Category Archives: Uncategorized

RELATED TERMS: Enaction Paradigm – Cognitive Science; Sensorimotor System Sensory Systems A design may explicitly and deliberately address one or all of the human body’s sensory systems. It may also be the case that a design addresses more that one of these senses implicitly or unintentionally; or unintentionally prioritises or hierarchises one of the senseContinue reading “Somatosensory System”

RELATED TERMS: “So Hiro’s not actually here at all. He’s in a computer-generated universe that his computer is drawing onto his goggles and pumping into his earphones. In the lingo, this imaginary place is known as the Metaverse. Hiro spends a lot of time in the Metaverse. It beats the shit out of the U-Stor-It.”Continue reading “Metaverse”

RELATED TERMS: Theoretical practice Open system theory was initially developed by Ludwig von Bertanlanffy in the 1950s. Although conceived in the context of biology, the theory is applicable in other disciplines. The theory defines systems as being “characterized by an assemblage or combination of parts whose relations make them interdependent” (Scott, 1992: 77). As oneContinue reading “Open Systems Theory”

RELATED TERMS: Heterarchy; Open Systems Theory The concepts of complexity, emergence and relationality were introduced in 20th century science and philosophy as means of counteracting the effects of positivism and reductionism. They are crucial for understanding the operation of designed outputs as material, semiotic phenomena and therefore important to consider in conceptualisation and design processes.Continue reading “Emergence”

RELATED TERMS: Actantial model – Greimas; Agon; Agonism and avant-gardism; Antagonist; Focalisation; Protagonist; Telos and Teleology; Theatre and Drama Theory The dramatic conflict is the persistent tension, the driving force, from which the content of the story is gestated and produced. According to Robert McKee (1999: 210): “Nothing moves forward in a story except throughContinue reading “Dramatic Conflict”

RELATED TERMS: Actantial Model – Greimas; In Medias Res The kind of use that is made of Greimas’ semiotic square in the design of narrative environments is similar to that of Donna Haraway (1992: 304) in ‘The Promises of Monsters’. She notes that, in alliance with Bruno Latour, she will use “this clackety, structuralist meaning-making machine”Continue reading “Semiotic Square”

RELATED TERMS: Narratology; Philosophy “The study of design is linked, historically and conceptually, to teleology. Since Plato and Aristotle, the apparent orderliness of sensible objects has inspired reflection upon first principles. As William Paley suggested in his proof of God’s existence, whatever appears to have been designed – whether natural or artificial – provides anContinue reading “Telos and Teleology”

RELATED TERMS: Diegese; Use for Narrative levels. See also Frame narratives and Embedded narratives Diegetic levels are also referred to as narrative levels, for example, the English translation of Gerard Genette’s book Narrative Discourse talks of narrative levels. The notion is used to describe the relations between an act of narration and the diégèse, i.e. the story as a wholeContinue reading “Diegetic Levels”

RELATED TERMS: Alienation effect (Verfremdungseffekt); Defamiliarisation, Ostranenie or making strange; Psychogeography; Situationist International Within the practice of designing narrative environments, détournement may usefully be articulated with ontological metalepsis, as a creative and critical technique. Détournement is the reuse of preexisting artistic elements in a new ensemble. It has been a constantly present tendency of theContinue reading “Détournement”

RELATED TERMS: Co-Design; Creative Thinking; Critical Thinking; Design History; Design of Narrative Environments; Latour; Modernism; Modernity; Ontological Designing; Philosophy; Postmodernism; Practice; Product Design and Industrial Design; Theoretical Practice; User-Centred and User-Driven Design; Utopia and Utopian Thinking; Design practices lie at an intersection. They intersect social practices taking place within, while re-shaping, public space; commercial practicesContinue reading “Design Practice and Functionalism”