Author: Design Incubation

Teaching Communications Design History Beyond the Canon

How do we avoid a “value this, discard that” attitude?

Carey Gibbons
Visiting Assistant Professor
Pratt Institute

The publication of Martha Scotford’s “Is There a Canon of Graphic Design History?” (1991), and the broader questioning of the idea of the canon across design history, art history, and other disciplines in recent years, has resulted in a closer examination of the study of communications design history. The need to move beyond the canon of communications design, which tends to emphasize the accomplishments of white male designers and dismisses the potential importance of anonymous works, feels particularly urgent following the Black Lives Matter protests and in light of the increasing attention being given to racial injustice. This presentation discusses the challenges and opportunities associated with designing a communications design history course. How do we avoid a “value this, discard that” attitude while still acknowledging figures whose philosophies or works had a seminal or pivotal impact upon the evolution of the field? How do we cover both mainstream and marginal forms of communications design? Additionally, are we going beyond artistic or formal qualities, and examining communications design as a history of ideas, as advocated by Tibor Kalman, J. Abbott Miller, and Karrie Jacobs in their influential 1991 Print magazine article, “Good History/Bad History”? After examining these questions, I will discuss my recent experience teaching communications design history at the Pratt Institute, where I have increasingly attempted to show that individuals from a variety of races, ethnicities, gender expressions, geographic backgrounds, cultures, and socioeconomic groups have contributed to the field of communications design. I will focus on my students’ experience participating in a class Instagram account (@beyondthecommdesigncanon), which aims to unearth and examine the people and stories of communications design that have been traditionally overlooked and not part of the commonly-taught “canon” of design history.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Feminine Archetypes on Women’s Suffrage Postcards as Agents of Propaganda

Insight into the prevailing beliefs of the early twentieth century

Andrea Hempstead
Assistant Professor
Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi

Archetypes have been used as a successful marketing tool for years as the “collective unconscious,” so the use of feminine archetypes on suffrage postcards at the turn of the century should not be surprising. Both pro and anti-suffrage cards visualize the conformity to, as well as the divergence from, the mother, the maiden, the lover and the huntress to further their cause. The social importance of postcards during this time can be compared to the power and proliferation of the modern-day meme on social media, as billions of private visual messages were made public. Today, memes are used as a cultural practice of belonging for conversation, community and identification.

As consumerism grew in America at the turn of the twentieth century, so did the need to communicate to sub-cultures within America. By studying the styles, methods and modalities of the illustration of women as feminine archetypes on suffrage postcards, we gain insight into the prevailing beliefs of the early twentieth century surrounding gender roles, sex and power, gender and nationalism, and how these postcards were used as agents of propaganda using feminine archetypes.

Context and an understanding of audience are integral to meme generation. By examining the use of feminine tropes and archetypes in memes as situational understanding, we can see how the power of the narrative has shifted. The female narrator can use gendered assumptions to further her message through the common experience with the messaging of a meme.

Building off of historical analysis, sub-cultural beliefs and motives can be contextualized to gain an understanding of the use of archetypal imagery and messaging present on suffrage postcards and memes. By comparing and contrasting the use of the feminine archetype on suffrage postcards and memes, we can see how the feminine ideal and experience are tools for message making.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Adaptation in Design Research: Combatting Social Isolation in Older Adults

Our need to socially connect is the strongest evidence of our shared humanity.

Christine Lhowe
Assistant Professor
Seton Hall University

At the core of human-centered design are people. Grounded in empathy and driven by human needs, HCD has the power to improve quality of life for individuals and society. As our communities, environments, and global structures change, especially now during the COVID-19 pandemic, design must adapt to serve people within new contexts.

Our need to socially connect is the strongest evidence of our shared humanity. We are so highly interdependent on each other that isolation not only affects mental well-being but contributes to physical decline. In older adults, a population largely affected by loneliness, social isolation is associated with a 50% increased rate for dementia and other serious medical conditions.1

As a design practitioner and educator, my research focuses on cultivating meaningful connections through experiential design. With Me, an intergenerational toolkit was created to integrate older adults deeper into the fabric of society. As an analog kit, the fundamental purpose is to encourage people to spend time with one another.

In February 2020, With Me was in the last stages of production before implementation at a non-profit serving older adults across New York City. Social distancing requirements in mid-March put it indefinitely on hold. Caregivers were no longer able to do home visits. Family members were strongly recommended against visiting their loved ones. Loneliness in one of the most vulnerable populations to COVID-19 was magnified. When connection was needed most, With Me had to transition to a virtual solution.

