Methodological bricolage: What does it tell us about design?

This paper explores an approach to design research that is becoming more prevalent in practice-based doctoral studies and examines what it tells us about the current state of design research. A previous examination of design PhD case studies has shown that the bricolage approach is evident in a majority of contemporary practice-based design PhDs [1]. The usual academic norm of using an established method or methodology is often discarded in favour of a ‘pick and mix’ approach to select and apply the most appropriate methods. Does it suggest a discipline in crisis, where existing methods are unfit for purpose? Or does this suggest that design as a discipline is maturing and developing a distinct research model? Is design undisciplined? The paper answers these questions by proposing that design researchers navigate a complex, indeterminate and temporal framework where the bricoleur is the best operative

Alterplinarity – ‘Alternative Disciplinarity’ in Future Art and Design Research Pursuits

Contemporary design is typified by fluid, evolving patterns of practice that regularly traverse, transcend and transfigure historical disciplinary and conceptual boundaries. This mutability means that design research, education, and practice is constantly shifting, creating, contesting and negotiating new terrains of opportunities and re-shaping the boundaries of the discipline. This paper proposes that this is because globalisation and the proliferation of the digital has resulted in connections that are no longer “amid”, cannot be measured “across”, nor encompass a “whole” system, which has generated an “other” dimension (Bourriaud, 2009), an “alternative disciplinarity” - an “alterplinarity”. As the fragmentation of distinct disciplines has shifted creative practice from being “discipline-based” to “issue- or project-based” (Heppell, 2006), we present the argument that the researcher, who purposely blurs distinctions and has dumped methods from being “discipline-based” to “issue- or project-based”, will be best placed to make connections that generate new ways to identify “other” dimensions of design research, activity and thought that is needed for the complex, interdependent issues we now face. We present the case that reliance on the historic disciplines of design as the boundaries of our understanding has been superseded by a boundless space/time that we call “alterplinarity”. The digital has modified the models of design thought and action, and as a result research and practice should transform from a convention domesticated by the academy to a reaction to globalisation that is yet to be disciplined

Information systems and business informatics: an Australian German comparison

At last year\u27s ACIS conference in Melbourne a panel titled \u27IS: A discipline in crisis\u27 discussed issues relating to be in disability of IS in Australia. It is not, however, just the Australian IS discipline that must deal with problems such as the need for better organisational structures and greater visibility in universities. This paper presents a comparison between the German Business Informatics discipline and the Australian Information Systems discipline. The objective is to provide another perspective on the IS discipline to raise new ideas and stimulate discussion with reference to the organisational structure of our discipline in universities.<br /

Why is there no queer international theory?

Over the last decade, Queer Studies have become Global Queer Studies, generating significant insights into key international political processes. Yet, the transformation from Queer to Global Queer has left the discipline of International Relations largely unaffected, which begs the question: if Queer Studies has gone global, why has the discipline of International Relations not gone somewhat queer? Or, to put it in Martin Wight’s provocative terms, why is there no Queer International Theory? This article claims that the presumed non-existence of Queer International Theory is an effect of how the discipline of International Relations combines homologization, figuration, and gentrification to code various types of theory as failures in order to manage the conduct of international theorizing in all its forms. This means there are generalizable lessons to be drawn from how the discipline categorizes Queer International Theory out of existence to bring a specific understanding of International Relations into existence

Incorporating molecular data in fungal systematics: a guide for aspiring researchers

The last twenty years have witnessed molecular data emerge as a primary research instrument in most branches of mycology. Fungal systematics, taxonomy, and ecology have all seen tremendous progress and have undergone rapid, far-reaching changes as disciplines in the wake of continual improvement in DNA sequencing technology. A taxonomic study that draws from molecular data involves a long series of steps, ranging from taxon sampling through the various laboratory procedures and data analysis to the publication process. All steps are important and influence the results and the way they are perceived by the scientific community. The present paper provides a reflective overview of all major steps in such a project with the purpose to assist research students about to begin their first study using DNA-based methods. We also take the opportunity to discuss the role of taxonomy in biology and the life sciences in general in the light of molecular data. While the best way to learn molecular methods is to work side by side with someone experienced, we hope that the present paper will serve to lower the learning threshold for the reader.Comment: Submitted to Current Research in Environmental and Applied Mycology - comments most welcom