Emeritus professor receives national award for Chinese architecture studies

NEW PALTZ — Ronald Knapp, emeritus professor of Geography at the State University of New York at New Paltz, was recently awarded the 2007 Henry Glassie Award at the national meeting of the Vernacular Architecture Forum in Savannah, GA.

Ronald Knapp

According to the award committee, Knapp was nominated for two books, “Chinese Houses: The Architectural Heritage of a Nation,” published by Tuttle Press (2005) and “House Home Family: Living and Being Chinese,” published by the University of Hawaii Press (2005) (and co-edited by Kay-Yin Lo).

The committee noted that both books were excellent examples of scholarship of vernacular environments and that the first was based on over thirty years of fieldwork in China.

“Ronald Knapp, who was trained as a geographer, has done more than anyone else outside of China to celebrate, analyze and promote understanding of that country’s domestic architectural heritage,” stated the committee.

Named Distinguished Professor by SUNY in 1998, Knapp is internationally known for his pioneering achievements in the study of cultural and historical geography. He has published more than a dozen books on Chinese folk architecture, symbolism and the history of China’s frontiers. In addition to teaching at New Paltz for 34 years, he served as coordinator of the New Paltz Asian Studies Program, chair of the SUNY Chancellor’s China Coordinating Committee and director of the college’s Office of International Education.

The Henry Glassie Award, named for the renowned vernacular architecture scholar and folklorist, recognizes special achievements in, and contributions to, the field of vernacular architecture studies. It is awarded only intermittently, as deemed appropriate by the board of directors of the Vernacular Architecture Forum.