This presentation is a case study on adaptation in an ongoing research project. It asks if we can replicate the benefits of physical time together while in a virtual world. It experiments with technology in a population that is often hesitant with using it. It explores how experiences may be designed for meaningful interactions across varying communication channels.

  1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Loneliness and Social Isolation Linked to Serious Health Conditions. https://www.cdc.gov/aging/publications/features/lonely-older-adults.html

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Connecting Scholars, Building Community, Design Research Network(ing) | Design Incubation Affiliated Society Meeting

This open forum will have design scholars and researchers discuss various research topics, offer their ideas, discuss opportunities for contributors/participants/collaborators, and open dialog regarding multiple challenges within the design research field.

Friday, February 12, 2021
12:30 PM Eastern Time (the US and Canada)
Online ZOOM Event

This is the Affiliated Society meeting of the 109th CAA Annual Conference. The meeting is open to non-conference attendees as well. Please register in advance for this event.

Overview:

Please join us at The College Art Association (CAA) Design Incubation Affiliated Society meeting | Connecting Scholars, Building Community, Design Research Network(ing) virtually on Friday, February 12, from 12:30-1:30 pm (EST).

Design Incubation is a volunteer academic organization whose focus and mission are facilitating research and scholarship in design. We aim to foster discussion and collaboration among academics and industry professionals. We are a resource for those working and studying within the field.

This open forum will have design scholars and researchers discuss various research topics, offer their ideas, discuss opportunities for contributors/participants/collaborators, and open dialog regarding multiple challenges within the design research field. Design Incubation will also be discussing some of their ongoing work with the mission/focus of supporting design research.

Some of the questions we will discuss with panelists include:

  • How did you determine your research agenda?
  • How do your dept and institution define and support the work you do?
  • How would you describe/categorize your dept and institution?
  • If you were going to position your research within a category, would you say your work addresses: design theory,
    design history, design practice, design research (traditional graphic design, speculative design, UXUI, typography, AR, VR, creative computing, design solutions, etc.), design pedagogy, something else?

MODERATOR:

Dan Wong
Associate Professor, New York City College of Technology, CUNY
Co-founder/Executive Director, Design Incubation

Dan’s research considers the forms and methodologies of communication design research and innovates through the practice of communication design.

PANELISTS:

Heather­­­ Snyder Quinn
Assistant Professor, DePaul University’s School of Design
Director of Design Futures, Design Incubation

Heather’s research uses design fiction and speculative design to question the ethics of emerging technologies, challenge technocratic power, and imagine possible futures.

Jessica Barness
Associate Professor, School of Visual Communication Design, Kent State University
Director of Research Initiatives, Design Incubation

Jessica’s research focuses on social media, publication practices, and the design of scholarship, and how these relate to issues of power and representation.

Ayako Takase
Assistant Professor of Industrial Design, Rhode Island School of Design
Director of Master Program
Co-Founder, Observatory Design

Ayako’s design research focuses on evolving relationships between people, objects, and technology in the context of work.

Penina Acayo Laker
Assistant Professor, Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts, Washington University St. Louis
Co-Principal Investigator, Mobility for All by All

Penina’s research centers around topics that utilize a human-centered approach to solving social problems.

Registration required. Please use your institutional email to register.

Edgelands: Using Creative Technology to Predict the Future

A call to action for technology users, producers, and regulators

Jonathan Hanahan
Assistant Professor
Washington University in St. Louis

Edgelands explores the increasing tension between the natural world and the infiltration of electronic waste. Electronic Waste (e-waste) is the fastest growing waste stream on the planet. While 70% of new technology is recyclable, only 30% of it actually gets recycled. As devices increasingly get smaller and more advanced, their ability to be recycled drastically decreases due largely to custom fabrication techniques and no industry recycling or extraction standard. This dilemma is leading to an enormous amount of material blanketing the surface of the earth and worse, a culture of hazardous extraction practices in illegal e-waste dumpsites. Rare earth minerals—which are expensive and intensive to extract—end up serving far shorter lives as useful materials than they should. This puts the planet on the edge of a situation where finding solutions to extract materials from existing products will soon outvalue and outperform the process of digging into the earth to extract new materials.

