Dear Terry
Apologies for the delay in replying to your post. It’s graduation ceremony week here and things are a little hectic. One of our recipients of an Honorary Doctorate, an esteemed graphic satirist alumnus, passed on in his speech to students the advice: “Stay hungry, stay foolish.” I may have taken the advice on staying foolish too literally in my ribald response to your post. If so, more apologies. But I think the advice is good and I hope to stay reasonably foolish. We do tend to take ourselves a little too seriously at times don’t we? One of the other Honorary Doctorates was Kylie Minogue. She looked nice in her hat but she didn’t offer much in the way of good advice.
I must confess that when I first read your post, I thought it might be a deliberate self-parody. But on closer reading I realised that there was no trace of humour there. In the words of Lieutenant Columbo, there’s one thing bothering me. If I understand you correctly, you place great faith in evidence-based research. Yet you make many assumptions that appear to be based on intuition. For instance, referring to my short post you infer -
‘… that suggests that you think that the analysis that I presented is deeply and completely in error and that I am both mistaken and behaving improperly to propose it..”
Where I come from, this is known as adding 2+2 and making 47 (or something similar). I do hope you don’t use this method in your research! I notice that you also regularly (most recently in your response to Birger Sevaldson) allude to the field being:
“… obsessed about 'creativity' and 'creative persons'” and you refer often to “… those who privilege creativity”?
Is there any evidence for this or is it possible that it is you who is obsessed with creativity? I wonder whether you underestimate your own skills of intuition?
I think part of the problem here is that our respective subjects are in different universes and only artificially fall under the term ‘Art & Design’. The design of systems and the design of visual poetry are very different in their aims and I’m sure we don’t want to get bogged down in semantics around the meaning of ‘design’ again. I think of my field as one where ‘art’ and ‘design’ are inseparable. So I am sure the simple reason for our different perspectives is that your propositions may make very good sense in your particular field (though it seems some think otherwise) but less so in varying degrees in many others.
What excites me about my own particular subject could be touched on by mentioning a few words; words like ‘joy’, ‘empathy’, ‘humanity’, ‘poetry’, ‘magic’, ‘humour’ and 'charm' (not qualities to be found in abundance in your message). Most especially, I am excited by the way these qualities are expressed in a unique way by each individual picturebook maker, depending on his own personal life experience and his own personal language of mark-making. There are many forms of research that contribute to knowledge in this area and I like to think that I am still ‘hungry’ to learn about all of them. But rather than pick through all of the points you raise, I hope you won’t mind if I respond to them them by asking a question. You speak of a
“… shift towards better use of research-derived information and away from dependence on human ‘creativity’ and ‘intuition’.”
Are these two things mutually exclusive? Don’t they inform and depend on each other?
I would be very interested to hear your views on how such a shift could be seen as helpful in my field. If we think of creativity as always involving a problem to be solved, what sort of research-derived information might inform a problem characterised by the implicit question; ‘how do I design a poetic visual text that expresses in a personal yet universal way the death of a parent (based on my own experience)?’
A picturebook that continues to enchant and delight after fifty years in print is ‘The Tiger Who Came to Tea’ by Judith Kerr. It breaks every ‘rule’ of story telling. Nothing much happens. It has been accused of being sexist. A tiger knocks on the door, eats all of the food and goes away again. Any formula for good design and story telling would not allow it to see the light of day. And it is a masterpiece. I suspect that using a mass of data to inform the creation of a brilliant picturebook would not have led to this book. I touch on these issues in my new book with Morag Styles (soon to be available in all good book stores but not very academic I’m afraid).
And I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on the concept of ‘thinking outside of the box’ and what that means. Isn’t it the case that a great many major discoveries and advances in knowledge across many fields, have been made by going against received wisdom, and even against apparently proven ‘information’?
Of course we will all be benefiting from the availability of better information. But is it helpful to set 'better information' against 'creativity'? Will we write better poetry and paint better pictures? Or will we simply no longer have need for either?
I am honoured by your suggestion of a joint programme of research. At the moment we are stretched to the limit here but would be keen to talk about any mutually beneficial/ worthwhile research.
As for your own ‘implicit ad-hominem attack’ on my professorship. I too am happy to overlook. The professorship was a clerical error.
This message is far too long.
Best wishes from beautifully autumnal Cambridge
Martin
Professor Martin Salisbury
Course Leader, MA Children's Book Illustration
0845 196 2351
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________________________________________
From: PhD-Design - This list is for discussion of PhD studies and related research in Design [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of Terence Love [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Wednesday, October 12, 2011 7:36 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Are PhDs a threat to design education?
