Knowledge practices in design: The role of visual representations as 'epistemic objects'

We use a detailed study of the knowledge work around visual representations to draw attention to the multidimensional nature of `objects'. Objects are variously described in the literatures as relatively stable or in flux; as abstract or concrete; and as used within or across practices. We clarify these dimensions, drawing on and extending the literature on boundary objects, and connecting it with work on epistemic and technical objects. In particular, we highlight the epistemic role of objects, using our observations of knowledge work on an architectural design project to show how, in this setting, visual representations are characterized by a `lack' or incompleteness that precipitates unfolding. The conceptual design of a building involves a wide range of technical, social and aesthetic forms of knowledge that need to be developed and aligned. We explore how visual representations are used, and how these are meaningful to different stakeholders, eliciting their distinct contributions. As the project evolves and the drawings change, new issues and needs for knowledge work arise. These objects have an `unfolding ontology' and are constantly in flux, rather than fully formed. We discuss the implications for wider understandings of objects in organizations and for how knowledge work is achieved in practice

Picturing difference: juxtaposition, collage and layering of a multiethnic street

My research is an ethnographic exploration of how cultural and ethnic diversity manifests through regular, face-to-face social contact on the Walworth Road in South London. My focus is the small independent shops along the mile length of this multi-ethnic street and the social and spatial interactions between proprietors and customers within them. While absorbed in an ethnography of everyday life, I searched for ways of understanding the layers of place, time and experience that make this street. As an architect, I had a fascination for how urban space is designed and appropriated, and a predilection for a visual reading of the city. As an inexperienced ethnographer, I had to learn about a much slower process of looking; making time to sit, listen and talk. My research methodology has been influenced by a combination of architectural and ethnographic approaches to how individuals appropriate and re-constitute urban space in the habitual rhythm of their day-to-day lives. In this paper I expand on my ethnographic process of exploring difference through pictures made during fieldwork. I use juxtaposition, collage and layering as both illustrative forms and analytic methods for observing and representing difference

Recycling bins, garbage cans or think tanks? Three myths regarding policy analysis institutes

The phrase 'think tank' has become ubiquitous – overworked and underspecified – in the political lexicon. It is entrenched in scholarly discussions of public policy as well as in the 'policy wonk' of journalists, lobbyists and spin-doctors. This does not mean that there is an agreed definition of think tank or consensual understanding of their roles and functions. Nevertheless, the majority of organizations with this label undertake policy research of some kind. The idea of think tanks as a research communication 'bridge' presupposes that there are discernible boundaries between (social) science and policy. This paper will investigate some of these boundaries. The frontiers are not only organizational and legal; they also exist in how the 'public interest' is conceived by these bodies and their financiers. Moreover, the social interactions and exchanges involved in 'bridging', themselves muddy the conception of 'boundary', allowing for analysis to go beyond the dualism imposed in seeing science on one side of the bridge, and the state on the other, to address the complex relations between experts and public policy

Dante Gabriel Rossetti's salutation of Beatrice pictures as Victorian comics

Accepted manuscrip

Truth, Beauty, Freedom, and Money: Technology-Based Art and the Dynamics of Sustainability

Proposes innovative new approaches and models for art and technology institutions, and provides details for an "Arts Lab," a unique hybrid art center and research lab

Concluding dialogue

This is a chapter in a book with the overall description: This is a critical time in design. Concepts and practices of design are changing in response to historical developments in the modes of industrial design production and consumption. Indeed, the imperative of more sustainable development requires profound reconsideration of design today. Theoretical foundations and professional definitions are at stake, with consequences for institutions such as museums and universities as well as for future practitioners. This is ‘critical’ on many levels, from the urgent need to address societal and environmental issues to the reflexivity required to think and do design differently

Introductions

This is the introduction to the book with the overall description: This is a critical time in design. Concepts and practices of design are changing in response to historical developments in the modes of industrial design production and consumption. Indeed, the imperative of more sustainable development requires profound reconsideration of design today. Theoretical foundations and professional definitions are at stake, with consequences for institutions such as museums and universities as well as for future practitioners. This is ‘critical’ on many levels, from the urgent need to address societal and environmental issues to the reflexivity required to think and do design differently