• Gustave Heully, “Moldy Assumptions.”
• Brigid McManama, “Interventions on Pacoima Wash: Repurposing Linear Infrastructure into Park Spaces.”

MA Typical Study Program

Phd in architecture.

This program prepares students to enter the academic professions, either in architectural history, architectural design, or other allied fields. PhD students are trained to teach courses in the history and theory of architecture while also engaging in studio pedagogy and curatorial work. In addition to the colloquium, PhD students take a series of approved courses both at UCLA Architecture and Urban Design and across campus. They select these courses in relation to their own research interests and in consultation with their primary advisor. The priorities for selection are breadth of knowledge and interdisciplinary experience that retains a focused area of expertise. To this end, the students identify Major and Minor Fields of study. The Minor Field is generally fulfilled by satisfactorily completing three courses given by another department and the Major Field by five courses offered by UCLA Architecture and Urban Design.

Once coursework is completed, PhD students move to the Comprehensive Exam, Qualifying Exam, and the writing of a dissertation, and final defense, if deemed appropriate by the doctoral committee. In the transition from coursework to exams, PhD students work on one paper beyond its original submission as coursework. The paper begins in the context of a departmental seminar, but often continues either in the context of an independent study, summer mentorship, or a second seminar with faculty consent. Upon the research paper’s acceptance, students begin preparing for their comprehensive exam. Before their third year, students must also satisfactorily complete three quarters of language study or its equivalent according to University standards. The particular language will be determined in consultation with the Standing Committee. The Comprehensive Exam is administered by at least two members of the Standing Committee and at most one faculty member from another Department at UCLA, also a member of the Academic Senate.

The Comprehensive Exam tests two fields: the first covers a breadth of historical knowledge—300 years at minimum—and the second focuses on in-depth knowledge of a specialization that is historically and thematically circumscribed. Students submit an abstract on each of these fields, provide a substantial bibliography, and prepare additional documentation requested by their primary advisor. These materials are submitted to the committee no less than two weeks before the exam, which occurs as early as the end of the second year. Students are encouraged to complete the Comprehensive Exam no later than the end of their third year of study.

The Comprehensive Exam itself consists of two parts: an oral component that takes place first, and then a written component. The oral component is comprised of questions posed by the committee based on the student’s submitted materials. The goal of the exam is for students to demonstrate their comprehensive knowledge of their chosen field. The written component of the exam (which may or may not be waived by the committee) consists of a written response to a choice of questions posed by the committee. The goal of this portion of the exam is for students to demonstrate their research skills, their ability to develop and substantiate an argument, and to show promise of original contribution to the field. Students have two weeks to write the exam. After the committee has read the exam, the advisor notifies the student of the committee’s decision. Upon the student’s successful completion of the Comprehensive Exam, they continue to the Qualifying Exam.

Students are expected to take the Qualifying Exam before the beginning of the fourth year. The exam focuses on a dissertation prospectus that a student develops with their primary advisor and in consultation with their PhD committee. Each student’s PhD committee consists of at least two members of the Standing Committee and one outside member from another department at the University (and a member of the Faculty Senate). Committees can also include faculty from another institution. All committees are comprised of at least three members of UCLA Academic Senate. The prospectus includes an argument with broad implications, demonstrates that the dissertation will make a contribution of knowledge and ideas to the field, demonstrates mastery of existing literature and discourses, and includes a plan and schedule for completion.

The PhD dissertation is written after the student passes the qualifying exam, at which point the student has entered PhD candidacy. The dissertation is defended around the sixth year of study. Students graduating from the program have taken posts in a wide range of universities, both in the United States and internationally.

