Dear Lubomir & List
You may be surprised to know that I am strongly opposed to equating design
practice as research. That has never been an ambition and I share much of
your thinking that would discredit such approaches.
Instead, what I am keenly interested in is ways to marry design practice
with academic research. I believe there are many strong reasons for wanting
to do so. I am also convinced there are several broad and credible routes
for achieving the marriage, and some (although perhaps not yet a critical
mass) completed research that demonstrates comparative strengths and
weaknesses. Simply doing a design project and saying it is research is not
one of the credible routes.
However, carrying out a design project - specifically as an agent for
answering research questions - holds much merit for me. Action research, as
mentioned by Terry, is one broad methodology that is highly relevant if we
desire to use designing as an 'action' to intervene in a situation or
illuminate a problem worth researching. Researchers who have gone down this
route, or academics who have been involved in the supervision of such
studies, will know that it is especially difficult to plan and carry out. I
have witnessed the methodological, practical and epistemological struggles
that can take place. Switching between a designer's hat and a researcher's
hat - or donning a half-researcher/half-designer hat, is an intellectual
challenge that I believe requires some trial runs to get accustomed to.
Nevertheless, despite the difficulties, I have also seen how satisfying the
outcomes can be, and how much of a fruitful learning process the journey is.
Perhaps this clarifies what I meant by 'design practice as a METHOD of data
collection'; I accept that without some further explanation such a snappy
phrase can be readily misinterpreted.
Best regards, Owain
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