Dear Nelson:
In Turkey we have a similar situation and two types of postgraduate degree is
given. In the following paper, we explained this situation clearly. They both
have the equal rights. The difficulty in our country is the titles are
same. Dr
title as 'Proficiency in Art' is given in mainly art schools in painting,
sculpture, graphics, industrial design and interior design as you mentioned in
your text. In the industrial design Departments under Architecture, in
graduate
and undergraduate programs thesis depends on research, but they also get the
same deggree.
Er, A. H., Bayazęt, N., Redefining the "Ph.D. in Design in the Periphery:
Doctoral Education in Industrial Design in Turkey" Design Issues, Vol. 15,
No: 3, Autumn 1999. pp:34 44
Nigan Bayazit
Quoting MSC Nelson <[log in to unmask]>:
> Dear Ken:
>
> While I do not have the resources to verify the factual details of your
> Dyson discussion, I think that you have done a good job of discussing the
> underlying issues. I do have a discussion suggestion for a related topic,
> however.
>
> I agree that a PhD is a research degree, and the receiver of such a degree
> should be expected to have a thorough background in research. However,
> while it is easy to dismiss those who question the research basis of a PhD
> as scholars who profess to use "intuition" or "designerly thinking" for the
> basis of research methodologies, there is some validity to these
> questioners' criticism; design can be studied in a scientific manner, but
> design is not itself a science. Perhaps what many critics of the
> research-based focus of the PhD in design are looking for is advanced,
> scholarly study of applied design methods and practices. This advanced
> degree would recognize that design itself is an applied field rather than a
> research field.
>
> I propose that people begin to think about the possibility of two different
> advanced degrees. One would be the PhD in Design, clearly designated as a
> research degree with foundations in research traditions. The other degree
> would be the Doctor of Design, an advanced degree in applied design with
> foundations in studio culture. These two different degrees represent the
> needs of the two constituent groups in design education and scholarship.
>
> While I wish I could take credit for coming up with this extremely elegant
> idea, it is in fact a mirror of what many other scholarly fields have been
> doing for many years. In the field of music, universities in the United
> States commonly offer both a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Music and a
> Doctor of Music (DM). The PhD is a research degree and the DM is an
> advanced degree that combines performance and scholarship. For an example
> of a highly regarded program that does this, see the Northwestern University
> School of Music Web site at
> http://www.music.northwestern.edu/areas_of_study/as_degrees.html
> The program descriptions at the site could be altered by substituting the
> word "design" for every reference to music, and they would work for a
> comprehensive program in design.
>
> Regards,
> MSC
>
> p.s. The alternative anecdote to your pseudo-PhD department chair who is a
> designer is that of the pseudo-architect who is a researcher. While it
> would make sense that someone with a PhD in architecture could design at
> least a portion of a building, there is no requirement that this PhD know
> how to actually do anything other than research. When that PhD begins to
> work on actual buildings, it is a nightmare for those working around them,
> as they do not have a clue what they are doing. I have personally seen this
> happen in real life, and it is not a good thing. In both my example and
> your example, the failure is really at the institutional level and not at
> the individual level. If the university hired the failed PhD candidate and
> then put them in charge of research, then there is something wrong with the
> university.
>
>
> M.S.C. Nelson
> Assistant Professor
> Environment, Textiles and Design
> University of Wisconsin-Madison
> Room 235
> 1300 Linden Drive
> Madison, WI 53706
> 608-261-1003
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related
> research in Design [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Ken
> Friedman
> Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 11:52 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Freeman Dyson, etc.
>
> Dear Jeffrey and Tao,
>
> Thanks for your notes on Freeman Dyson. Dyson's speech and your notes
> got me thinking.
>
> My view is in tune with Tao and Dyson both. Dyson has always been a
> provocateur, and his commencement speeches are true to his style. I
> am more bothered by Dyson's comments on global warming and
> biotechnology than his disagreement with the concept of the PhD.
>
> Dyson argues against the PhD degree, or, better said, against the way
> that people earn a PhD and what doctoral education does to their
> perspectives and abilities. What is he really saying?
>
> Freeman Dyson is a well-educated polymath. He is much like
> Buckminster Fuller, another genius who had no PhD. Fuller, like
> Dyson, had a talent for rigorous intellectual work and great skill in
> applying his work to the larger world. While Dyson has little regard
> for degrees, he has high regard for rigorous research.
>
> The point of doctoral education in design is to create a culture of
> research where none existed until recently. This requires an
> appreciation for rigorous thinking. We work in a field where some
> argue that rigorous thinking and rigorous research are meaningless or
> even counterproductive. The alternatives range from pure intuition to
> artistic ability to something called designerly thinking.
>
> The argument against rigor is a genuine issue to those who make it. A
> few years back, one of the design journals published an article that
> argued AGAINST rigor as a foundation for design research. The
> argument was based on several dozen incorrect facts. Many of the
> inaccurate claims involved myths about research common in the kinds
> of studio programs that have no research training. Nevertheless,
> these mythological arguments against rigor managed to convince the
> journal and its reviewers to publish the article, including those
> several dozen mistakes.
>
> This is anecdotal, to be sure, but the anecdote plays out repeatedly
> at conferences and in faculty tearooms. The main difference here is
> publication in a peer-reviewed journal.
>
> The argument itself involves a position quite opposite to Dyson's views.
>
> Some people in the design field argue AGAINST rigor while arguing FOR
> a PhD award to designers. Dyson takes the opposite position. Dyson
> argues against bothering with the PhD degree while arguing FOR
> rigorous research.
