March 15, 2022

Tasks Due Today

• Research Paper

This Week’s Topics

At the end of this session, students should have an understanding of the following:

• How to define your Research Project Topic / Question
• The Research Project & Presentation guidelines and due date

 

 

Begin class: What is your manifesto?

Write for 5 minutes in your research journal

Use bulleted points that you can share the class

 Grades
It will take a bit of time for me to read the papers posted this week.

Grades for the first paper will be posted before next weeks class.

• Check Your Grade

Activities

Below find the information covered in this session. Complete all of the following activities, videos, and assignments.

1. Finding Your Research Topic (30 min)

“Our identity is abstract and ever-changing. The ways in which we’re shaped by our world can evolve as the world around us changes and we encounter new experiences… With diverse representation comes a wealth of experiences and perspectives that elevate the design industry.” KALEENA SALES FROM EXTRA BOLD, PRINCETON ARCHITECTURAL PRESS, 2021.

Who are you? What do you care about?:

This week we will take a look at the Research Project guidelines and begin in earnest to define our project topic and proposal.

Use your Research Project to bring awareness to the issues that matter to you as an individual, as a global citizen, as a designer.

 

Use your own manifesto to define what today’s designer should be thinking about, rebelling against, and acting on.

Take another look at what you wrote.

In your Research Journal, you should be collecting your influences, the “stuff” that informs your design aesthetic, and what you believe in. As communication designers, we are always collecting and sampling from the world in which we live.

Nothing is truly original. This video below uses music as its subject to show that we are constantly “sampling” from and influenced by past and present cultures. If you were to collect all your visual, musical, and cultural, “samples” what would your collection look like? Use your influences to help direct your research project topic ideas.

 

If you haven’t seen it yet, watch Abstract: The Art of Design > Paula Scher to learn how a designer’s 40-year career was influenced by her life, her culture, her city, her passion.

Defining Your Research Topic

Your research should explore the relationship between specific theories that we cover in class and a specific contemporary design project, aesthetic, or approach within the last 40 years that puts these theories into practice. Begin with a particular writing, concept, or design project that you find compelling and draw connections between it and the theories we’ve discussed.

Start broad and then focus in.

You might start broadly with a general area of interest.

• • Design + Gender
  • Design + Diversity
  • Design + Protest
  • Design + Gaming
  • Design + Health
  • Design + Politics
  • Design + Identity
  • Design + Technology
  • Design + Music
  • Design + Social Justice
  • Design + Film
  • Design + ?

Check out AIGA’s Eye On Design for numerous examples that would make interesting design theory research topics. You will need to define your own topic, but these should give you some ideas.

Embrace the past

It’s difficult to look at our current time to clearly see what will be influential to the next generation (which styles or trends or political or cultural influences will have a lasting impact), but we can look to the past to see what, how, and why those influences are visible today, whether as reaction/rebellion or as influence/nostalgia. We are always asking WHY? Here are two examples where a designer, design movement, or graphic style was influenced by the past (pop culture, politics, technologies, social conflicts). When exploring these types of topics, historical sources should play a big role.

• • “Jugend-ish” typefaces embody modern self-expression
  • Influence of ’80s video games in contemporary graphic design

Reject the past

We can also look at current social-political movements to look deeply at our design field and our culture to consider how these events are influencing the present design field. In these examples, current social-political changes are informing/changing our approach to language, communication, design, and how we relate to each other. When exploring these topics the theories of communication, meaning, psychology, signs & symbols, etc. play a big role. Again we are always asking WHY?

• • How type represents gender and why
  • Design is normative but it can also be transformative
  • Typography as a Radical Act in an Industry Ever-dominated by White Men

Defining Your Research Question

Once you have narrowed down your research topic. Start to ask some questions in order to define your research question or thesis statement. Here are some tips.

Developing a Research Question – City Tech Library

Choosing a Research Topic: Purdue Online Writing Lab

Writing Strong Thesis Statements: Purdue Online Writing Lab

2. Research Project & Presentation Guidelines 

Review the Research Project and Presentation guidelines and start to define your research topic following the suggestions.

The Research Project is designed to facilitate independent research in contemporary design and design theory.

Your goal will be to consider the ideas and theories we discuss in this course, and the contexts in which they emerged, and identify a design project, designer, or style that puts these ideas into practice.

Your findings from this research will be shared with the class through a 10-15 minute audio-visual presentation (ie: a video slideshow with narration) at the end of the semester.

Find detailed guidelines in Research Project & Presentation

 

3. Assignment: Reading Response 5 (2+ Hours)

DUE Monday, March 21, at 6pm

The prompt for this week is an overly simple one from 3 texts from designers who employed systematic approaches to their work.

For this one you can answer with 3-4 paragraphs, as usual, or you can create a visual response, incorporating text with design elements.

If you choose the visual response, use the systematic approach outlined in these texts to create your design, then upload a jpeg or pdf file.

The focus of these texts is the evolution of the International Style from the New Typography movement and the Bauhaus of the 1920-1940s to Swiss Typography and the embrace of European modernism of the 1950’s. Read Jan Tschichold, “The Principles of the New Typography” pg35-38, Karl Gerstner, Designing Programmes pg55-61, Joseph Muller-Brockman, “Grid and Design Philosophy” pg62-63 in our Hypothesis group. 

These are found in our main text Graphic Design Theory: Readings From the Field by Helen Armstrong.

As before, after annotating the text, create a rough draft of your response in your Research Journal. Your response should be about 200 words and checked for spelling and grammar errors. Publish your finished response on the class site, using the guidelines provided.

Resources

Assignment: Reading Response 5

Discussion Week 6

Research Project & Presentation

Using Hypothesis

Research Journal

Grammarly

Reading Response (Example) post

Research Project Presentation