Delia Duong Ba Wendel explores how communities recover and rebuild from conflict. She approaches this work from an interdisciplinary perspective, drawing from training in Urban Planning, Cultural Geography, Architectural History, and Anthropology. Current research is located in Rwanda, where she explores post-genocide peacebuilding as a sociospatial endeavor; one that is defined and challenged in the design of homes, settlements, and civic space. This project, The Ethics of Stability, was recognized by grants from the Social Science Research Council, Harvard Center for Ethics, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, and American Council of Learned Societies.  

Generally, Delia's research engages three main areas: spatial politics, conflict and disaster recovery, and African urbanism. Publications include essays for the Journal of Urban Design, New Orleans and the Design Moment, and The Handbook of Architectural Theory.  In 2015, Delia co-edited the anthology Spatializing Politics: Essays on Power and Place with Fallon Samuels Aidoo (published by GSD/Harvard U. Press). The book was funded in part by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. 

Delia received a PhD in Urban Planning from Harvard University in 2016 and holds degrees in Architecture (BArch, Rice University), Cultural Geography (MSc, University College London) and Architectural History and Theory (MDes, Harvard GSD). During 2014-16, she taught in the Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning departments at Harvard's Graduate School of Design and was an Assistant Professor in Architectural Studies at University of Edinburgh from 2008-11. Professional work includes design for architecture firms in New York and Washington, DC, her own architectural design practice in Virginia, and a brief consultancy for the Disaster Management Programme at UN-Habitat/ Nairobi.

During 2017-18, Delia will be a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania's Wolf Humanities Center. Beginning in 2018, she will join MIT's Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP) as an Assistant Professor.

Contact: wendel@mit.edu