Design & Society

Catalog description

Conversations about design often focus on an individual object. Yet, design’s impact goes beyond the scale of an individual object and physical form at any scale is shaped by historic, cultural, economic, and social forces. This course will use topical case studies to investigate the role of design in society. A focus on the relationship between lived experience and design will allow the course to consider the roles and responsibilities of designers to address issues ranging from affordable housing to climate change and larger questions of inequity and accessibility. Overall, the course will look at policies and programs, natural and built environments, fashion and products and people and space relationships. The course will examine these and many other subjects with a focus on specific populations meant to explore global and local relationships within the purview of the past, present and future.