Provocation Through Narratives: New Speculative Design Tools for Human-Non-Human Collaborations

In a complex and changing world, design is called to act to nurture and provoke critical reflections regarding wicked, complex, and interconnected issues, becoming a sensemaking agent that, exploiting its speculative methods, uses narratives as an inquiry tool, as a co-design tool, and as a provocative tool. Through the presentation and analysis of a provotype designed by the authors, the research aims to define new speculative tools for human-non-human collaborations and highlight how design narratives may be involved within more-than-human discourses

Le disuguaglianze di genere veicolate dai linguaggi pittogrammatici. Una ricerca istruttoria per la definizione di strumenti-guida destinati al progettista

Il design della comunicazione svolge un ruolo di responsabilità sociale e culturale, rappresentando e allo stesso tempo plasmando la società. Un design della comunicazione che sia inclusivo e sostenibile dal punto di vista sociale e culturale deve pertanto essere in grado di progettare tenendo conto della molteplicità e delle diversità che caratterizzano la realtà, facendosi portatore di valori quali pluralismo e rispetto. Il presente contributo si colloca nell’area costituita dall’intersezione tra design della comunicazione e gender studies. Il contesto nel quale ci si muove è caratterizzato da un lato dall’urgenza di affrontare le disuguaglianze di genere, ribadita dall’Agenda ONU 2030 per lo sviluppo sostenibile, dall’altro dal ruolo dei messaggi mediatici nel veicolare stereotipi negativi nei confronti della donna e dalla conseguente necessità di formare progettisti consapevoli. L’area di ricerca riguarda le rappresentazioni visive schematizzate – linguaggi pittogrammatici – al fine di mettere in evidenza come sistemi comunicativi per definizione universali e indirizzati alla collettività tutta – quindi idealmente rappresentativi della molteplicità – risultino invece fortemente asimmetrici e orientati al maschile. Al centro la riflessione sulla rappresentazione dei generi e sulla centralità dell’uomo bianco, elevato a “prototipo unico della specie umana” (Melandri, 2011)

Codesign with more-than-humans: toward a meta co-design tool for human-non-human collaborations

What does more-than-human mean? How can we, as humans, understand that our ecology is only one of the many that do exist within the world? Furthermore, in which way should we step aside to let all ecological actors exercise their agency? And, more specifically, what should be the role of design and designers in tackling complex issues and in contributing to a major shift in thoughts? These questions fostered a reflection on the relation between possible futures and the design practice itself and set the basis for the creation of a provotype. A provotype (from “provocation” and “prototype”) is a conceptual product or an artifact whose objective is to foster reflections and provoke discussions mainly concerning social and environmental sustainability, innovations, and technologies, leaving gaps to be filled with the audience imagination. The research reported in this contribution deals with issues and questions that fall under the umbrella of the topic of alternative biopolitics in future scenarios: how can we co-design with more-than-human actors? In which way can symbiosis between different entities be achieved? What is the meaning of interspecies justice, and which should be the steps to follow to fulfill it? And, finally, maybe the most significant question to focus on: how can communication between different entities be fostered? The designed provotype consists of a fictional event (“The first Multispecies Symposium”) which takes place in 2100, further helped the researchers in opening new reflections that made it possible to experiment with participatory design and to finalize a tool that can be used to share and expand reflections about futures without hierarchies, not human-centered, sustainable progress and hope, participative futures

Packaging as a Link to the Environmental Issues. Tools and Languages for the Communication of Sustainability

Sostenibilidad es una de las palabras clave que hoy en día se discute mucho en el campo de los envases. Nuestro aporte se ubica en el área de investigación que concierne a las funciones comunicativas e informativas del envase en relación al tema de la sostenibilidad ambiental. La reflexión se desarrolla desde una perspectiva que asigna al packaging el papel de enlace, una entrada que permite el acceso a contenidos e información orientada a concienciar al consumidor sobre sus opciones de compra. El trabajo se articula con la presentación de un caso de estudio desarrollado dentro de un proyecto de investigación europeo, a través del cual pretendemos aportar una contribución al área disciplinar desde la perspectiva metodológica y práctica.Sustainability is one of the key words which is nowadays highly discussed in the field of packaging. Our contribution is located in the research area that concerns the communicative and informative functions of packaging in relation to the issue of environmental sustainability. The reflection evolves from a perspective that assigns packaging the role of link, an entrance that allows access to content and information aimed at making the consumers aware of their purchasing choices. The paper is articulated with the presentation of a case study developed within a European research project, through which we aim to provide a contribution to the disciplinary area from the methodological and practical perspective

