true, we all cite certain books favored by us. we also cite our own work
because this is what we have mastered and are in the process of extending
as we move on. but we do move on.
what is my canon may not be someone else's and i am not sure if it is
healthy for design to legislate its literature. all we need to assure is
our ability to talk to each other. a canon would assure that but also
stifle the conversations (e.g., did the author really say that? is it
kosher to think differently?). i would think it to be more productive to
discuss certain design competencies or categories of knowledge to which
designers should be able to contribute or to to converse about, knowledgeably.
klaus
At 11:03 AM 9/11/00 +0100, Nigel Cross wrote:
>It seems reasonable that any PhD student in the area of “Design Studies”
>should have knowledge of a ‘canon’ of works that the research community
>regards as core. But we have seen in suggestions so far that there is
>little common agreement, because we are still a ‘community’ of individuals
>with only some overlapping interests - we need to do some serious
>community-building, as Victor and others have suggested.
>Also, many ‘canonical’ works are papers, rather than books - I realised
>this problem for new research students 20 years ago, and compiled what I
>considered to be a basic ‘reader’ covering papers relevant to my
>perception of the core:
>Cross, N (ed.) (1984) Developments in Design Methodology, Wiley,
>Chichester.
>
>This book (now out of print) has been influential, especially amongst
>newcomers to design research, largely because there was no other easy
>source for getting into the field. It covered the period 1962-82, and
>another is now due to cover the last 20 years (but it is more difficult
>now, because so much more has been published in that period).
>
>The books that I find most often referenced by myself are:
>Schön, D (1983) The Reflective Practitioner, Temple-Smith, London.
>and
>Simon, H A (1969) The Sciences of the Artificial, MIT Press, Cambridge,
>Mass.
>These two seem to me be particularly ‘canonical’ in the design research
>field.
>Architecture-oriented books are:
>Lawson, B. (1990) How Designers Think, Butterworth, Oxford
>and
>Rowe P (1987) Design Thinking, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.
>Engineering-oriented book is:
>Bucciarelli L (1994) Designing Engineers, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.
>
>By the way, wasn’t this request for some introductory texts first started
>by David Durling (on behalf of someone else) on the design research list -
>it seems to have moved to the PhD list. Should it be copied/referred back
>to the dr list. How do we do that, Ken?
>
>Nigel
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