Expert answer:Final Paper
Expert answer:Write a 2500 to 3500 word essay based on the Design for the Century — Final Paper Requirements.There’s no grading rubric. All the requirements are in the pdf file.(You cannot rewrite it or use the same examples or ideas from manifesto. You can only write a new one or go deeper from the ideas or conclusions in the manifesto.)
design_for_this_century__final_paper_requirements.pdf
designforthecenturymanifesto.docx
readings_and_videos_from_this_semester.docx
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Design for This Century
Fall 2017
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[CRITICAL] DESIGN for Our Century
FINAL Writing assignment draft
Due date TBA.
For your first, midterm, writing project, we asked you to develop a “manifesto” of design
values/ideas/axioms that, sometimes loosely, sometimes closely, would help guide and direct your
work.
For your second, final project, you will write a 2500 to 3500 word essay extending your Manifesto
into the realm of design at a very comprehensive scale: our century and planet. In this text you will
construct a critical design proposal for what you consider the most crucial challenge[s] we face
across the century we are now 15 years into. You will explain why this design proposal is necessary;
how it can be realized; who the design and user communities will be; who might fund it; what its
lifespan will be [the entire century? a year? A decade?]; etc. You should include a summary
overview of site, timeframe, general economics, required technology, anticipated roadblocks,
manufacturing needs, etc. If appropriate, the position you articulated in your manifesto can inform
and direct this design project. The paper should include drawings and images to support the text,
but regardless of image content your word count should be a minimum of 2500 words, and no more
than 3500-4000.
[CRITICAL] DESIGN for OUR CENTURY
Across the semester we have leveraged the concept of design for a Century- looking both backward
in history to the previous century, and the challenges and advances it provided; as well as looking
at our own unfolding century, with a new and continuously accelerating set of challenges and
innovations.
For this final paper, you will be informed by material taken from the readings, design examples,
and films from across the entire semester. For your previous assignment we observed that
designers are good at turning critical observations [‘there’s something wrong here’] into proposals;
this is what you will
do with this assignment. By using the term ‘critical design’ as a key catalyst for this paper, we want
to both invoke the space of ‘critical design’ [for example, Dunne and Raby: see their manifesto here
http://www.dunneandraby.co.uk/content/bydandr/13/0 ] but also extend this concept to push you to
THINK CRITICALLY and then DESIGN. In other words, you’re not restricted in the assignment to
adopting a ‘critical design’ approach to your proposal, but you ARE being asked to deploy critical
thinking in the development of sites, scales, materials, objects, programs, business models,
ecologies, and so on, for the project. This is an opportunity to bring the skills of writing, design and
research together.
As with the previous paper, you will footnote and acknowledge the sentences/ideas you take from
the readings (even where you completely change them). We are expecting you will refer to both a
range of the readings as well as the lectures across the semester [both by guests and course
leader].
WHAT IS AT STAKE?
A key goal for this paper will be a focus on translating the values you developed in the Manifesto
into practice. You may also work with values you have been discovering, practicing, refining and
evolving across the semester, or values and agendas you have acquired from the lectures.
Ask yourself what is at stake in our current century- what are the most interesting or urgent design
opportunities, sites, and projects: and connect these to your manifesto. You may even question or
oppose your manifesto in the final paper/project, or take a different position, but regardless: you
should extend and respond to the ideas you began to develop in the manifesto.
We’ve spoken a lot about challenges, risk, and situations of planetary catastrophe this semester.
This project is an opportunity to begin to work on sites- and at scales- which are very specific and
real. Your final paper should give a clear picture of what design CAN and SHOULD do to change
the futures which are currently determined by those situations of risk.
A REPRISE: THE MANIFESTO: ‘Che Fare’ [what is to be done?]
In your first assignment, we asked you to develop “a future manifesto”: not yet actively rooted in
present practice, but rather related to how you will see yourselves 10 years + from now. The crucial
question then, as now, will be “What shall we do?” We asked you to make claims about the future
of design (and technology), to make a statement about where design and technology as a whole
should go; and ultimately to set a possible agenda for how design should be in the C21st. This
final assignment is an opportunity to really try to answer that difficult question: ‘What is to be done?’
