Michael Gameli Dziwornu is a Ghanaian urban geographer and research scientist whose work bridges rigorous scholarship with public-facing practice. He heads the Thematic Mapping Section at Ghana’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute for Scientific and Technological Information (CSIR-INSTI). Holding a PhD in Urban Studies from the University of Milan-Bicocca, where his dissertation traced the spatial politics of container urbanism in Accra. Michael’s research spans human geography, migration studies, sustainable development, and carceral geography. His scholarship appears in journals such as Home Cultures, GeoJournal, Crime Prevention and Community Safety, Future Anterior, and the Journal of Asian and African Studies, and he regularly presents at global forums including the American Association of Geographers, Society of Architectural Historians, and the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam. See here the website of CSIR-INSTI.
Office Southeast: urban research collective based in Accra, Ghana.
Starting from within ongoing processes of urbanization, we examine their historical conditions and explore their possible futures. We understand urbanization as situated and specific—while recognizing that such specificity often emerges through comparative and relational perspectives.
Bringing together research, curatorial, and design practices, Office Southeast was founded by Ghanaian urban geographer Michael Gameli Dziwornu and Polish architectural historian Łukasz Stanek. Michael’s work on West African urbanism and the afterlives of infrastructure intersects with Łukasz’s research on Cold War–era architectural exchanges among regions often regarded as peripheral. The name Office Southeast reflects our respective trajectories as well as our shared ambition to develop research methods and concepts beyond hegemonic centers of knowledge production.
Library
Date
Title
2025
A ‘Better Life for All in Bricks and Mortar’: The Spatial Rationalities of Container Urbanism in Accra. Journal of Asian and African Studies, 60:3, 1549-1566Download
2024
Global Container Urbanism and Sustainable Urban Development, Home Cultures 21:1, 1–19. Download
2024
Hegemony by Adaptation: Decolonizing Ghana’s Construction Industry, Comparative Studies in Society and History Vol. 66, Issue 4, 899-932Link
2024
Race, Time, and Architecture: Dilemmas of Africanization in Ghana, 1951-1966, Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 83:2, 191-208Download
2023
Archives 1-3, in: Claire Lubell, Rafico Ruiz eds. Fugitive Archives: A Sourcebook for Centring Africa in Histories of Architecture (Montreal: Canadian Centre for Architecture, Jap Sam Books), 14-103Link
2023
Socialist Worldmaking: Comparative Research between the Socialist and Postcolonial Countries during the Cold War, in: Patrick Le Galès, Jennifer Robinson eds. The Routledge Handbook of Comparative Global Urban Studies (London: Routledge), 416-28Download
2022
Artist Intervention: Asutsuare Rebound, Future Anterior: Journal of Historic Preservation History, Theory, and Criticism, 19:2, 147-155Download
2021
Crime Drop in Ghana? Some Insights from Crime Patterns and Trends, Crime Prevention and Community Safety, 23:4, 433-449Download
2021
Socialist Worldmaking: The Political Economy of Urban Comparison in the Cold War, Urban Studies 59:8, 1575-1596Download
2021
Buildings for Dollars and Oil: East German and Romanian Construction Companies in Cold War Iraq, Contemporary European History 30:4, 544-61Download
2021
Tracing the Marine Drive, Accra – Canadian Centre for ArchitectureLink
2020
Architecture in Global Socialism. Eastern Europe, West Africa, and the Middle East in the Cold War, Princeton University PressLink
2015
Architects from Socialist Countries in Ghana (1957-1967): Modern Architecture and Mondialisation, Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 74:4, 416–42Download
Team
Łukasz Stanek is Professor of Architectural History at A. Alfred Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA. Stanek authored Henri Lefebvre on Space: Architecture, Urban Research, and the Production of Theory (University of Minnesota Press, 2011) and Architecture in Global Socialism: Eastern Europe, West Africa, and the Middle East in the Cold War (Princeton University Press, 2020). His papers were published in Comparative Studies in Society and History, Contemporary European History, Urban Studies, Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, among others. After receiving his PhD from the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands (2008), Stanek taught at the Swiss Federal University of Technology (ETH) in Zurich (Switzerland), and the University of Manchester (UK), and he was guest professor at Harvard University (USA), and the University of Ghana at Legon in Accra (Ghana). See here Łukasz’s profile at the University of Michigan and here his personal website.
Network
- Eric Don-Arthur photographer based in Winneba in Ghana, believing in photography as liberation pedagogy, website.
- Ruth-Anne Richardsonpracticing architect, writer and principal of StudioRED in Accra, Ghana, instagram.
- Kojo David DerbanAccra-based chartered architect and a history and heritage enthusiast, instagram.
- Kuukuwa ManfulAssistant Professor of Architecture at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, website.
- Ayodele Arigbabuwriter, architect and creative technologist based in Lagos, Nigeria, website.
- Warebi Brisibearchitects, historian, and preservationist, and Professor at Rivers State University, Port Harcourt, Nigeria, website.
- Dana SalamaDesigner, artist, researcher, facilitator, and PhD researcher at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, University of Michigan, website.
- Clint Abrahamsarchitect and lecturer at the School of Architecture, Planning & Geomatics, the University of Cape Town, South Africa, website.
- Adedoyin Teribaarchitectural historian at Dartmouth College, USA, specializing in modern and contemporary architecture & urbanism in West Africa and its diasporas, website.
- Kaja Kusztraartist, designer, and teacher of visual communication at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, Poland, website.
- Alice Korkor Ebeheakeyartist and art historian at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana, website.
- Kwasi Ohene-Ayehcurator and research fellow at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana, website.
- Ola Udukuarchitect, historian, and Professor and Head of the Liverpool School of Architecture, UK, website.
- Iain Jackson architect, historian, and Professor and Research Director at the Liverpool School of Architecture, UK, website.
