Types of Academic Books: Reviewing Examples in Architecture and Interior Design

There are different types of books in every academic discipline, covering various subject matters, while taking different positions and offering different approaches to an array of problems. However, besides being influenced by the requirements of the field, books belonging to the same type usually share specific characteristics as well. Understanding these characteristics and their implications in terms of structure and content can be beneficial in different stages of both education and research. Based on such characteristics, this article seeks to introduce the most common types of academic books, available in the fields of architecture and interior design. For this purpose, we will first examine some prototypes of academic books and explain their prominent features. We will then study such features in the context of the published works to find out how the structure and narrative of such books are aligned with common characteristics of their respective types.