Transdisciplinarity among universities as a catalyst for a gender-sensitive revolution. Strategies and approaches from the perspective of communication design

One of the most influential and proven vehicles for sustainable development is inclusive and quality education. This is why it is crucial to promote gender equality in higher education and research, for only in this way can we build a fairer world where everyone has equal opportunities to contribute, create, fulfil their dreams, use their talents, and above all, develop a more sustainable world in collaboration with other human beings. This contribution intends to approach the issue of the university’s role in closing the gender gap from the disciplinary perspective of Communication Design. The contribution therefore aims to fuel the reflection on the role and strategies that the educational path in design can experiment and equip itself with to promote a shift in perspective and contribute to a positive change. The presentation of the case study «A multidisciplinary awareness-raising campaign project against gender-based violence, from the university for the university» has the aim of supporting the argumentation. The case study constitutes a practical example of an inter-university multidisciplinary project, an awareness-raising campaign, in which the synergy and juxtaposition of different and complementary disciplines enable the activation of a virtuous circle of knowledge and awareness. The strategy implemented in this case involved the university on several intertwining levels: from the university, through the university, for the university. The actors engaged in the research and project were located at different levels of the academic pathway: Professors, researchers and students worked together and with different roles in the various stages of the projec

Technology toward more-than-human symbiosis: Critical reflections from the design perspective

The research aims at analyzing the theme of human-nature interactions mediated by technologies from different perspectives and applying three lenses: the first one is more pragmatic and oriented by technological applications, and, thus, with relapses on design practices, while the other two are theoretical – decolonization and post-human feminism – and they provide a critical vision of the topics of interest from an ontological and epistemological point of view, with relapses on design theories. Therefore, the goal of the research is to provide a first draft of a framework, designed through a process of literature review and case studies analysis, that can stimulate more-than-human connections as collaborative and symbiotic processes between human and non-human agents, oriented by new perspectives upon technology

Building Multivalent Iminosugar-Based Ligands on Calixarene Cores via Nitrone Cycloadditions

A novel and challenging approach for the construction of multivalent iminosugar architectures directly on calixarene scaffolds is presented, which exploits multiple cycloaddition reactions of a carbohydrate-derived nitrone on diversely functionalized calix[4]­arenes. Regardless of the 4-fold reiteration on a single calixarene, the reactions take place with high regio- and stereoselectivity, demonstrating this method as an appealing one for the synthesis of calixarene-based neoglycoconjugates

Assembly of a supramolecular capsule on a molecular printboard

A molecular capsule based on ionic interactions between two oppositely charged calix[4]arenes, 1 and 2, was assembled both in solution and on a surface. In solution, the formation of the equimolar assembly 1·2 was studied by 1H NMR, ESI-MS, and isothermal titration calorimetry, giving an association constant (Ka) of 7.5 × 105 M-1. A β-cyclodextrin self-assembled monolayer (β-CD SAM) on gold was used as a molecular printboard to anchor the tetraguanidinium calix[4]arene (2). The binding of tetrasulfonate calix[4]arene 1 was monitored by surface plasmon resonance spectroscopy. Rinsing of the surface with a high ionic strength aqueous solution allows the removal of the tetrasulfonate calix[4]arene (1), while by rinsing with 2-propanol it is possible to achieve the complete desorption of the tetraguanidinium calix[4]arene (2) from the β-CD SAM. The Ka for the capsule formation on a surface is 3.5 × 106 M-1, thus comparing well with the Ka determined in solution