Kwan Chan

MFA Design Cultures

I approach design through ‘activism’, taking both its political meaning and sense of activation. For the former, I research on the modes of political participation in protest context which resemble design activities, and I term them as acts of ‘protest-making’. For the latter, I build my interest in design activism, referring to those design projects orientating towards social and ecological goals instead of working towards solely commercial purposes. More specifically, I am developing my research area evolving the concept of user, from its theoretical understanding in various design disciplines to design methodologies such as human-centred design. Paving my way to becoming a design culture researcher, I position myself between the areas of design history and philosophy and design practices. I seek to mediate the two rather distant disciplines in my academic writing and design criticism.  

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