Terry,
On Jun 26, 2012, at 10:11 PM, Terence Love wrote:
> one development I identified from researching design fields
> behaviour was the 'Parochiality Axiom'. In brief, this indicated that all
> individual design fields tend to create a sub-set of design theories and
> definitions that they regard as 'all of design'.
Is it possible that there is no "all of design," and each of the fields is right? The people in design [definition x] have defined "all of design [definition x]" and the people in design [definition y] have defined "all of design [definition y]"? What is the evidence that there is an "all of design" other than the accumulation of the various parochial design fields?
> This has many implications
> for understanding design theory more generally.
I am not claiming that there is no design theory more generally but I'm not convinced that any more general theory can fully comprise the parochial individual design fields.
> Another example was the 'Design Theories-Tools-Materials-Activities
> Dependency Axiom'. In brief, evidence across design fields indicates that
> design theories, concepts and ways of viewing design in any design field
> are, through psychological fixation, dependent on the design tools used in
> that design field and the material and activities of design outcomes.
A few years back, I was teaching at University of California Davis and one of my students proudly informed me that he'd come up with a great definition of design: "Art using computers." He didn't have an answer when I asked him what that did to the first decade of my design career.
But trying to avoid the sort of tautology common in the art world--art is what artists do; artists are those who do art--leaves me not completely clear when (as a practicing graphic design, design educator, and design writer) a particular activity of mine is design and when a particular activity of mine is not design. It's not surprising that people use "how I get my job done" as a model for an activity that they have defined as "design."
> Another example, is how design fields that use
> 'creativity' as one of their most common tools define design in terms of
> 'creativity'.
If creativity (make that "creativity." I think you're right to put it in quotes) is central to design [definition x] but not to design [definition y] and something not central to design [definition x] is central to design [definition y], what is the hope of an "all of design" theory being central to either?
On Jun 26, 2012, at 10:11 PM, Terence Love wrote:
> I claim moral ownership of this material,
> the research and research findings and ask that people reference and credit
> it appropriately if they use it in their own research and publications.
Someday when we find ourselves on the same continent again, I'd like to buy you a beer and probe the "moral ownership" phrase. I suspect that might be too cumbersome to do by email.
Gunnar
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Gunnar Swanson
East Carolina University
graphic design program
http://www.ecu.edu/cs-cfac/soad/graphic/index.cfm
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