Recent PhD Dissertations

• Marko Icev, "Building Solidarity: Architecture After Disaster and The Skopje 1963 Post-Earthquake Reconstruction." ( Read )
• Anas Alomaim, "Nation Building in Kuwait, 1961-1991."
• Tulay Atak, “Byzantine Modern: Displacements of Modernism in Istanbul.”
• Ewan Branda, “Virtual Machines: Culture, telematique, and the architecture of information at Centre Beaubourg, 1968–1977.”
• Aaron Cayer, "Design and Profit: Architectural Practice in the Age of Accumulation"
• Per-Johan Dahl, “Code Manipulation, Architecture In-Between Universal and Specific Urban Spaces.”
• Penelope Dean, “Delivery without Discipline: Architecture in the Age of Design.”
• Miriam Engler, “Gordon Cullen and the ‘Cut-and-Paste’ Urban Landscape.”
• Dora Epstein-Jones, “Architecture on the Move: Modernism and Mobility in the Postwar.”
• Sergio Figueiredo, “The Nai Effect: Museological Institutions and the Construction of Architectural Discourse.”
• Jose Gamez, “Contested Terrains: Space, Place, and Identity in Postcolonial Los Angeles.”
• Todd Gannon, “Dissipations, Accumulations, and Intermediations: Architecture, Media and the Archigrams, 1961–1974.”
• Whitney Moon, "The Architectural Happening: Diller and Scofidio, 1979-89"
• Eran Neuman, “Oblique Discourses: Claude Parent and Paul Virilio’s Oblique Function Theory and Postwar Architectural Modernity.”
• Alexander Ortenberg, “Drawing Practices: The Art and Craft of Architectural Representation.”
• Brian Sahotsky, "The Roman Construction Process: Building the Basilica of Maxentius"
• Marie Saldana, “A Procedural Reconstruction of the Urban Topography of Magnesia on The Maeander.”
• David Salomon, “One Thing or Another: The World Trade Center and the Implosion of Modernism.”
• Ari Seligmann, “Architectural Publicity in the Age of Globalization.”
• Zheng Tan, “Conditions of The Hong Kong Section: Spatial History and Regulatory Environment of Vertically Integrated Developments.”
• Jon Yoder, “Sight Design: The Immersive Visuality of John Lautner.”

A Sampling of PhD Alumni and Their Pedagogy

Iman Ansari , Assistant Professor of Architecture, the Knowlton School, Ohio State University

Tulay Atak , Adjunct Associate Professor, Pratt School of Architecture

Shannon Starkey , Associate Professor of Architecture, University of San Diego

Ece Okay , Affiliate Research, Université De Pau Et Des Pays De L'adour

Zheng Tan , Department of Architecture, Tongji University

Pelin Yoncaci , Assistant Professor, Department Of Architecture, Middle East Technical University

José L.S. Gámez , Interim Dean, College of Arts + Architecture, UNC Charlotte

Eran Neuman , Professor, School of Architecture, Tel Aviv University

Marie Saldana , Assistant Professor, School of Interior Architecture, University of Tennessee - Knoxville

Sergio M. Figueiredo , Assistant Professor, Eindhoven University of Technology

Rebecca Choi , Assistant Professor of Architecture History, School of Architecture, Tulane University

Will Davis , Lecturer in History, Theory and Criticism, Department of Architecture, National University of Singapore

Maura Lucking , Faculty, School of Architecture & Urban Planning, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee

Kyle Stover , Assistant Professor, School of Architecture, Montana State University

Alex Maymind , Assistant Professor of Architecture and Director of Undergraduate Studies in Architecture, University of Minnesota

Gary Riichirō Fox , visiting faculty member at Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) and lecturer at USC School of Architecture

Randy Nakamura , Adjunct Professor, College of Arts and Sciences, University of San Francisco

Aaron Cayer , Assistant Professor of Architecture History, School of Architecture + Planning, University of New Mexico

Whitney Moon , Associate Professor of Architecture, School of Architecture & Urban Planning, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee

Todd Gannon , Professor of Architecture, the Knowlton School, Ohio State University

Dora Epstein Jones , Professor of Practice, School of Architecture, the University of Texas at Austin

Sarah Hearne , Assistant Professor, College of Architecture and Planning, University of Colorado Denver

PhD Typical Study Program

*The choice of language to fulfill this requirement must be discussed with the Ph.D. Standing Committee

Our Current PhD Cohort

AUD's cohort of PhD candidates are leaders in their fields of study, deepening their scholarship at AUD and at UCLA while sharing their knowledge with the community.

