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Towards contingency : how design literacy empowers pluralistic worldviews and enhances transitional design

  • The word "literacy" has come to be used to describe a wide range of competencies, including design literacy - a term that, despite its presence in design discourse, is still characterised by a certain fuzziness. In this paper, we explore this highly discursive theoretical field in order to gain a more nuanced and expanded understanding of the topic. In doing so, we argue that these divergent positions are also due to the ambiguity of the term “design”. We understand design as the perpetual de- and reconstruction of the world, as a way of worldmaking, both physically and conceptually. Thus, design literacy can be understood as a way to perceive traces of design and its processes, to perceive the world as contingent: a circular cognitiveThe word "literacy" has come to be used to describe a wide range of competencies, including design literacy - a term that, despite its presence in design discourse, is still characterised by a certain fuzziness. In this paper, we explore this highly discursive theoretical field in order to gain a more nuanced and expanded understanding of the topic. In doing so, we argue that these divergent positions are also due to the ambiguity of the term “design”. We understand design as the perpetual de- and reconstruction of the world, as a way of worldmaking, both physically and conceptually. Thus, design literacy can be understood as a way to perceive traces of design and its processes, to perceive the world as contingent: a circular cognitive process of recognising that something - if not everything - in our cultural pluriverse is designed, understanding how it was designed and that it can potentially become the subject of design again and again. In our paper, we emphasise the contingency of design - and the ethical level that can arise from understanding the possibility of a different design. Ultimately, our aim with this paper is to emphasise that design literacy is a crucial competence for encouraging pluralistic perspectives and initiating transition processes, as it helps to acknowledge the temporary necessity but long-term non-necessity of things (which particularly includes the transitory nature of one's own creations).show moreshow less

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Metadaten
Document Type:Peer-Reviewed Article
Author:Dustin Jessen, Sven Quadflieg
URN (citable link):https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:bsz:wup4-opus-83788
DOI (citable link):https://doi.org/10.46467/TdD39.2023.92-113
Year of Publication:2023
Language:English
Source Title (English):Temes de disseny
Volume:39
First Page:92
Last Page:113
Divisions:Nachhaltiges Produzieren und Konsumieren
Dewey Decimal Classification:700 Künste
OpenAIRE:OpenAIRE
Licence:License LogoCreative Commons - CC BY-NC-ND - Namensnennung - Nicht kommerziell - Keine Bearbeitungen 4.0 International