DEC conference: "Objects Users Context: Privileging Context in Design and Design Education"

Fall 2010
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC

Graphic design, once focused on the creation of objects, now addresses an increasingly complex culture, characterized by information overload and rapidly changing technology. While recent attention to the "needs and wants of users" has made some communication more responsive to the people for whom we design, it often fails to capture the situatedness of communication and its audiences within larger systems. This conference will address the consequences of privileging context as an organizing principle for design practice and design education. It will challenge longstanding paradigms for undergraduate and graduate curricula and the persistence of value systems that may no longer be relevant in today's society. Context-centered design addresses the settings, social forces, systems, and shaping influences of and for design, with particular concern for the issues arising from complexity and the long-term consequences of design action.

Contact: Santiago Piedrafita
Conference committee: Meredith Davis, Denise Gonzales Crisp, Santiago Piedrafita, and Kermit Bailey

Posted by designeducators in Events | May 25, 2009