Adam Boggs is a sixth year Ph.D candidate and interdisciplinary artist, scholar, educator and Urban Humanist. His research and teaching interests include the tension between creativity and automation, craft-based epistemologies, and the social and material history of architecture at the U.S.-Mexico border. He holds a BFA in Sculpture Cum Laude from the Ohio State University, and an MFA in Visual Art from the State University of New York at Purchase College. Prior to joining the doctoral program at UCLA he participated in courses in Architecture (studio and history) at Princeton University and Cornell University. His dissertation analyzes the history of indigenous labor during the Mexican baroque period to form a comparative analysis with the 20th century Spanish revival architecture movement in Southern California and how the implementation of the style along the U.S.-Mexico border might function as a Lefebvrian “thirdspace” that disrupts binary thinking. In Spring 2024 he will teach an undergraduate seminar course at AUD on the history of architecture at the U.S.-Mexico border as part of the CUTF program.

Hanyu Chen is a second-year doctoral student at UCLA AUD. Her research focuses on the intersection between (sub)urban studies, heritage conservation, and the genders of the space. Specifically, it concerns the dynamics of genders in (sub)urban areas and how these dynamics are conserved as heritage. Born and raised in China for her first 18 years, Hanyu chose the conservation of comfort stations in China as her master's thesis at the University of Southern California, where she earned her master’s degree in Heritage Conservation and officially started her journey in architecture. Her thesis discusses the fluidity and genders of comfort stations and how they survive in contemporary China’s heritage conservation policies.

Hanyu also holds a Bachelor of Science degree in AMS (Applied Mathematics and Statistics) and Art History from Stony Brook University.

Yixuan Chen

Yixuan Chen is an architectural designer and a first-year doctoral student in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design at UCLA. Driven by an impulse to demystify both the grand promises and trivial familiarities of architecture, her research embarks on the notion of everydayness to elucidate the power dynamics it reveals. She investigates the conflicts between these two ends and focuses on modernization across different times and places.

Prior to joining UCLA AUD, she was trained as an architect and graduated from the University of Nottingham's China Campus with a first-class honors degree. Her graduation project “Local Culture Preservation Centre,” which questioned the validity of monumental architecture in the climate crisis, was nominated for the RIBA President's Medal in 2016.

She also holds a Master of Arts degree with distinction in Architectural History from the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. Her dissertation, “Shijing, on the Debris of Shijing,” explores the vanishing shijing places, or urban villages, where rural migrant workers negotiate their urban identity in Chinese cities, revealing shifting power relations. Additionally, she authored an article in Prospectives Journal titled "Architectural Authorship in ‘the Last Mile,’" advocating for a change to relational architectural authorship in response to the digital revolution in architecture.

Pritam Dey is an urban designer and second-year doctoral student at UCLA AUD. His research interest lies at the intersection of colonial urbanism, sensorial history, and somatic inquiries. His architecture thesis investigated the crematorium and temple as sensorial infrastructure, and was presented at World Architecture Congress at Seoul in 2017. Previously Dey worked in the domain of urban design, specifically informal markets, as a shaper of urbanism in Indian cities. Prior to joining the AUD doctoral program, his past research focused on investigating the role of informal and wholesale markets in shaping up urbanity in the Indian city cores and co-mentored workshops on Urbanity of Chitpur Road, Kolkata with ENSAPLV, Paris which was both exhibited at Kolkata and Paris. He also co-mentored the documentation of the retrospective landscape of Hampi with the support of ENSAPLV and French Embassy. His investigations on the slums of Dharavi title ‘The tabooed city’ was published in the McGill University GLSA Research series 2021 under the theme: the city an object or subject of law?

