A Ball State University professor will be one of 800 American college faculty members to teach and research in other countries during the next academic year.
Nihal Perera, associate professor of urban planning and director of the Asian studies program, will spend 10 months in Hong Kong as a Fulbright Scholar.
The Fulbright Scholar program selects American students and faculty to study outside the United States.
"This program started as providing Americans with an opportunity to diversify America," he said. "That's the whole idea."
Perera will spend the 2006-07 academic year at Hong Kong Baptist University, where he will be part of the geography department and teach one class each semester. While in Hong Kong, Perera will also do extensive research. The key focus of his research will be how people look at land and what makes each place unique.
"When I traveled, I was always thinking, 'how is Shanghai Shanghai? How is Bangkok Bangkok?'" he said. "Has anyone given any thought to this?"
Perera was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, and visits Asia frequently. He studied in Sri Lanka and London before coming to the United States.
Perera began his teaching career at Ball State in 1995.
Wes Janz, associate professor of architecture and co-director of CapAsia, met Perera that year and was awed by Perera's knowledge base, Janz said. Perera is intelligent, passionate and informed, he said.
"I was impressed with his range of interests and depth of knowledge," he said.
He's also open, easy going and casual about many things, Janz said.
Fifth-year student Lindsay Bacurin met Perera when he taught one of her summer classes.
"He was such a nice guy and interested in everybody and what they think," she said.
In class, Perera seemed interested in the content and thought behind projects, as opposed to the presentation of them, Bacurin said.
In 1999, Perera created and became the director of the CapAsia program, which is an immersive field study offered to students. For CapAsia, Perera takes students to southern Asian cities to learn and apply planning and architecture theories.
Bacurin traveled to Asia with Perera during the last CapAsia. Perera allowed students to make the CapAsia trip their own, she said.
"He lets us do what we want and explore what we're interested in," Bacurin said. "He's always open to suggestions."
It also helped that he was exited about what and how they were learning, she said. He had a laid-back attitude and was willing to adjust when changes needed to be made.
"It was really great to be on the trip with him," Bacurin said. "He was always cool-headed."
Perera won a $70,000 Fulbright-Hays Group Projects award to help pay for the last CapAsia and recently found out he received another one for the next CapAsia trip.
Janz said securing these awards was a spectacular achievement.
"Nihal can say he's the recipient of three awards from the Fulbright Foundation," he said. "This is an exceptional level of accomplishment for a scholar and professor."
Because of his involvement in the Fulbright Scholars program, the next CapAsia trip will be postponed until Spring 2008, but Perera said he would be able to bring new aspects to the program after his year in Hong Kong.
He will be able to further develop his network of contacts, which can later be used as contacts for the CapAsia field studies, Perera said.
His time in Hong Kong will also help him with his teaching when he returns to Ball State for the Fall 2007 semester, he said.
He teaches a planning in multicultural societies course, the only one in the United States, and will have more insight into East Asian cultures to share with students, he said.
Janz said the trip would help Perera show students and scholars how to look outside the western perspective in urban planning and architecture.
"He'll be able to bring a more nuanced perspective about how we think about cities and planning and urban design," he said.
During his trip, Perera intends to be the editor of a book with chapters written by experts in Asia. The book will focus on the differences among cities in Asia.
Having multiple authors will allow people to have a more comprehensive look at Asian planning and architecture than if he would write the book himself, Perera said.
"I'm thinking maybe I shouldn't write just my version of Asia," he said. "I'm getting other people to write."
He hopes to publish the book by the end of 2007.
"It will act as a toolbox for urban leaders and planners to use to travel in an innovative path," he said. "It's pretty ambitious but one has to start from somewhere."
While in Asia, Perera will also be working a book about his birthplace, Colombo, Sri Lanka.
That book will look at how people share spaces differently. It will offer a new way to look at cities, Perera said. The two books will act as a way to educate people on topics that haven't been looked at before, he said.
"These are scholarly books where we are supposed to push the boundaries of knowledge," Perera said.
He is excited on his trip and is looking forward to spending time on his research in Hong Kong.
"It's one of the greatest places to carry out the research project I'm interested in."
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