Temes de Disseny #39 – Emerging Habitats: Design as a Worldmaking Agent

TdD


Crafts, Design & Arts Environmental Sciences Sustainable Development Social Sciences (General) Urban Studies & Planning Interdisciplinary Studies (General) Innovation Creativity





Temes de Disseny is a scientific publication born from the research anxiety and vocation of Elisava Research. Annually since 1986 the school makes the journal available for the readers. The publication addresses from an analytical perspective a great variety of subjects related to design’s connection with fields such as culture, communication, technology or economy from an analytical perspective.  



The 39th issue of Temes de Disseny calls on designers working at all scales to explore emerging habitats and the roles of design as a worldmaking agent. Human habitats are made up of ever-changing interactions between physical, material bodies, and social, relational events. Especially in times of uncertainty, design, with its potential for transdisciplinarity and multiscalarity, is ideally placed to identify, mediate and generate new relations between the hard and soft dimensions of human habitats in both urban and rural ecologies, fostering social innovation, political experimentation, and radical imagination. 



This new issue will be published with open access, peer reviewed and indexed content. Temes de Disseny is a journal that locals and foreign designers can use to share their knowledge internationally. We call for papers (original journal articles, state-of-art reviews, design case studies or pictorials) to gather knowledge regarding the following generic topics: 





  • Worldmaking: Many worlds exist as the world we know right now / design’s symbolic and operative apparatuses allow to explore diverse versions of the world / worldmaking enriches our understanding of lived environments and enhances our capabilities to transform them / worldmaking’s task is to multiply plural worlds in the face of global homogenisation. 




  • Transition Design: Contributions that explore, propose or exemplify pathways to transition from present states and conditions to long-term desirable futures / Wicked Problems and Problem Mapping / Visioning centred on Political and Governance Priorities/ Socio-Technical systems. 







  • Indeterminacy and Openness: how contemporary design negotiates radical indeterminacy / embracing change / temporality / new modes of design authorship / collaboration and co-design / open-ended design processes / play and game-based practices / chance operations / hyperstition 




  • Social Innovation, Equity and Empowerment: equity-centred design approaches/ social innovation design practices and non-extractive modes of participation / relational and power dynamics / design and community/the political dimension of agency / creative dissent 




  • Material-relational dimensions of habitats: human habitats are simultaneously material and relational / the material dimension of design practices generates affects and these have relational effects on the agents involved in a specific habitat 




  • The agency of non-human actors: Relevance of non-human agents in human habitats / Design practices as multispecies endeavours / Biodesign and new models of accountability / systems ecology / complex systems / xenodesign 




  • Multi-Cross-Trans disciplinarity: Include all design areas and disciplines: space, product, interaction, service, graphic, material design / foster multi, cross and trans disciplinarity / include all relevant design approaches, from pragmatic to speculative, from reflexive to activist 







Credits

 




  • Guest Editors: Mariana Amatullo, PhD; Roger Paez, PhD

  • Editors in Chief: Oscar Tomico, PhD; Danae Esparza, PhD  

  • Managing Editor: Guim Espelt, PhD

  • Editorial Board: Pau Alsina, Laura Benítez, Miquel Bruns, Bani Brusadin, Tomas Diez, Delia Dumitrescu, Danae Esparza, Jéssica Fernández, Albert Fuster, Ariel Guersenzvaig, Pere Llorach-Massana, Ezio Manzini, Sonia Massari, Andrew Morrison, Viviana Narotzky, Javier Peña, Anna Petit-Boix, Valentina Rognoli, Ramon Sangüesa, Ron Wakkary





Do you want to submit an article?  





Authors who aim to submit their manuscript should select a generic topic of this Temes de Disseny special issue and send an extended abstract proposal (500-600 words) through this online form before 29 September 2022. 



On 25 October 2022, authors of the accepted proposals will be informed, and must submit their manuscript before 20 December 2022. The journal will be published on Summer 2023. 



If you have a proposal but it doesn't fit the dates or formats proposed, please contact us at tdd@elisava.net with the details.