This body of work is a call to action for technology users, producers, and regulators regarding the ramifications of our capitalism driven desire for the newest and best alongside the global epidemic these discarding behaviors lead to. Edgelands is a research project in technology using technology. The project speculatively explores this situation through machine learning–‘breeding’ images of midwestern landscapes with images of illegal e-waste dumpsites in Africa, Asia, and India. The resulting trained neural network hypothesizes a world where the quantity of discarded electronics creeps into the periphery of everyday life and occupies the spaces abandoned by previous industries. The resulting output speculates on what this future might look like should we continue on the current trajectory. The images are simultaneously familiar and foreign, present and future, and aspire to encourage viewers to rethink their relationships to technology, devices, and the lifespan of said products.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Design Thinking X Medical Education: Empowering Empathy for Patient-Centered Care

An interdisciplinary collaboration to develop a series of interactive Design Thinking (DT) learning modules for medical learners

Hannah Park
Assistant Professor
School of Architecture and Design
University of Kansas

Blake Lesselroth, School of Community Medicine, University of Oklahoma-Tulsa
Maria Jose Cardona Giraldo, School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas
Denise Chiao, School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas
Kaitlyn M Jerome, School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas
Arturo Erasmo Pinilla Perez, School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas
Shant Thomas, School of Architecture and Design, University of Kansas
Jane Jarshaw, School of Community Medicine, University of Oklahoma-Tulsa

Empathy is a crucial trait for medical learners working towards their medical education competencies in (1) Patient Care; (2) Communication; and (3) Systems-Based Practice. Although medical schools typically teach about empathy during the preclinical years, research has shown that empathy erodes during the clinical years as a function of stress, fatigue, and a “hidden curriculum” that can foster emotional compartmentalization. Responding with an evidence-based and patient-centered plan that addresses the social determinants of health, future medical curricula must teach learners how to co-create solutions with their patients that address the needs and concerns of society at large.



In Spring 2020, a group of designers, a physician, and a medical student from two public universities chartered an interdisciplinary collaboration, Design Thinking X Medical Education, to develop a series of interactive Design Thinking (DT) learning modules for medical learners. DT is a methodology for creative problem-finding and solving that emphasizes empathy and a people-centered approach. The team hypothesizes DT can empower clinicians’ empathy and systems thinking ability to support the ethnically and socioeconomically diverse patient populations.

Through empathy-building intervention via DT, the project aims to enable the medical learners to (1) recognize their biases; (2) apply practicable skills to understand patients’ perspectives; and (3) use the feedback to deliver context-sensitive care. The final design deliverables of the project include teaching materials, evaluation forms, and instruction guides. By sharing the process and outcomes of the project, the presentation will showcase a range of DT strategies to prepare medical learners for supporting vulnerable populations. Furthermore, we will also discuss how DT education can attract non-design disciplines such as medicine.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Honeybee Colonies: An Interdisciplinary Approach to the Studio Classroom

Students experience the natural world in the urban setting of New York City

Mark Randall
Assistant Professor
The New School, Parsons School of Design

As reflected in the fossil record, honeybees extend back at least 30 million years and were well established as Homo Sapiens emerged. One of the earliest known images of human/bee interaction is from an 8,000, year-old Mesolithic cave painting of honey hunters in eastern Spain.

Bees have not only provided honey and beeswax, they have impacted human society throughout history; creatively, culturally and spiritually. Bees are a powerful metaphor for life; a lens through which we can explore art, design, science and culture.

Building a single-subject course from such rich material, allows for a dynamic and vibrant multi-disciplinary classroom that engages a diverse cohort of design, science and liberal arts students.

Based on student interest at Parsons School of Design, Honeybee Colonies: Art, Design, Science, and Culture was developed to explore the world of the honeybee in all of its complexity. Through science labs in bee biology, a bee-hunting field trip to Central Park, and a visit to a rooftop urban farm in Brooklyn, the course allowed students to experience the natural world in the urban setting of New York City. Guest lectures from designers, artists, an architect, and a filmmaker, demonstrated how bees have profoundly influenced their work.

Informed by their research and classroom experience, each student produced a final project on the subject of their choice. Diverse outcomes included, a line of honey-based skincare products inspired by ancient Egyptian beauty regiments; an agro-tourism business for the student’s family agricultural ranch in Puerto Rico; a cultural collection of honey recipes; and the design of a children’s community garden in Harlem. The universally positive course evaluations underscored students’ deep desire for interdisciplinary learning. This presentation will share how the studio space was activated through the multiple disciplines; and what specific methods and projects supported this approach.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

One Year On: Reflections on the Launch of the Chinese Type Archive

An open, collaborative index of Chinese typographic resources consisting of typefaces, bibliographic resources, and conceptual terminology

Caspar Lam
Assistant Professor of Communication Design
Parsons School of Design

YuJune Park
Assistant Professor of Communication Design
Parsons School of Design

Within Chinese typography, the lack of common reference points and conceptual frameworks have made it difficult for students and designers to understand this area of design. To address this gap, the Chinese Type Archive was launched at the start of 2020 as an open, collaborative index of Chinese typographic resources consisting of typefaces, bibliographic resources, and conceptual terminology. Conceived as a purpose-built resource dedicated to bridging and creating cross-cultural connections between Chinese and Latin typography, the Archive provides easier access to hard-to-find typographic material through linked data, lists of previously unnamed historic typefaces, and tracking of evolving conceptual terminology. In its origin, the project reflects a broader wave of renewed interest in Chinese typography from practitioners over the last decade. The first phase of the project began with a seed collection of data, university and design organization funding, and several rounds of technical iteration before its beta launch.