POSSIBLE THEMES, POSSIBLE WORLDS
You will already have many themes and ideas in play from your manifesto; the lectures; and the
many readings and films. In addition, we return to this shortlist of keywords below as an extra
provocation.
accelerationism algorithms artificial ‘big data’ coding biopolitics biotech bios cities architecture
infrastructure computation ‘computational economy’ ‘critical design’ culture theory empire
extinction fabrication ‘fab lab’ gaming action ubiquitous gender geofutures geologic time
‘internet of things’ matter media nature networks planetary climate nation ‘post national’ ‘post
empire’ oil colonial security conflict models scenarios ‘the singularity’ sound noise space
systems technology ubicomp anthropocene ‘global warming’ hacking ‘artificial Intelligence’ AI
autonomous human ‘non human’ risk asymmetrical ‘human rights’ rights ethics universal
capital cryptocurrency encryption thalience resources scarcity refugees warfare
communication ‘the Stack’ aerospace UX UI application app exit
Zhaohong Xia
Design for The Century
10/12/2017
Midterm Paper
Design For The Century Manifesto
Human society is facing an important momentum in its history. When the 20th century
ended, a stage of making history that changed the world forever also ended. Of course, that stage
was modernity, with all its elements: rationalism, the scientific revolution, and the industrial
revolution.
THE CURRENT CONTEXT
The technological developments of the last century (and the century before it)
have significantly impacted all aspects of human society, including aesthetics. As a
result, art has ceased to be focused on producing accurate interpretations of reality and
became focused on representing abstract visions. In this new approach, art became a
mean through which conceptualization and expressiveness are the main axes around
which artists can express their ideas. In architecture, these changes were translated into
the emergence of concepts such as functionality, safety, and ergonomics. But perhaps
more importantly, the extremely rapid advancement of technology has led to a fast
development of abstract ideas applied to design problems. An example is the emergence
of online outsourcing options that can allow a system to save physical space, which can
otherwise be used for other activities1. Developments of this type require future designers
to take into account the role of virtual space in modern design and its relationship with
physical space.
Two important phenomena can be used to broadly characterize post-modernist
societies: globalization and the arrival of an information age. Both of these phenomena
have important implications for design. For instance, globalization encourage the spread
of knowledge and ideas between people, making designers around the world to embrace
concepts that have initially emerged in distant lands. On the other hand, globalization can
also discourage creativity, as people in different parts of the world are influenced by each
other’s ideas and may be less likely in developing unique perspectives on design-related
issues. The process of globalization and the emergence of intelligent technologiesincluding artificial intelligence (A.I.)-will likely continue at a fast speed in the 21st
century. This means that future designers will need to know how to adapt to translate fast
cultural and technological changes happening on a consistent basis in their work. Are
they prepared to do this at the present time? Probably not.
THE NECESSITY OF CHANGE
Modern designers need to find a balance between their profession-a field that is
full of many contradictions that are caused by the rapid change of the structures that have
1
been used in the past. As a future designer, I would want to make sure that this balance
can be achieved. The situation of contemporary designers can be better understood by
recalling what happened during the 20th century when the use of electronic devices
rapidly altered many habits that were common across the globe. These changes were also
felt at the level of design, as new constructions had to take in account new aspects related
to modern lifestyle. In other words, it was no longer feasible to promote designs that
followed the same structures that were commonly used at the beginning of the 20th
century. Spaces had to be bigger and provide easy access to electricity in order to
accommodate the many devices that characterized modern life. This example greatly
illustrates how technological and the socio-cultural changes associated with it require the
emergence of a new approach.
The last twenty years have witnessed a huge increase in the power of computer
technology. This has led to a significant increase in productivity and caused economic,
cultural, and scientific change. These changes are so fast that it is often difficult to
estimate the power of their impact; that is, the power of impact is also consistently
evolving as new technological innovations emerge. When the speed of these recent
developments is compared to the speed of the scientific, technological, and social
developments that characterized societies 50 years ago, it becomes clear that our society
is changing faster than ever. This also suggests that designers must be more flexible than
ever to adapt to new changes, even more, flexibles than they had to be 50 years ago. As a
future designer I want to learn to be flexible, but what does this mean? How should I train
for it? Unfortunately, the answer is difficult to find.
