Ralf Michel

Wolfgang Jonas

Michelle Christensen

Design is inextricably interwoven with all aspects of life and has even produced its own astonishing genre of research. Design research opens up new perspectives of interdisciplinary empiricism, joining with economics, sociology, technology, and philosophy to produce analyses and syntheses that get to the heart of daily life. The twelve contributions from international authors that comprise this book vividly make this case. They cover the relationship between subject and object, animation, all forms of representation, design activism, and many other themes. This book is intended to inspire discussion. Its target reader is anyone seeking to expand their understanding of design, to fundamentally improve their praxis, and to more deeply appreciate life in all of its aspects.

Positions and Perspectives

NERD - New Experimental Research in Design 2

Gesche Joost

Katharina Bredies

Florian Conradi

Andreas Unteidig

Are there differences between design practice and the practice of design research? What alliances between text and artefact are possible in the search for new knowledge? How does design research translate and transform theories and methods from other disciplines? Is design research moving towards becoming a formal discipline and, if so, would this really be an advantage? 16 international authors address these four different aspects in the form of personal statements, and 19 researchers share their reflections based on their experience of having carried out a practice-based PhD. This book investigates the status quo of things in the multi-faceted and constantly evolving field of design research, and outlines the elementary issues faced by researchers. The compendium is a survey of a fast-growing field and, at the same time, provides pointers for personal orientation. With statements from: Uta Brandes, Rachel Cooper, Clive Dilnot, Michael Erlhoff, Alain Findeli, Bill Gaver, Ranulph Glanville, Matthias Held, Wolfgang Jonas, Klaus Krippendorff, Claudia Mareis, Mike Press, Elizabeth B.-N. Sanders, Arne Scheuermann, Cameron Tonkinwise, Brigitte Wolf

Positions, Arguments, Perspectives

Design as Research

In a state of ontological crisis, all boundaries have been ruptured between nature and culture, human and machine, and object and subject. We find ourselves exhaustively tackling the turmoil of our own designed circumstances, as we emerge to become extensions of the extensions that we built. In this practice-based design theory project, the authors share their experiments in negotiating power with things, hacking mundane objects, and thus their own everyday lives, allowing themselves to be swayed and misled, disrupted and called into question. The experiments delineate a mode of critical cultural inquiry where design and sociology collide to elicit critical perspectives on the ‘designer’ and the ‘designed’ as we act within an entangled politics of things.

A Critical Approach Through Design

Politics of Things

Michelle Christensen

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