Design, Oppression, and Liberation

Main Article Content

Frederick M.C. van Amstel
Lesley-Ann Noel
Rodrigo Freese Gonzatto

Abstract

The role of design in structuring oppression has gone largely unacknowl­edged by design research and design history. However, we can see a recent move, pushed by social movements, to recognize design’s complicity with many forms of oppression. Acknowledging oppressive design opens up the possibility of occu­pying, reclaiming, repairing, and restoring what oppressors have done with it. Some approaches shift design research from denouncing to announcing new realities. Without doing so, fatalism could prevail, even if critical of the current reality. In the case of design, this means putting equal effort on analyzing oppressive designs and on developing liberating designs. In tune with this implication, this special issue highlights research that contributes to both sharpening the understanding of oppression in design, and increasing the solidarity between the different struggles for liberation that cut across design.

Article Details

How to Cite
van Amstel, F. M. ., Noel, L.-A., & Gonzatto, R. F. (2022). Design, Oppression, and Liberation. Diseña, (21), Intro. https://doi.org/10.7764/disena.21.Intro
Section
Original Research Articles Introduction

References

Angelon, R., & van Amstel, F. (2021). Monster Aesthetics as an Expression of Decolonizing the Design Body. Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education, 20(1), 83–102. https://doi.org/10.1386/adch_00031_1

Bardzell, S. (2010). Feminist HCI: Taking Stock and Outlining an Agenda for Design. Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1301–1310. https://doi.org/10.1145/1753326.1753521

Costanza-Chock, S. (2018). Design Justice: Towards an Intersectional Feminist Framework for Design Theory and Practice. Proceedings of the Design Research Society 2018. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3189696

Fanon, F. (2007). The Wretched of the Earth. Grove.

Freire, P. (1984). A máquina está a serviço de quem? Revista BITS, 1(7), 6.

Freire, P. (1996). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Continuum.

Freire, P. (2000). Pedagogia da indignação. UNESP.

Gonzatto, R. F., & van Amstel, F. (2022). User Oppression in Human-Computer Interaction: A Dialectical-existential Perspective. Aslib Journal of Information Management, (ahead-of-print). https://doi.org/10.1108/AJIM-08-2021-0233

Grosfoguel, R. (2020). Pensamiento descolonial afro-caribeño: Una breve introducción. Tabula Rasa, (35), 11–33. https://doi.org/10.25058/20112742.n35.01

Gutiérrez Borrero, A. (2015). Resurgimientos: Sures como diseños y diseños otros. Nómadas, (43), 113–129.

hooks, bell. (2014). Teaching to Transgress. Routledge.

Jack, M., & Tuli, A. (2021). Designing for Liberation: Our Lives, Mobility, and Technology. Interactions, 28(2), 34–41. https://doi.org/10.1145/3448020

Liao, S., & Huebner, B. (2021). Oppressive Things. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 103(1), 92–113. https://doi.org/10.1111/phpr.12701

Noel, L.-A. (2020). Envisioning a Pluriversal Design Education. In R. M. Leitão, L.-A. Noel, & L. Murphy (Eds.), Proceedings of PIVOT 2020: Designing a World of Many Centers, DRS Pluriversal Design SIG Conference (pp. 69–77). https://doi.org/10.21606/pluriversal.2020.021

Passos, L. A. (2010). Trama. In D. R. Streck, E. Redin, & J. J. Zitkoski (Eds.), Dicionário Paulo Freire (pp. 406–407). Autêntica Editora.

Reynolds-Cuéllar, P., Grisales, C., Wong-Villacrés, M., Serpa, B., Goñi, J. I., & Lemus, O. A. (2022). Reviews Gone South: A Subversive Experiment on Participatory Design Canons: Dedicated to the Memory of Oscar A. Lemus. Proceedings of the Participatory Design Conference 2022 - Volume 1, 206–217. https://doi.org/10.1145/3536169.3537794

Santos, M. R. dos. (2018). Gênero e cultura material: A dimensão política dos artefatos cotidianos. Revista Estudos Feministas, 26. https://doi.org/10.1590/1806-9584.2018v26n137361

Schultz, T., Abdulla, D., Ansari, A., Canlı, E., Keshavarz, M., Kiem, M., Martins, L. P. de O., & J.S. Vieira de Oliveira, P. (2018). What Is at Stake with Decolonizing Design? A Roundtable. Design and Culture, 10(1), 81–101. https://doi.org/10.1080/17547075.2018.1434368

Souza, O. (2020). Racist Motifs in Design. In R. M. Leitão, L.-A. Noel, & L. Murphy (Eds.), Proceedings of PIVOT 2020: Designing a World of Many Centers, DRS Pluriversal Design SIG Conference. https://doi.org/10.21606/pluriversal.2020.013

van Amstel, F., & Gonzatto, R. F. (2020). The Anthropophagic Studio: Towards a Critical Pedagogy for Interaction Design. Digital Creativity, 31(4), 259–283. https://doi.org/10.1080/14626268.2020.1802295

Vieira Pinto, Á. (1993). Sete lições sobre educação de adultos. Cortez.

Westerlaken, M. (2020). What is the Opposite of Speciesism? On Relational Care Ethics and Illustrating Multi-Species-isms. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 41(3/4), 522–540. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-09-2019-0176