Routledge Research in Design, Technology and Society – serie

This book explores the work of important authors in the search for a transition towards more ethical design focused on more-than-human coexistence.In a time of environmental crises in which the human species threatens its own survival and the highest level of exacerbation of the idea of a future and technological innovation, it is important to discard certain anthropocentric categories in order to situate design beyond the role that it traditionally held in the capitalist world, creating opportunities to create more just and sustainable worlds. This book is an invitation to travel new paths for design framed by ethics of more-than-human coexistence that breaks with the unsustainability installed in the designs that outfit our lives. Questioning the notion of human-centered design is central to this discussion. It is not only a theoretical and methodological concern, but an ethical need to critically rethink the modern, colonialist, and anthropocentric inheritance that resonates in design culture. The authors in this book explore the ideas oriented to form new relations with the more-than-human and with the planet, using design as a form of political enquiry.This book will be of interest to academics and students from the world of design and particularly those involved in emerging branches of the field such as speculative design, critical design, non-anthropocentric design, and design for transition.

Data has emerged as a key component that determines how interactions across the world are structured, mediated and represented. This book examines these new data publics and the areas in which they become operative, via analysis of politics, geographies, environments and social media platforms. By claiming to offer a mechanism to translate every conceivable occurrence into an abstract code that can be endlessly manipulated, digitally processed data has caused conventional reference systems which hinge on our ability to mark points of origin, to rapidly implode. Authors from a range of disciplines provide insights into such a political economy of data capitalism; the political possibilities of techno-logics beyond data appropriation and data refusal; questions of visual, spatial and geographical organization; emergent ways of life and the environments that sustain them; and the current challenges of data publics, which is explored via case studies of three of the most influential platforms in the social media economy today: Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp.Data Publics will be of great interest to academics and students in the fields of computer science, philosophy, sociology, media and communication studies, architecture, visual culture, art and design, and urban and cultural studies.

The Digital Bespoke? is about mass customization, 3D printing, human bodies, and the step towards digitally built objects made to individual specifications. The author argues that the modes of customization offered by digital fabrication and mass production have more in common with their industrial predecessors than with craft-based customization. Using case studies of historical and current practices from Europe, Africa, and North America to ground her theory, she investigates where digital fabrication technologies have developed from and how their uses differ from existing modes of production. Digital fabrication and mass customization are concepts encompassing broad ecosystems of technologies and practices. Both are increasingly implemented and hyped. As such, it is imperative to address not just their potential, but their challenges. Written for a scholarly audience and for design practitioners concerned with the social and political impacts of digital fabrication and mass customization, this book will be a useful reference point for students and researchers in digital and analogue design, technology, and material culture.

Data has emerged as a key component that determines how interactions across the world are structured, mediated and represented. This book examines these new data publics and the areas in which they become operative, via analysis of politics, geographies, environments and social media platforms. By claiming to offer a mechanism to translate every conceivable occurrence into an abstract code that can be endlessly manipulated, digitally processed data has caused conventional reference systems which hinge on our ability to mark points of origin, to rapidly implode. Authors from a range of disciplines provide insights into such a political economy of data capitalism; the political possibilities of techno-logics beyond data appropriation and data refusal; questions of visual, spatial and geographical organization; emergent ways of life and the environments that sustain them; and the current challenges of data publics, which is explored via case studies of three of the most influential platforms in the social media economy today: Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp.Data Publics will be of great interest to academics and students in the fields of computer science, philosophy, sociology, media and communication studies, architecture, visual culture, art and design, and urban and cultural studies.

Computer Architectures is a collection of multidisciplinary historical works unearthing sites, concepts, and concerns that catalyzed the cross-contamination of computers and architecture in the mid-20th century.Weaving together intellectual, social, cultural, and material histories, this book paints the landscape that brought computing into the imagination, production, and management of the built environment, whilst foregrounding the impact of architecture in shaping technological development. The book is organized into sections corresponding to the classic von Neumann diagram for computer architecture: program (control unit), storage (memory), input/output and computation (arithmetic/logic unit), each acting as a quasi-material category for parsing debates among architects, engineers, mathematicians, and technologists. Collectively, authors bring forth the striking homologies between a computer program and an architectural program, a wall and an interface, computer memory and storage architectures, structures of mathematics and structures of things. The collection initiates new histories of knowledge and technology production that turn an eye toward disciplinary fusions and their institutional and intellectual drives.Constructing the common ground between design and computing, this collection addresses audiences working at the nexus of design, technology, and society, including historians and practitioners of design and architecture, science and technology scholars, and media studies scholars.

Different Engines investigates the emergence of technologies in Latin America to create images, sounds, video games, and physical interactions. The book contributes to the construction of a historiographical and theoretical framework for understanding the work of creators who have been geographically and historically marginalized through the study of five exemplary and yet relatively unknown artifacts built by engineers, scientists, artists, and innovators. It offers a broad and detailed view of the complex and sometimes unlikely conditions under which technological innovation is possible and of the problematic logics under which these innovations may come to be devalued as historically irrelevant. Through its focus on media technologies, the book presents the interactions between technological and artistic creativity, working towards a wider understanding of the shifts in both fields that have shaped current perceptions, practices, and design principles while bringing into view the personal, social, and geopolitical singularities embodied by particular devices. It will be an engaging and insightful read for scholars, researchers, and students across a wide range of disciplines, such as media studies, art and design, architecture, cultural history, and the digital humanities.