An urban designer and architect, Pritam Dey pursued his post graduation from School of planning and Architecture, Delhi. During his academic tenure at SPA, he was the recipient of 2018 Design Innovation Center Fellowship for Habitat design allowing him to work on the social infrastructure for less catered communities in the Sub Himalayan Villages. In 2022 He mentored a series of exhibitions on the theme of Water, Mountains and Bodies at Ahmadabad.

He was the 2022-23 Urban Humanities Initiatives Fellow at UCLA and recipient of 2023 UCLA Center for India and South Asia fellowship for his summer research.

Carrie Gammell

Carrie Gammell is a doctoral candidate working at the intersection of architectural history, property law, and political economy. Her research focuses on claims, investments, and intermediary organizations in the United States, from the Homestead Act of 1862 to the Housing Act of 1934.

Carrie is also a Senior Research Associate at cityLAB UCLA, where she studies state appropriations for California community college student housing. In the past, she contributed to Education Workforce Housing in California: Developing the 21st Century Campus, a report and companion handbook that provides a comprehensive overview of the potential for land owned by school districts to be designed and developed for teachers and other employees.

Prior to joining AUD, Carrie worked as an architectural designer in Colombia and the United States, where she built a portfolio of affordable housing, multi-family residential, and single-family residential projects as well as civic and cultural renovations and additions. She holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Rice University and a Master in Design Studies (Critical Conservation) from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Chi-Chia Hou

Chi-Chia Hou is a doctoral candidate in his sixth year at UCLA AUD. His working dissertation, “New Frontier: Architecture and Service 1893-1960,” explores his interest in architecture and wealth, changing ideas of profit and management, and social scientific discourses for measuring work and worker, self and others, and values of landed property.

His research locates moments of theorizing methodologies to manage income-generating properties in schools of agriculture, home economics, and hotel studies. The schools taught their students theories, while instilling the imminence of faithful direction of oneself, of self-as-property. The pedagogies, existing beyond the purview of Architecture, were of immense architectural consideration.

Chi-Chia Hou took a break from school in the previous academic year to learn from his daughter and has now returned to school to learn from his brilliant cohorts.

Adam Lubitz

Adam Lubitz is an urban planner, heritage conservationist, and doctoral student. His research engages the intersection of critical heritage studies and migration studies, with an emphasis on how archival information can inform reparations. His community-based research has been most recently supported by the Columbia GSAPP Incubator Prize as well as the Ziman Center for Real Estate and Leve Center for Jewish Studies at UCLA.

Prior to joining AUD, Adam worked at World Monuments Fund within their Jewish Heritage Program, and taught GIS coursework at Barnard College. His master's thesis applied field research with experimental mapping techniques in the old town of a municipality in Palestine. Adam holds MS degrees in Historic Preservation and Urban Planning from Columbia University and a BA in Urban Studies from New College of Florida.

José Monge is a PhD candidate in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design. His dissertation, titled Maritime Labor, Candles, and the Architecture of the Enlightenment (1750-1872) , focuses on the role that whale-originated illuminants, specifically spermaceti candles and oil, played in the American Enlightenment as an intellectual project and the U.S. as a country. By unravelling the tension between binaries such as intellectual and manual labor–the consumers that bought these commodities and the producers that were not able to afford them–the project understands architecture as a history of activities that moved from sea to land and land to sea, challenging assumptions about the static “nature” of architecture.

Kurt Pelzer

Kurt Pelzer is a fourth-year PhD candidate at UCLA AUD. Their research explores the relational histories, material flows, and politics of land in and beyond California in the long nineteenth century during the United States parks, public lands, and conservation movements.

Their current scholarship traces the settler possession and exhibitionary display of a Giant Sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum) in the 1850s; an act that contested the ways Miwok peoples ancestral to California's Sierra Nevada knew and related to life and land. Their broader interests include histories of colonialism and capitalism in the Americas, environmental history, and Blackness and Indigeneity as a methodological analytic for political solidarities and possibilities.

