Designing with and for others

The paper argues that as designers are increasing designing with others and design for others it is important for them to be skilled in intercultural communication and be aware of the effects of their practices, including the ways others are represented in the objects they produce. We will use an international project to upcoming designers’ reflection on their practices while working with others and designing for others. We conclude that although the project provided them with an opportunity to experience working across cultures it is questionable as to whether they gained an understanding of the principles that contribute to enhancing intercultural communication

Authentic learning: the gift project

Higher Education is experiencing an increasingly diverse student population. Students bring a range of skills and experiences to their courses; they have different backgrounds and different needs. This fluidity requires an approach to teaching that encompasses the social aspects of learning. It has been suggested that authentic approaches to teaching and learning can assist in offering a perspective on learning which views learning as ‘enabling participation in knowing’. We propose that the authentic learning practices developed in The Gift design project, discussed in this paper, constituted approaches which acknowledged that students’ interests and experience are intrinsically bound up with motivation and engagement and, as such, have a major influence on the ways in which learning is constituted and developed. The Gift project has developed a range of innovative formative strategies which have provided both students and tutors with opportunities to become involved in peer assessment and review, peer feedback and reflection on learning outcomes. This re-conceptualisation of the assessment process has provided valuable insights into the development of learning skills such as problem solving, critical analysis, and the development of creativity and learner autonomy

Amplifying learner's voices through the global studio

Amplifying learner's voices through the global studi

Highlighting issues in current conceptions of user experience design through bringing together ideas from HCI and social practice theory

A socio-technical reconceptualisation of use, and the active roles of the material and users in design prompt us to question professional designers’ roles and agencies within the wider realm of social (re)production. This paper focuses on bringing together key concepts of UX design and theories of practice, and pointing out some challenges that lie ahead of professional designers in the conception of their work. Theories used in HCI and historical legacies of production models may limit a full conception of ‘experience’ – or a locating of the social ‘motor’– that can bring change about, as well as ‘hide’ other factors that make up professional design. We argue that there are limitations with current theories underlying design practice, and that the commonly conceived concept of agency in design and use, and the ontological place allocations of the professional designer and the user in the mechanisms of social (re)production need to be revisited. An investigation of professional designing as a social practice can serve the purpose to illustrate alternative conceptions of agency in professional designing, and help designers to be more aware of the social dynamics in their work

Mapping coupled open innovation processes from activity theory framework

Organisations have started to adopt open innovation processes to supplement their internal competencies and resources. Adoption of these processes assist them in keeping up with the pace of technology and protecting their competitive advantage in the market. Despite the significance of open innovation processes, there are few studies focusing on them. The purpose of this study is mapping coupled open innovation processes to contribute to the field of open innovation. The case study research was set up to explore how organisations undertake coupled open innovation processes from the perspective of employees working in a smallmedium sized enterprise. The Activity Theory was used as a research framework. The research findings revealed how the importing and exporting mechanisms of coupled processes. The findings are discussed to fill the knowledge gaps in the existing literature and help design management academia and practice identify future work areas

Exploring articulations of design activism

Discussions on design activism generously embrace the activist ethos of designers, but are inconsistent in articulating how design activism makes a difference in relation to the various socially engaged design approaches generated. Committed to critically and transformationally engage with progressive socio-economic and political problems, the activist designer creates forms and situations within social processes. By mapping the fields of knowledge and concepts on which design activism draws, the paper attempts to bring an understanding of what informs Design Activism actions beyond the neoliberal paradigm. Drawing on the emerging discussions on design activism, the paper brings together articulations of design activism from scholars and design collectives to foreground the foundation for a more coherent understanding of design activism and a constructive dialogue within its community

Rethinking design: from the methodology of innovation to the object of design

The design literature theorizes design as the methodology of innovation, supposedly required for mediating the world’s separate entities, such as theory and practice, the human and the material, and subjective and objective knowing, coming “naturally” with the designer’s ways of knowing. But instead of taking such naturalizations for granted, we argue that through such positioning of design the specifics of design activity are obscured, along with the locations designers take within them. We propose that “design as a methodology” is an object produced by design. Investigating this object of design, and how it is made, will make visible what design activity is, and what locations the designers take within them.<br

Tracing the tensions surrounding understandings of agency and knowledge in technology design

The literature suggests that prevailing understandings of the makeup of design knowledge and agency in producing design knowledge in technology is not helpful for design processes and its practitioners. Tensions arise within processes of designing, when design knowledge is understood as objective, whilst subjectivity is experienced in the research methods employed. In the same time, knowledge production is pursued in an individualist manner, where the situated nature of knowing as an interplay of factors, likely reaching beyond personal traits and human intention, is not acknowledged. In this way, design processes are currently working against their inherent potential with likely effects on designers and subsequently design outcomes. The arising tensions cause issues for practitioners, who are stuck in between an objectivity demand and experienced subjectivity, without an alternative conception of their work. Practice-oriented conceptualisations of social dynamics, how things are, and come to be, as well as existing research in consumption practices and sustainable design, have shown that agency and knowing conceptualised as emerging from practice might reconcile this tension. It is therefore that we argue for a reconceptualization of the makeup of knowledge and agency in knowledge production, so that these advancements in conceptualising practices can be of service to the technology design discipline

Review of creativity factors in final year design projects in China

This paper focuses on investigating a common phenomenon that emerges in the reformative process of China’s design education system from the traditional to ‘creativity-directed’. The investigation is explored through the following aspects: the circumstance of conducting Final Year Design Projects (FYDPs) in China, with a review of relevant pedagogical theories of Project-based learning (PjBL); and a review of cross-cultural understanding of creativity. Through conducting the literature survey, it is proposed that some product design students’ lack creative abilities that could affect their learning performance in FYDPs. It is proposed that this is evident through their difficulty in applying subject specific knowledge in an effective way. Analyses suggest that underpinning the problem might be the educational and social cultures within China’s product design programmes and how the final year projects are implemented. In conclusion it is suggested that design students’ creative abilities are influenced by the adopted problem solving processes that involve knowledge application

Insights on how metacognition influences knowledge application in product design education

Insights on how metacognition influences knowledge application in product design educatio