Different Engines investigates the emergence of technologies in Latin America to create images, sounds, video games, and physical interactions. The book contributes to the construction of a historiographical and theoretical framework for understanding the work of creators who have been geographically and historically marginalized through the study of five exemplary and yet relatively unknown artifacts built by engineers, scientists, artists, and innovators. It offers a broad and detailed view of the complex and sometimes unlikely conditions under which technological innovation is possible and of the problematic logics under which these innovations may come to be devalued as historically irrelevant. Through its focus on media technologies, the book presents the interactions between technological and artistic creativity, working towards a wider understanding of the shifts in both fields that have shaped current perceptions, practices, and design principles while bringing into view the personal, social, and geopolitical singularities embodied by particular devices. It will be an engaging and insightful read for scholars, researchers, and students across a wide range of disciplines, such as media studies, art and design, architecture, cultural history, and the digital humanities.

The Architectural Imagination at the Digital Turn asks what it means to speak of a "digital turn" in architecture. It examines how architects at the time engaged with the digital and imagined future modes of practice, and looks at the technological, conceptual and economic phenomena behind this engagement. It argues that the adoption of digital technology in architecture was far from linear but depended on complex factors, from the operative logic of the technology itself to the context in which it was used and the people who interacted with it.Creating a mosaic-like account, the book presents debates, projects and publications that changed how architecture was visualized, fabricated and experienced using digital technology. Spanning the university, new media art institutes, ecologies, architectural bodies, fabrication and the city, it re-evaluates familiar narratives that emphasized formal explorations; instead, the book aims to complicate the "myth" of the digital by presenting a nuanced analysis of the material and social context behind each case study. During the 1990s, architects repurposed software and technological concepts from other disciplines and tested them in a design environment. Some architects were fascinated by its effects, others were more critical.Through its discussion on case studies, places and themes that fundamentally influenced discourse formation in the era, this book offers scholars, researchers and students fresh insights into how architecture can engage with the digital realm today.

The Architectural Imagination at the Digital Turn asks what it means to speak of a "digital turn" in architecture. It examines how architects at the time engaged with the digital and imagined future modes of practice, and looks at the technological, conceptual and economic phenomena behind this engagement. It argues that the adoption of digital technology in architecture was far from linear but depended on complex factors, from the operative logic of the technology itself to the context in which it was used and the people who interacted with it.Creating a mosaic-like account, the book presents debates, projects and publications that changed how architecture was visualized, fabricated and experienced using digital technology. Spanning the university, new media art institutes, ecologies, architectural bodies, fabrication and the city, it re-evaluates familiar narratives that emphasized formal explorations; instead, the book aims to complicate the "myth" of the digital by presenting a nuanced analysis of the material and social context behind each case study. During the 1990s, architects repurposed software and technological concepts from other disciplines and tested them in a design environment. Some architects were fascinated by its effects, others were more critical.Through its discussion on case studies, places and themes that fundamentally influenced discourse formation in the era, this book offers scholars, researchers and students fresh insights into how architecture can engage with the digital realm today.

Computer Architectures is a collection of multidisciplinary historical works unearthing sites, concepts, and concerns that catalyzed the cross-contamination of computers and architecture in the mid-20th century.Weaving together intellectual, social, cultural, and material histories, this book paints the landscape that brought computing into the imagination, production, and management of the built environment, whilst foregrounding the impact of architecture in shaping technological development. The book is organized into sections corresponding to the classic von Neumann diagram for computer architecture: program (control unit), storage (memory), input/output and computation (arithmetic/logic unit), each acting as a quasi-material category for parsing debates among architects, engineers, mathematicians, and technologists. Collectively, authors bring forth the striking homologies between a computer program and an architectural program, a wall and an interface, computer memory and storage architectures, structures of mathematics and structures of things. The collection initiates new histories of knowledge and technology production that turn an eye toward disciplinary fusions and their institutional and intellectual drives.Constructing the common ground between design and computing, this collection addresses audiences working at the nexus of design, technology, and society, including historians and practitioners of design and architecture, science and technology scholars, and media studies scholars.

The Digital Bespoke? is about mass customization, 3D printing, human bodies, and the step towards digitally built objects made to individual specifications. The author argues that the modes of customization offered by digital fabrication and mass production have more in common with their industrial predecessors than with craft-based customization. Using case studies of historical and current practices from Europe, Africa, and North America to ground her theory, she investigates where digital fabrication technologies have developed from and how their uses differ from existing modes of production. Digital fabrication and mass customization are concepts encompassing broad ecosystems of technologies and practices. Both are increasingly implemented and hyped. As such, it is imperative to address not just their potential, but their challenges. Written for a scholarly audience and for design practitioners concerned with the social and political impacts of digital fabrication and mass customization, this book will be a useful reference point for students and researchers in digital and analogue design, technology, and material culture.