Material Innovations

Here are the general topics & corresponding readings for the semester. Click on the topic names to get a list of the blog posts that respond to the topic.:

Week 1 – INTRO: STATE OF THE PLANET, STUFF COMES FROM SOMEWHERE, PEER PRODUCTION NETWORKS

1. We Are All Emerging Economies Now by John Thackara in the Design Observer. John Thackara runs the Doors of Perception Blog and Conference (Doors 9: Juice was the most recent in India) and is a generally all-around interesting and serious design observer/commentator.

2. Chapter 1.: Scoping the Territory: Design, Activism & Sustainability from Design Activism – Beautiful Strangeness for a Sustainable World by Alastair Fuad- Luke who seems to be everywhere in the sustainable / resilient design discourse. I don’t know anything about these organizations but appearantly he is involved with SlowLab and SLOW

3. Modern Indian Design: the Roots from Thinking Design by S. Balaram a Prof. at India’s National Institute for Design (NID). A well-worn copy of this book was generously given to me by Poonam Bir Kasturi of Daily Dump and much more. It is now out of print but can be found sans images here (.pdf).

A SPOONFUL WEIGHS A TON

Week 2 – Humans are Animals: Megacities, the Anthropocene & The Urban-Rural Continuum

1. Ch.1: Scale, Scope, Stakes, Speed from Whole Earth Discipline by Stewart Brand. Digital footnotes for the chapter can be found here. For the ridiculously quick video-cliff-notes on squatter cities watch the shortest TED talk I have ever seen.

2. Barefoot Designer: Design as Service to Rural People from Thinking Design by S. Balaram a Prof. at India’s National Institute for Design (NID). A well-worn copy of this book was generously given to me by Poonam Bir Kasturi of Daily Dump and much more. It is now out of print but can be found sans images here (.pdf). According to the Amazon page a new edition is coming out in 2010! This would be great news.

3. Global-Local Tensions: Key Issues for Design in An Unsustainable World from Design Activism – Beautiful Strangeness for a Sustainable World by Alastair Fuad- Luke who seems to be everywhere in the sustainable / resilient design discourse. I don’t know anything about these organizations but appearantly he is involved with SlowLab and SLOW

EXTRA
You may find this Short Interview “The Earth We Created” useful.

In Class we will look at:

* 19.20.21
* The Anthropocene
* Anthropogenic Biomes

Week 3 – The End is the Beginning: Carrying Capacity & Life Cycle Analysis

Week 4 – Believing is Seeing: Following Flows, Feedback & Embodied Energy

PRODUCT SERVICE SYSTEMS: BASE OF THE PYRAMID, ADAPTIVE MODELS & FAVELLA CHIC

Week 5 – Design for the Third World: Design Ethnography, Slum Tourism, Asymmetrical Exchanges

Week 6 – Product Story Systems: CSAs, PDOs & RFIDs