“Every move you make is an untimely moment redistributing what has gone before while opening up what may yet come.” – J.D. Dewsbury (2000, p. 480).

Dr. Angela M. Person is an architectural geographer and environmental designer whose research and teaching explores environment-society relationships. She teaches courses in architectural theory and criticism, architectural methods, environment-society relationships, political geography, and human geography. Dr. Person has a particular enthusiasm for mentoring undergraduate students through inquiry-based research, critical creative practice, and intentional professional development.

As a fellow at the Smithsonian Institution, Dr. Person co-authored The Care and Keeping of Cultural Facilities (2014), which documents best practices for cultural institution facilities management. This book was awarded the 2015 Distinguished Author Award by the International Facilities Management Association. Dr. Person’s dissertation research, “Locating the Agency of Architecture,” was recognized with an Honorable Mention by the Architectural Research Centers Consortium (ARCC). This designation honors significant new research in the fields of architecture and environmental design, judged on the basis of the quality, potential impact, and presentation of the research.

Dr. Person co-edited Renegades: Bruce Goff and the American School of Architecture, published by the University of Oklahoma Press (2020). She also co-edited Affective Architectures: More-than-Representational Approaches to Heritage for the Routledge book series “Critical Studies in Heritage, Emotion, and Affect” (2020). Additionally, Dr. Person is working on her fourth book, Locating the Agency of Architecture, which calls for a qualitative paradigm shift in the ways built environments are engaged by scholars and design practitioners.

Dr. Person is director of research initiatives and strategic planning and assistant professor at the Gibbs College of Architecture at the University of Oklahoma, where she is also a lecturer of cultural geography. In this administrative role, she supports Gibbs College in leveraging its resources to drive development of thoughtful, sustainable, and experiential solutions to the design problems of the future. Recently, she organized the national conference Schools of Thought (link), which brought together more than 100 design educators from over 50 institutions around the United States and beyond to explore the future of design teaching.

Dr. Person earned her PhD from the University of Oklahoma, while studying in the Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability. She also has a background in museum studies (MA), environmental design (BS), and geology (minor). In her free time, she enjoys designing furniture and interiors with her friend and design partner, Luisa.