Prior to arriving at UCLA, Pelzer worked at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in the Architecture and Design Curatorial Department participating in exhibitions, programming, and collections work. Pelzer completed a Master of Advanced Architectural Design in the History, Theory, and Experiments program from California College of the Arts in San Francisco, and earned their Bachelor's degree in Landscape Architecture from the College of Design at Iowa State University.

Shota Vashakmadze

Email Shota Vashakmadze

Shota Vashakmadze is a sixth-year PhD candidate at UCLA AUD. His dissertation traces the conjoined histories of architectural computing, environmental design, and professional practice in the late 20th century, adopting critical approaches to architecture’s technical substrates—the algorithms, softwares, and user protocols of computation—to examine their social and political dispositions. In his scholarship and pedagogy, he aims to situate forms of architectural labor within the profession’s ongoing acculturation to environmental crisis. Most recently, he has been leading the development of the interdisciplinary “Building Climates” cluster, a year-long course sequence at UCLA, and co-organizing an initiative dedicated to fostering discourse on climate change and architecture, including a two-day conference entitled “Architecture After a Green New Deal.”

His research has been supported by the Canadian Centre for Architecture and appeared in journals including Architectural Theory Review , The Avery Review, and Pidgin Magazine. He is currently completing a contribution to a collection on landscape representation and a chapter for an edited volume on architecture, labor, and political economy.

Shota holds an MArch from Princeton University and has a professional background in architecture, landscape, and software development. Before coming to UCLA, he researched methods for designing with point cloud data and wrote Bison, a software plugin for landscape modeling.

Alexa Vaughn

Alexa Vaughn (ASLA, FAAR) is a first year PhD student in Architecture + Urban Design and a Eugene V. Cota-Robles Fellow , from Long Beach, California. She is a Deaf landscape designer, accessibility specialist, consultant, and recent Fellow of the American Academy in Rome (2022-23). She is a visionary speaker, thought leader, prolific writer and researcher, and the author of “ DeafScape : Applying DeafSpace to Landscape,” which has been featured in numerous publications.

Her professional work is centered upon designing public landscapes with and for the Deaf and disabled communities, applying legal standards and Universal Design principles alongside lived experience and direct participation in the design process. She is an expert in designing landscapes for the Deaf community (DeafScape) and in facilitation of disabled community engagement. Prior to joining the A+UD program, Alexa worked for several landscape architecture firms over the course of six years, including OLIN and MIG, Inc.

Through a disability justice lens, her dissertation will seek to formally explore the historical exclusionary and inaccessible design of American urban landscapes and public spaces, as well as the response (activism, policy, and design) to this history through the present and speculative future. She will also actively take part in activist- and practice-based research with cityLAB and the Urban Humanities Institute .

Alexa holds both a BA in Landscape Architecture (with a minor in Conservation and Resource Studies) and a Master’s degree in Landscape Architecture (MLA) from the University of California, Berkeley, with specialization in accessible and inclusive design. Much of her work can be found at www.designwithdisabledpeoplenow.com and on Instagram: @DeafScape.

Yashada Wagle

Yashada Wagle is a third year PhD student in Critical Studies at UCLA AUD, and a recipient of the department's Moss Scholarship. Her research focuses on imperial environmental-legislative regimes in British colonial India in the late nineteenth century. She is interested in exploring questions around the histories of spaces of extraction and production as they network between the metropole and the colony, and their relationship with the conceptions of laboring bodies therein. Her master's thesis focused on the Indian Forest Act of 1865, and elucidated the conceptualization of the space of the ‘forest’ through the lenses of its literary, legislative, and biopolitical trajectories, highlighting how these have informed its contemporary lived materiality.

Wagle holds a Bachelor in Architecture (BArch) from the Savitribai Phule Pune University in India, and a Master in Design Studies (History and Philosophy of Design and Media) from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. She was previously a Research Fellow at the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies (KRVIA) in Mumbai, India.