While many people are happy to see that science and technology are changing our
society at a fast speed, future designers have a both reasons to be happy and concern.
They should be happy to have the opportunity of working in such a challenging
environment and where-thanks to modern technology-they can translate their imagination
into physical entities to a degree that was impossible a few decades ago. On the other
hand, future designers are not prepared to be flexible because the society is, as always,
slow in adapting. More specifically, future designers are not sufficiently trained for
working in a globalized, IT-driven society. Future designers learn to understand their
future from the perspective of the present. They do not learn to understand their potential
future by taking into account future cultural and technological changes. This is, in fact,
understandable, at it seems both difficult and unreasonable to train future designers in
responding to potential problems of the future. However, if we consider that “future” can
mean 5 years and not 30, preparing designers to be flexible seems more reasonable. For
this reason, it is important that both I and other future designers consider the potential
challenges that we will be facing when considering the most likely scenarios that we will
witness in the near future. We must take into consideration all of these scenarios and
make a list at least mentally-of potential responses. For instance, if we are determined to
change the design in order to make it more sustainable in the near future, we must learn
how to find the right arguments that will convince others that such designs are necessary.
Common arguments will likely be supported by research regarding the relationship
between culture, technology, and desire, that is, desire for a specific product.
BARRIERS THAT LIMIT THE POSSIBILITY OF CHANGE
The possibility of change is limited by a single problem: human’s tendency to
consider future possibilities from a perspective that is significantly biased by the present
perspective. Future designers do not know for sure what the future holds for them. They
believe to know what will happen (e.g., machines will do much of the labor work and
future workspaces will have to accommodate them). However, they do not know the
details (e.g., how will these machines look) neither do they know what roles they will
have in this future (e.g., could A.I. take designers’ place?). Many of them are not sure
whether a mature A.I. will be a humanlike intelligence or simply one that is at our
disposal. Many are also concern that if we use A.I. in wrong ways the consequences
could be very negative2. These uncertainties do not limit people from becoming future
designers, nor should it. However, the lack of a clear perspective makes difficult
choosing a specific career path, a specific specialization. For examples, many future
designers do not know where they will be able to put their imagination into practice and
what kind of imagination will society need. This lack of certainty may make some future
designers limit their options to the ones that seem the most secure, at least from a
subjective perspective.
WHAT CAN BE DONE?
We need to predict the potential role of technology in shaping the human
landscape. For instance, thanks to IT companies do no longer have to be in the same
2
place and many different types of location can be less specific (e.g., some shopping
centers contain schools)3. These changes, fortunately, have started to be acknowledged by
several people who have a word to say in policy-making. For instance, the former British
Prime Minister David Cameron stated that he could run the government remotely from
his smartphone4.By taking in account the current emerging trends in design and the way
these trends adjust to ever-changing human needs, we have a chance of guessing how the
recent future will look like-for the society a whole and for us as designers.
We should not be afraid of failure. We can learn of valuing failure in order to
develop our capacity to build new forms of solving a problem5. In other words, if as
future designers we fail from time to time to see the necessity of change, we should not
be discouraged in trying to make better “guesses” next time. Instead, we should learn
from our mistakes by trying to figure out what went wrong and why it went wrong. While
this strategy may not always work, we should never stop from trying in developing new
ways for predicting future outcomes and adapt accordingly. Quite likely, only by
following these steps we will be able to be successful future designers.
3
https://monoskop.org/images/8/87/The_Impossible_Prison_A_Foucault_Reader.pdf
5
4
Readings and Videos from this Semester
wk 2 (Sep 07th): Ed Keller: HORIZONS of the HUMAN lecture.
Relations between: humans and new humans; non-humans; technologies; general
economies; AI; ecosystems; ‘alien’ life; geological systems and the planet.
