Now that the fire and fury have died down (much heat, little light), might I ask, What was that all about?
The thread, and some sub-threads, were started with an alarmed "Help! Our [sic] field needs a new name" cry from Don Norman, complaining about a piece of journalism in the New York Times about fashion business, which he claimed (not very accurately) assumed that "all designers are from art schools". But that's not very surprising within the context of fashion journalism. Don also commented, derisorily, "Guess what they mean by a 'designer' : fashion". There must be PhD Fashion Design students and their tutors who felt excluded and insulted by such a comment.
Don went on to link his comments to company directors he had talked with who also seemed to think design was primarily about styling, or something, and weren't interested in what Don was offering. That's a bit more surprising, given all the hype about design thinking in business. But I don't understand why Don thought it appropriate to gripe about it to the PhD Design list. It provoked a great flurry of responses, some of it about the role of designers, some of it about defining design, but as far as I can see it hasn't contributed to or advanced the discussion of PhD studies and related research in design.
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