Martin,
Thank you for your reply. I find it a little strange.
Your implicit ad-hominem attack I'm happy to overlook: it may be an accepted
attribute of professorship in your area of design. The research is more
important.
Of more concern for me, is how you engaged with the analysis I presented.
The analysis was presented in good faith and is backed by reasonable
empirical evidence. Yes, it is a challenging idea, yet it seems to offer, on
the basis of readily available evidence a better justified explanation of
the current states of design practice, education and PhD research than that
assumed by many design practitioners, educators and researchers who focus
on creativity. More importantly, in research terms, it exposes weaknesses in
current perspectives, knowledge and theories; its implications suggest
strategies for improving design practices, education and research; and it
offers accurate predictive power useful to future developments across many
design fields.
Typical responses I would expect of professional researchers would be
along the lines of 'Wow, that is interesting! It challenges existing
theory. Great! Is it valid? What are its implications? How can I test it?
How does it fit into the broader scheme of knowledge? How can I use it to
improve my own work? What are its limits? Ah, it suggests things have been
overlooked. Have they? How does the world look if we include the things
we've overlooked? How does that change theory? .... and the like' .
For me, I now need to also create a professional response - to you. I've
received a reply from yourself - a professor (awarded for integrity,
professional competence, sound reasoning, research skill etc) - that
suggests that you think that the analysis I presented is deeply and
completely in error and that I am both mistaken and behaving improperly to
propose it.
What do you suggest is the most appropriate professional response from my
side to your reply to my initial proposal? I look forward to your thoughts.
Standing back as a research professional, the most obvious way forward is to
test the analysis I proposed in the area that you are most knowledgeable,
Childrens' Book Illustration, so that you can most easily identify
weaknesses in it. Childrens' Book Illustration is a useful design area to
test the idea because it is one that many in the design field would regard
as more essentially needing human creativity rather than information.
Others might even regard it as using the skills of Art more than being a
design practice. So, if the analysis proves accurate and valid in
Childrens' Book Illustration, it is a good starting point for proving it
more widely across other design fields that assume they necessarily depend
on human creativity and intuition.
To recap the main points of what I suggested: 1) That the context of design
has significantly changed and that information relevant to design is now
widely available whereas previously it was not; 2) that the primary need to
use human creativity and intuition was due to the shortage of relevant
information; 3) using relevant information replaces much of the need for
designers to use 'creativity' and 'intuition' approaches; 4) that this
defines a new paradigm of design research practices, education and research;
and 5) refocusing design on information use and understanding potentially
improves on and usefully replaces earlier approaches grounded primarily on
the assumption that human creativity and intuition are the main skills and
competencies in design.
A practical way forward is to review the information and knowledge that is
used in design activity in the area of Childrens' Book Illustration; how it
currently shapes and defines design outcomes; whether there exists
information currently not being used that would improve design outcomes;
what the current design approaches are and how much they depend directly on
'creativity' and 'intuition' rather than information; and, whether
improvement in design practices, education and research would be possible in
the area of Childrens' Book Illustration with a shift towards better use of
research-derived information and away from dependence on human 'creativity'
and 'intuition'.
Professionally, would you be interested in establishing a joint program of
research to investigate the above issues? I welcome hearing your reasoning
either way.
Regards,
Terry
===
Dr Terence Love FDRS, AMIMechE, PMACM, MISI
[log in to unmask] Mob: +61 434 975 848
Dept of Design,
Researcher, Social Program Evaluation Research Unit
Dept of Psychology and Social Sciences
Edith Cowan University, Western Australia
Dept of Design
Curtin University, Western Australia
Honorary Researcher, IEED
Management School, Lancaster University, UK
===
-----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
Salisbury, Martin
Sent: 11 October 2011 12:48
To: Dr Terence Love
Subject: Re: Are PhDs a threat to design education?
Dear Terry
This is wonderful news! Thank you for sharing it and Praise the Lord! There
is no longer any need for unpredictable, intuitive human input into the
design of a children's book illustration, a dress, a tea pot, a chair or a
car. All we need to design now is a reliable suicide rate monitor (can we
put you in charge of that bit?).
Best regards
Martin
Professor Martin Salisbury
Course Leader, MA Children's Book Illustration
0845 196 2351
[log in to unmask]
http://www.anglia.ac.uk/ruskin/en/home/microsites/ccbs.html
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