Dear all,
While reading all the discussions on this subject, I
would like to share my experience as a Ph.D. (1999)
holder graduated from a university (Hong Kong
Polytechnic University) in a non-English speaking
world.
I have 3-year full time practical working experiences
before I returned to study for my higher degrees on
design, and I continued my free-lance practice while
(and after) I am pursuit my Ph.D. In 1997, I landed
on a full-time position teaching graphic design in a
communication department in a university in Hong Kong,
and have been trying to get back to teach in design
school since then.
I found the situation of design school as what
Professor Giard said, Ph.D. is desirable but not
required-- in most design schools both in Hong Kong
and in the States. With one article published in
Journal of Design History and severals on
communication journals, I found myself have been
struggling between practice-led design
community/academic, and non-design intellectual
community.
Currently I took up a new position (starting from this
Fall) at the SUNY Institute of Technology at Utica,
and again it is in a communication department. I
don't feel I am in any advantage with a Ph.D. in
Design, plus practical experience, research records,
and university teaching experience when applying
position in design school at all in this stage. I can
only explain to myself that, there are other non-Ph.D.
requirement more desirable and required, and, may be,
just because I am graduated from a university in a
non-English speaking world.
I am still struggling in a non-design school
environment, and working on design research that I am
interested. If anyone in the list will have a chance
to visit New York City before December 1, please visit
the exhibition on the Chinese Graphic Design at the
Cooper Union School of Art. This is the research
project that I have been working for about a year,
which resulted as an exhibition. Your comment on the
exhibition is welcome. My upcoming article on Chinese
Graphic Design will be appeared on Design Issues.
I believe in "research, teaching, practice" for design
academic because I feel both my students and me
benefits from it. My current research direction is on
establishing Chinese graphic design history as a part
of world design knowledge, and working towards
theorizing cross-cultural hybridization framework of
design studies and visual communication.
I don't know how any people with a relatively new
Ph.D.-Design out there, but I certainly interested to
know about their life after "Ph.D.-Design".
Wendy Siuyi Wong
Assistant Professor of Graphic Design
Department of Tech. Communication & Literature
SUNY Institute of Technology, Utica
--- Stephen Scrivener <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> Gunnar
>
> It seems to me that increasingly it is the case that
> the PhD is becoming
> an entry qualification for university lectureship.
> In countries, such as
> Taiwan, it is now an explicit requirement (so I am
> told by my Taiwanese
> PhD students. At the Doctoral Education in Design
> conference in 2001,
> staff from Kyoto University commented on the fact
> that within 5 years the
> department no faculty member will have practice
> experience, although all
> will hold doctorates. In the UK it is not an
> explicit requirement but
> with the RAE and everything a PhD tends to looked
> upon favourably.
>
> If this is not one of the factors driving the
> discussions about
> practice-based doctorates then I think it will
> become so in the fulness
> of time. Computer Scientists, from my experience,
> have developed research
> as a rarefied form of what they do in everyday
> practice; Engineers have
> done the same (although industry, which needs and
> recognises the
> intellectual abilities of doctoral staff, tends to
> claim that a PhD
> training does not prepare them properly for
> exercising their skills in
> the industrial setting). I think that design will
> have to do likewise if
> the PhD is going to contribute significantly to
> designing.
>
> Steve
>
>
>
>
> > When there are not enough of those to go around,
> what to you think
> > will be the requirement sacrificed--PhD degree,
> research experience,
> > MFA degree, or practical experience?
> >
> > begin:vcard
> n:Scrivener;Stephen AR
> tel;cell:0789 9743150
> tel;fax:024 7688 7759
> tel;work:024 7688 7477
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>
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