In her spare time, Wagle enjoys illustrating and writing poetry, some of which can be found here .

Dexter Walcott

Dexter Walcott is a registered architect currently in his fifth year with the Critical Studies of Architecture program at UCLA. His research focuses on the Latrobe family and early nineteenth century builders in the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys. He is interested in the role of the built environment in histories of labor, capitalism, steam-power, and industry.

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Joy is a fifth-year PhD student in architecture history. Her research explores geology as antiquity from early 19th – 20th century British colonial Hong Kong and China. She holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature with a focus in German from Middlebury College in 2017, and is a graduate of The New Normal program at Strelka Institute, Moscow in 2018. Previously, she has taught in the Department of Architecture at University of Hong Kong, as well as the Department of Design at Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

After working as a curatorial assistant at Tai Kwun Contemporary in 2019, she has continued the practice of art writing and translation, collaborating with many local Hong Kong artists as well as international curators such as Raimundas Malašauskas. In her spare time, she practices long-distance open water swimming. In 2022, she completed a 30km course at the South of Lantau Island, Hong Kong.

The MA and PhD programs welcome and accept applications from students with a diverse range of backgrounds. These programs are designed to help those interested in academic work in architecture develop those skills, so we strongly encourage that you become familiar with fundamental, celebrated works in the history and theory of architecture before entering the program.

Applicants to the academic graduate programs must hold a Bachelor’s degree, or the foreign equivalent. All new students must enter in the fall quarter. The program is full-time and does not accept part-time students.

Applications for the MA and PhD programs (Fall 2024 matriculation) will be available in Fall 2023, with application deadline of January 6, 2024; please revisit this page for updates. Accepted candidates who wish to enroll must file an online Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) by April 15, 2024.

How to Apply

Applying to the MA and PhD programs is an online process via the UCLA Application for Graduate Admission (AGA).

Completing the requirements will take some time, so we strongly recommend logging in to the AGA in advance to familiarize yourself with the site and downloading the documents and forms you will need to complete your application.

You can also download this checklist to make sure you have prepared and submitted all the relevant documents to complete your application.

Your Statement of Purpose is a critical part of your application to the MA and PhD programs. It is your opportunity to introduce yourself and tell us about your specific academic background, interests, achievements, and goals. Our selection committee use it to evaluate your aptitude for study, as well as consideration for merit-based financial support.

Your statement can be up to 1500 words in length. Below are some questions you might want to consider. You don’t need to answer every question; just focus on the elements that are most relevant to you.

• What is your purpose in applying to the MA or PhD program? Describe your area(s) of research interest, including any areas of concentration and specialization.
• What experiences have prepared you for this program? What relevant skills have you gained from these experiences? Have your experiences led to specific or tangible outcomes that would support your potential to contribute to this field (e.g. performances, publications, presentations, awards or recognitions)?
• What other information about your past experience might help the selection committee in evaluating your suitability for this program? E.g. research, employment, teaching, service, artistic or international experiences through which you have developed skills in leadership, communication, project management, teamwork, or other areas.
• Why is UCLA Architecture and Urban Design the best place for you to pursue your academic goals?
• What are your plans for your career after earning this degree?

Your Personal Statement is your opportunity to provide additional information to help the selection committee evaluate your aptitude for study. It will also be used to consider candidates for UCLA Graduate Division fellowships related to diversity. You can read more about the University of California Diversity Statement here .

Your statement can be up to 500 words in length. Below are some questions you might want to consider. You don’t need to answer every question; just focus on the elements that are most relevant to you.