>
> Most of us have no argument with people who undertake rigorous and
> valuable research without a PhD. Chris
> Rust at Sheffield-Hallam University and Sharon Poggenpohl at Hong
> Kong Polytechnic University are outstanding professors who do solid
> work without a PhD. The problem that bothers me is people who want a
> PhD without doing the work or research based on special pleading and
> argument by assertion rather than reasoned argument from evidence.
>
> Most designers begin in studio programs. Research education is
> necessary if they are to conduct useful research. PhD programs offer
> the training they need.
>
> Dyson made his argument against the PhD while picking up one of his
> 20 or 30 honorary doctorates. Even though Dyson seems to disagree
> with doctoral education, he makes the argument while collecting his
> doctorates. That is OK. Dyson has earned the privilege. It
> nevertheless flavors my view on whether he means what he says.
>
> A few key facts place this in a different context. Dyson did not just
> wake up one morning to cook up contributions that some believe should
> have won a Nobel Prize. He spent years of work and study in different
> physics programs, mostly at the doctoral level. After taking his
> bachelor's degree in theoretical mathematics at Cambridge, he won
> fellowships at Trinity College, Cambridge, at Cornell, at the
> University of Birmingham, and at the Institute for Advanced Studies
> in Princeton. He did graduate study at Cornell with Hans Bethe and
> Richard Feynman, and the equivalent of post-doctoral study at the
> Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Those two dozen honorary
> doctorates suggest that Dyson could have earned a PhD.
>
> Then there is the story behind the story. Dyson is a well-educated
> Briton from a highly successful upper-class family. His father was
> Sir George Dyson, composer, conductor, and director of the Royal
> College of Music. His mother was a lawyer, an unusual career for a
> woman in early twentieth-century England. The Astronomer Royal, Sir
> Frank Dyson - no relative - took young Freeman under his wing. He
> attended Cambridge at a time when there were few universities in the
> UK. Those few universities were open to very few people indeed
> compared with the UK today.
>
> Dyson could afford his maverick approach in a way that nearly no one
> else could do, then or now. No one doubts - nor ever doubted - that
> he could have completed a PhD had he wished to do so. In Dyson's
> case, the combination of genius, wealth, connections, and good luck
> were a fine substitute for a PhD.
>
> Anyone who does the work that Dyson did - or its equivalent - ought
> to be a professor without a PhD. This is not always the case in
> design. Those who take charge of research programs without the proper
> training are often responsible for an avalanche of problems.
>
> A typical case comes to mind involving a design professor who failed
> to complete his PhD. His committee found problems in his thesis and
> refused to accept it. He had collected many good images for the
> project, though, and he got a good picture book out of it for a good
> publisher. He was a furniture designer, and his book led to a
> professorial appointment at a pure studio school where no one on the
> faculty had ever published a book. They did not see the difference
> between his book and a research monograph, and there was no
> requirement for a doctorate in any case.
>
> Once chaired as professor, this fellow was able to return to his
> original school as a professor. This was the school where he failed
> his own doctoral work. Despite his frequent boast that all he had to
> do to get his PhD was to walk over to the chancellery to pick the
> degree up, he never completed his thesis and he lacked the ability to
> do so. The problems began here, more for the school than for the
> professor.
>
> As professor, however, he was responsible for doctoral education. In
> 20 years, he was able to graduate only three doctors -- one who had
> completed her work when he took the post, and two whom others
> advised. He did have a long roll of uncompleted doctors who were
> unable to finish because they had no help or advising from the
> professor. As the school began to build its program in design
> research, with other crises also under way, he finally had to leave
> the job. When he did, he left the entire research program in
> disarray. It has taken others several years to straighten out the
> problems he left behind.
>
> The point of our discussions on PhD design is not to argue that
> everyone should get a PhD, but to discuss HOW to make doctoral
> education productive and valuable. This also means arguing for good
> PhD work by those who do earn a degree and good conditions for
> doctoral study for those who wish to earn one.
>
> Two last facts about Freeman Dyson. Dyson may believe that there is
> no point to doctoral education, but he DOES believe in research
> education and in the kinds of programs that deliver it. The political
> fact is that we have organized universities in such a way that PhD
> training coincides with research training. While I sympathize with
> Dyson's argument against the narrow structure of PhD programs, I have
> not found a good substitute for the PhD program as a structure for
> organizing research education.
>
> The second fact is the special nature of the Institute for Advanced
> Studies. There are no PhD students at the Institute. The institute is
> not a school. Even though it has a faculty, it has no students. This
> is a place with rules of its own, and that is partly why Dyson was
> offered a position there and partly why he prospered there. Richard
> Feynman turned down offers of a professorship at the Institute
> because they have no students. He believed that research works best
> where you have many good PhD students working with professors.
>
> I am not sure which is best. Nevertheless, I DO think we should
> improve our PhD programs while we wait for a benevolent
> multimillionaire to fund our Institute for Advanced Study with an
> Abraham Flexner to build it. (For more information on Abraham
> Flexner, see the book review in the August 2003 issue of Design
> Research News. Flexner was the fellow who put 120 doctoral programs
> out of business in the early 1900s in his work to reform medical
> education in North America - that's 120 programs of what was then
> 155.)
>
> Once we do have our own Institute, of course, I will be happy to
> accept a professorship. Who knows what I will have to say about PhD
> programs once I no longer need to worry about students?
>
> Yours,
>
> Ken
>
> --
>
> Ken Friedman
> Professor of Leadership and Strategic Design
> Institute for Communication, Culture, and Language
> Norwegian School of Management
>
> Center for Design Research
> Denmark's Design School
>
> +47 46.41.06.76 Tlf NSM
> +47 33.40.10.95 Tlf Privat
>
> email: [log in to unmask]
>
----------------------------------------------------------------
This message was sent using IMP, the Internet Messaging Program.
|
