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Designing Futures

Designing Futures

Explores issues in design and contemporary culture through speculative and experiential engagements with questions at the intersection of digital technologies, ethics, and society.

Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
—Arundhati Roy, Writer

Objective & Outcomes

This course will equip students with a deeper understanding of various methodologies and approaches to engage in narratives about possible futures, including speculative and critical design, science fiction, design fiction, and speculative fabulation.

Upon completion of the course, students will be able to evaluate the implications of design from various critical lenses–ethical, cultural, environmental, political, and economic– as well as creatively and generatively design for complex socio-technical systems.

Typical Schedule

  • Session 1: Introduction
  • Session 2: History of Designing Futures
  • Session 3: Speculative Design + Science Fiction
  • Session 4: Experiential Design
  • Session 5: Feminism + Futurism
  • Session 6: Mid-Term Presentation + Critique
  • Session 7: Mid-Term Presentation + Critique
  • Session 8: Future of Work
  • Session 9: Post-Capitalist Future & Multi-Species Design
  • Session 10: Race + Afro-Futurism
  • Session 11: Crip Futures
  • Session 12: Decolonized Futures
  • Session 13: Final Project Presentation
  • Session 14: Final Project Presentation

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