• Are there educational, personal, cultural, economic, or social experiences, not described in your Statement of Purpose, that have shaped your academic journey? If so, how? Have any of these experiences provided unique perspective(s) that you would contribute to your program, field or profession?
• Describe challenge(s) or barriers that you have faced in your pursuit of higher education. What motivated you to persist, and how did you overcome them? What is the evidence of your persistence, progress or success?
• How have your life experiences and educational background informed your understanding of the barriers facing groups that are underrepresented in higher education?
• How have you been actively engaged (e.g., through participation, employment, service, teaching or other activities) in programs or activities focused on increasing participation by groups that have been historically underrepresented in higher education?
• How do you intend to engage in scholarly discourse, research, teaching, creative efforts, and/or community engagement during your graduate program that have the potential to advance diversity and equal opportunity in higher education?
• How do you see yourself contributing to diversity in your profession after you complete your academic degree at UCLA Architecture and Urban Design?

A Curriculum Vitae (résumé of your academic and professional experience) is recommended but not required.

Applicants must upload a scanned copy of the official transcripts from each college or university you have attended both in the U.S. and abroad. If you are accepted into the program you will be required to submit hard copies. These can either be sent directly from each institution or hand-delivered as long as they remain in the official, signed, sealed envelopes from your college or university. As a general rule, UCLA Graduate Division sets a minimum required overall grade-point average of 3.0 (B), or the foreign equivalent.

As of this Fall 2023 cycle, the GRE is NOT required as part of your application to UCLA AUD. No preference will be given to those who choose to submit GRE scores as part of their application.

However, if you do take the GRE exam and wish to include it as part of your application: More information on this standardized exam can be found at www.ets.org/gre . In addition to uploading your GRE scores, please direct ETS to send us your official score sheets. Our ETS codes for the GRE are below:

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design Institution Code: 4837 Department Code: 4401

We recommend you take the exam at least three weeks before the application deadline as it usually takes 2-3 weeks for ETS to send us the test scores.

If you have received a Bachelor’s degree in a country where the official language of instruction and primary spoken language of daily life is not English, you must submit either a Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) or an International English Language Testing System (IELTS). Exempt countries include Australia, Barbados, Canada, Ireland, Jamaica, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. This is a requirement that is regardless of your visa or citizenship status in the United States.

To be considered for admission to the M.Arch. program, international students must score at least a 92 on the TOEFL or a 7 on the IELTS exam. Because processing, sending, and receiving TOEFL and IELTS scores can take several weeks, international students must schedule their exam no later than October 31 in order to meet UCLA deadlines. TOEFL scores must be sent to us directly and uploaded as part of the online submission. Our ETS codes for the TOEFL are below:

UCLA Architecture and Urban Design Institution Code: 4837 Department Code: 12

If your score is less than 100 on the TOEFL or 7.5 on the IELTS, you are also required to take the English as a Second Language Placement Examination (ESLPE) on arrival at UCLA. The results of this test will determine any English as a Second Language (ESL) courses you need to take in your first term of residence. These courses cannot be applied towards your minimum course requirements. As such, you should expect to have a higher course load than students not required to take ESL courses.

If you have earned a degree or completed two years of full-time college-level coursework in the following countries, your TOEFL / IELTS and ESLPE requirements will be waived: U.S., U.K., Canada (other than Quebec), Australia, and New Zealand. Please provide official transcripts to demonstrate course completion. Unfortunately, we cannot accept any other documentation to demonstrate language proficiency.

Three (3) letters of recommendation are required. These letters should be from individuals who are familiar with your academic and professional experiences and can evaluate your capacity to successfully undertake graduate studies at UCLA. If you do not have an architecture background please note that we are looking for letters that evaluate your potential as a graduate student, not necessarily your architecture experience.

Letters of recommendation must be sent electronically directly to UCLA by the recommender. When logged in, you can enter the name and email address of each of your recommenders. They will be contacted by email with a request to submit a letter on your behalf. You can track which letters have and have not been received. You can also send reminders to your recommenders to send their letters.

Writing samples should illustrate an applicant’s capacities for research, analytical writing and scholarly citation. Texts may include seminar papers, theses, and/or professional writing.

Please complete and submit the Department Supplement Form to confirm your intention to apply to the MA or PhD program.