PRIMER19 Workshop by Bruce Tharp, Deepa Butoliya, & Stephanie Tharp; Making...
Event Information
Description
Join us for PRIMER19 Workshops Saturday, June 15, 2019!
All PRIMER19 workshops are open to the public as an extension of the PRIMER19 Conference programming occurring at Parsons, The New School on June 13-14, 2019*.
This year's PRIMER conference theme, FUTURES FOR ALL, highlights the wisdom and power of creating diverse spaces for interrogating the 'inevitable'. We intend to bring together participants from across industries and academia to share ideas, methods and projects that examine the reciprocal relationship between design, the world we live in, and the futures we want.
Workshop Info
Title: Making Futures: Dissonance and Discrimination
Presenters: Dr. Deepa Butoliya, Bruce Tharp, Stephanie Tharp
Dr. Deepa Butoliya; Assistant Professor at University of Michigan, Stamps School of Art & Design
Deepa Butoliya is a design research and educator based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Her research focuses on the marginal designerly practices from the Global South in particular those described by the term "Jugaad".
Deepa holds a Doctorate in Design from Carnegie Mellon University and is currently an Assistant Professor at University of Michigan Stamps School of Art & Design.
This workshop will introduce key dimensions for creating speculative futures work that participants will apply to new design proposals. They will also be empathetically exposed to examples that lead to understanding inclusive and diverse perspectives of our collective futures.
Bruce Tharp; Associate Professor at University of Michigan, Stamps School of Art & Design & Co-Author of Discursive Design
"Believed to be the first industrial designer to receive a PhD in anthropology (University of Chicago), in 1998 Bruce began researching the material culture of Indiana's Old Order Amish, focusing on the production & consumption of value. He first earned a BS in mechanical engineering from Bucknell University and a master’s degree in industrial design from Pratt Institute. In between his schooling, he served as a US Army nuclear weapons officer (Captain) in Germany.
After researching the future of work and the workplace for Haworth Inc.'s design research think-tank, the Ideation Group, he began his teaching career. Over the last fifteen years he has been a tenured professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and currently at the University of Michigan’s Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design. His and Stephanie Tharp's award-winning design studio has exhibited internationally, licensed designs for local and global companies, and self-produced commercial, experimental, and discursive products. He and Stephanie recently published "Discursive Design: Critical, Speculative, and Alternative Things."
Stephanie Tharp; Associate Professor at University of Michigan, Stamps School of Art & Design & Co-Author of Discursive Design
Stephanie Tharp is an industrial designer and educator— currently an Associate Professor and Undergraduate Program Co-Director at the University of Michigan Stamps School of Art & Design. Her recent research surrounds the theory and practice of discursive design. One current project is a collaboration with chronic pain specialists exploring public engagement with medical research and challenging popular stigmas of pain sufferers.
She received a master's degree in industrial design from the Rhode Island School of Design, and a bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan. From 2002 until 2014, she was Associate Professor, and Program Chair of Industrial Design at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s School of Design. She has work experience with Ford Motor Company, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Armstrong Industries, and Amazon.
In addition to running an award-winning design studio with Bruce, she has led interdisciplinary student teams in collaboration with companies such as Motorola, Dell, and Proctor & Gamble.
Workshop Overview
This workshop will introduce key dimensions for creating speculative futures work that participants will apply to new design proposals. They will also be empathetically exposed to examples that lead to understanding inclusive and diverse perspectives of our collective futures.
At PRIMER18, Bruce Tharp presented a popular breakout presentation introducing the topic of dissonance and five key dimensions (clarity, reality, familiarity, veracity, desirability) that are crucial to the “strangely familiar” element in all speculative work. Providing an element of year-to-year continuity for the PRIMER Conference community of practice, in Phase I of the workshop small groups of participants will use these five elements to analyze particular speculative projects to ensure understanding. And then they will generate alternatives by varying the degrees of dissonance along various dimensions.
In Phase II a more critical and globally-inclusive reflection will take place in imagining the implications and unintended consequences of those Phase I designs. This is the expertise of Deepa Butoliya, who also introduced such a perspective at Primer18. After acknowledging and analyzing the designs’ challenges, sharper language (developed by economist Thomas Sowell) to help counter the problems of the bluntness of the term “discrimination” will be presented. Then we will explore the problematique through the lens of futures in current western examples and Global South’s examples of futures’ work.
Phase III will involve applying those principles of greater inclusion to re-design and even completely recast the Phase I projects.
To complete the workshop, Phase IV will involve a reflection upon the individual agency that each participant has regardless of their professional position. Individually and in small groups various possibilities will be generated and discussed for possible concrete actions in the world. Among the list of possibilities, participants will be encouraged to choose and commit to actions to take after the workshop. Through email in the months following the workshop, the organizers will send check-ins and reminders and perhaps even consult with participants to better ensure progress toward more inclusive contexts and futures.
A key feature of the workshop will be identifying the individual agency and power that each participant has—whether student, professor, or industry professional—and determining what action can be taken after the workshop that is a step toward an inclusive future. The three facilitators intend on following up with participants with emails at intervals in the months following the event to better ensure that action in the world actually takes place.
Key Workshop Takeaways
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A key framework and language for doing speculative design and design futures work
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A simple but useful model to nuance the understanding and language of “discrimination” from recent economics literature
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Empathetic exposure through examples that lead to understanding inclusive and diverse perspectives of our collective futures
Special Notes
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PRIMER19 workshops are scheduled for A.M. and P.M. While this workshop is currently scheduled for the A.M. time slot, the final starting time may vary depending on scheduling needs. Workshop ticket holders will be notified accordingly.
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Attendees who purchase a PRIMER19 conference ticket receive a discount off of all PRIMER19 related workshops. Please check your confirmation email or contact theprimerconference@gmail.com for discount-related questions or problems.
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Student Tickers are available to purchase for individuals who (a) purchase using their official .edu email address AND (b) show a valid, current student ID/verification when checking into the conference and workshop.
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If you want to attend the PRIMER19 conference or affiliated workshops but are experiencing economic hardship, please visit the extenuating circumstances page on our website and we'd be happy to work with you!
Other PRIMER19 Workshops:
PRIMER19 Workshop by Andrés Valencia The Future is Human: A Toolkit for Progress
PRIMER19 Workshop by Frank Spencer: Wicked Opportunities: Innovation Through Foresight
PRIMER19 Workshop by Pierre Shaw & Kishan San: Platforms and Their Protagonists
PRIMER19 Workshop by Chirryl-Lee Ryan: Impact The World Isn't Ready For
PRIMER19 Workshop by Grace Turtle & Andreu Belsunces: Automated Control Wars
*What is PRIMER?
PRIMER conference was created to prepare you for the future and to equip you to help shape it. It is the annual conference (in the US and Europe) produced by the Design Futures Initiative, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in San Francisco, CA and the annual gathering for the Speculative Futures community with 20 (and growing) chapters worldwide.
We welcome anyone to join us! Conference attendees (and localized MeetUp members) span a wide array of designers, artists, technologists, makers, students, and organizations whose work focuses on questioning and rethinking our technologies, products, and systems, or proposes alternative narratives and future worlds.
Stay connected! For more information and updates, join our mailing list and follow us on social media.
