Taubman College Associate Professor of Architecture Lydia Soo has been named a 2008-09 Fellow at U-M's Department of Comparative Literature's Global Ethnic Literatures Seminar. (GELS)

The purpose of the Global Ethnic Literatures Seminar is to encourage the study of ethnic literature, art, music, and culture at the global level.

Lydia's project investigates the earliest written and visual sources for non-European buildings. Known to British architects during the second half of the 17th century, they contributed to a radically new understanding of architecture as a phenomenon relative to place and custom, challenging the traditional notion of the classical style as universal and absolute.