Now, one year later online, we present our continued progress with the project with reflections on community feedback and the project’s iterative methodology. These have led to new insights on barriers-to-entry, the cataloguing process, and the formation of online communities with networked, crowdsourced knowledge. Beyond the immediate impact on the discussion of global typography, the project has raised new questions on how designers should conceive of typography. In addition, the project has tangible ramifications on our idea of collections as a way of creating new sources of design knowledge that can engage designers at any level: student, professional, educator, and researcher. The insights gained from this case study has direct ramifications on design pedagogy and practice, particularly in how the acts of collecting and cataloguing can be powerful methods for learning, contextualization, and critical making.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Spencer Thornton Banks in St. Louis

A historical case study in the links between aesthetics and culture

Aggie Toppins
Associate Professor
Washington University in St. Louis

Spencer Thornton Banks (1912–1983), was a Black illustrator and graphic designer who practiced in St. Louis for over 50 years. His life and work were contextualized by significant social changes on a national level—the Great Migration, World War II, and Civil Rights—as well as a local level in a city deemed “The Broken Heart of America,” by historian Walter Johnson. The history of St. Louis is a story of racial segregation, removal, and abandonment. Banks’ aesthetic attests to empowerment and self-representation amidst urban decline. His comic strip “Pokenia,” which ran in the St. Louis Argus in 1939, is a rare example of a narrative about Black professional life, by a Black artist, published in a Black newspaper. Banks was also regularly commissioned to promote events, such as the National Negro Baseball League Championship and the Pine Street Y Circus, which were important to St. Louis’ Black community. This pecha kucha will present Banks’ oeuvre in the context of his time and place while exploring the way his forms expressed autonomy and self-respect.

A rarely discussed Black graphic artist of exceptional formal merit, Spencer Thornton Banks is a historical case study in the links between aesthetics and culture. His work has not been included in traditional design canons, in part because of historiographical bias, yet he coincided with a transitional and tumultuous time in St. Louis and national history. His unique approach to visual communication issued positive images of Black cultural life. This is a relevant topic in communication design in that it aims to expand the scope of historical knowledge through contributions from an underrepresented community while noting the concurrence of Banks’ celebratory representations with dominant narratives that evince mainstream racist ideology.

This research was presented at the Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference on Wednesday, February 10, 2021.

Design Incubation Colloquium 7.2: 109th CAA Annual Conference

Presentations and discussion of Research and Scholarship in Communication Design at the 109th Annual CAA Conference 2021.

Wednesday, February 10, 2021
6:00 PM – 6:30 PM

This is a virtual conference.

Video presentations of design research, history, theory, and practice in the field of communication design. A live moderated discussion will occur during the conference. Conference registration is required.

Wednesday, February 10, 2021
6:00 PM – 6:30 PM
Live Q&As Online – Meeting B

CO-CHAIRS

Aaris Sherin
Professor
St. John’s University

Dan Wong
Associate Professor
New York City College of Technology, CUNY

DISCUSSANT

Liz DeLuna
Professor
St. John’s University

Presentations

Spencer Thornton Banks in St. Louis
Aggie Toppins
Associate Professor
Washington University in St. Louis

One Year On: Reflections on the Launch of the Chinese Type Archive
Caspar Lam
Assistant Professor of Communication Design
Parsons School of Design

YuJune Park
Assistant Professor of Communication Design
Parsons School of Design

Honeybee Colonies: An Interdisciplinary Approach to the Studio Classroom
Mark Randall
Assistant Professor
The New School, Parsons School of Design

Design Thinking X Medical Education: Empowering Empathy for Patient-Centered Care
Hannah Park
Assistant Professor
School of Architecture and Design
University of Kansas

Edgelands: Using Creative Technology to Predict the Future
Jonathan Hanahan
Assistant Professor
Washington University in St. Louis

Adaptation in Design Research: Combatting Social Isolation in Older Adults
Christine Lhowe
Assistant Professor
Seton Hall University

Feminine Archetypes on Women’s Suffrage Postcards as Agents of Propaganda
Andrea Hempstead
Assistant Professor
Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi

Teaching Communications Design History Beyond the Canon
Carey Gibbons
Visiting Assistant Professor
Pratt Institute