REQUIRED READING
The-mastery-of-non-mastery http://www.publicseminar.org/2015/08/the-mastery-of-nonmastery/#.VljDCcr8_8f
xenofem manifesto http://www.laboriacuboniks.net/20150612-xf_layout_web.pdf
Bratton Outing Turing test http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/23/outing-a-i-beyond-the-turingtest/
Sand County Almanac, Leopold: excerpts http://faculty.ithaca.edu/mismith/docs/environmental/leopold.pdf
Corpus Atomicus lecture, Ed Keller https://www.scribd.com/doc/110678124/Corpus-Atomicus
REQUIRED SCREENING
Cave of Forgotten Dreams- Herzog Netflix: http://www.netflix.com/title/70145740
Keywords: Intelligence, limits of the human
RECOMMENDED READING, SCREENING
Under the Skin- Glazer [warning: extremely disturbing themes/images/action]
Amazon prime: http://www.amazon.com/Under-Skin-Scarlett-Johansson/dp/B00JH3S0AI
Google Play $$ https://play.google.com/store/movies/details/Under_the_Skin?id=5ITIlMYSGbY
The Accursed Share, Vol. 1- Georges Bataille [pdf] read: Theoretical Introduction
SUPPLEMENTARY readings, films
Southern Reach trilogy- intro chapter
http://www.kunsthallewien.at/#/blog/2015/12/next-universal-interview-laboria-cuboniks
Red Stack Attack! Algorithms, Capital and the Automation of the Common
Blog Post for Cyborgs, Ken Wark: http://www.publicseminar.org/2015/09/blog-post-for-cyborgs/
Friends of the Pleistocene [Ellsworth & Kruse] on Sudbury geological time
Manufactured Landscapes- Baichwal, Burtynsky
The Logic of an Endless, Living Desert, Ed Keller lecture 2011, ProtoEcologics conference, Croatia
The Things, Watts http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/watts_01_10/
wk 3 (Sep 14th): Melanie Crean, Meaning Through Signs
Required Reading:
Sturken & Cartwright, Practices of Looking, Introduction to Visual Culture, 2009: “Images, Power &
Politics,” and “Representation,” pp 9-16; “How We Negotiate the Meaning of Imgs” pp 26-30;
“Appropriation & Cultural Production,” pp 82 – 86.
Keywords (most from section titles): representation, identification, semiotics, myth, icon, the Gaze,
the Other
Questions:
Is power related to looking, and if so, how?
Images don’t inherently have worth, yet they do have monetary, social and political value; what
gives them value?
Do images relate to identify, if so, how?
2. Michel Foucault, “The Eye of Power,” interview from The Impossible Prison, pp 8 – 15
Keyword, panopticon, disciplinary gaze
Questions: how did the panopticon function when it was first designed? Does it still function now,
and if so, how?
3. Judith Butler, Bodies in Alliance (excerpts), 2011
Keyword: “space of appearance”
Guiding question: who has the right to appear in urban space, who does not, and why?
1.
Suggested Reading:
Sturken & Cartwright, Practices of Looking, Introduction to Visual Culture, 2009, “Spectatorship,”
“Discourse and Power,” The Gaze and The Other,” pp 101 – 120
Hito Steyerl, In Defense of the Poor Image, e-flux journal #10, Nov 2009
Stuart Hall, Representation, Meaning, Language, 1997
Key Concepts: representation, identification, the Gaze, the Other, panopticon, disciplinary
gaze, space of appearance
wk 4 (Sep 21st): HOLIDAY, no class
wk 5 (Sep 28th): MetroPolarity [M. Tellez, Alex Smith]: AGAINST EMPIRE
How do “we” situate ourselves within/against “empire” and its repeated depiction as the natural
pinnacle of human organization? A questioning of our own romantic myths in support of a ruling
class/order and its necessary/benevolent social control. A discussion of the roles that media and the
arts play in empire, gentrification, white supremacy, and white/heteronormativity as default.
MEDITATION
“We do not believe in the harmful dreams of utopia or dystopia. We exist between within fluctuating
and beyond these 2 (binary) options. A binary is an outdated control switch for old technology that
we no longer wish to live by. We would be fools not to study the reasons why the old technologies
came to be, and how they’ve changed us to who we are. This is a necessary meditation in an
ongoing process to sense a way out.”
REQUIRED READING/VIEWING
What is the White Fantastic Imagination? | M Asli
Duka: https://www.youtube.com/wa …
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