Wednesday, 3 September 2008
Tuesday, 2 September 2008
Context: Process: Content
We seem to be sketching out three main themes within our examination of the Manifesto - Context, Process and Content. If we're looking to create an automatic manifesto generator, we have to consider all three of these elements. We have to design parts of each, in different ways. How do we prototpye? Is it through the Studio Project with the second and third years? I like the idea of running semi-scientific test cases, where we run the same 'system' but change each variable slightly: move a chair into a different position, run the test on the day of the big brother final, ask people to only select 4 points.
Saturday, 30 August 2008
Architecture of the spaces of debate: #1 The Meeting Room.
I want to briefly collect/explore/collate the architecture of debate. Starting with the actual physical spaces of debate, first of which is the meeting room.
I have started a collection of meeting rooms. I will post them all soon.
Thursday, 28 August 2008
The spaces of debate
What maintains a manifesto?
Manifesto's are often created within a forum, a socially dynamic space, in which debate and rhetoric are utilised to boil down the moral justifications of our actions. When we leave this context and begin to bring these manifestos into existence within the everyday, they often become diluted or ignored. Why is this? Is it because we give the context or the 'institution' ownership of the manifesto, only existing as a group ideal, and as individuals we leave our responsibility for its maintenance at the door?
Does the manifesto only truly exist in its essence as a trace within the physical space it was defined? Is this physical space, this room, this studio, library, kitchen, cafe, pub, the place that holds potential to maintain the true quality of the manifesto. What if this place could always exist in its original state, a place where the manifesto makers could revisit to rekindle their ideals and refurbish their moral calculators?
What does a place like this afford us?
(Utilizing the unreal worlds of interactive gaming to create a forum in which discussion can happen)
A real, and yet unreal world, accessible anytime. A world in which the actual architecture can be defined to enhance debate/discourse and rhetoric, shaped and molded to expand and focus the practise of manifesto making. A space in which physical mapping can be enacted by representations of ourselves (our ideal selves) and recorded, documented and replayed. A space where extreme actions of debate can be tested, played and refined. Manifesto the game!
Manifesto's are often created within a forum, a socially dynamic space, in which debate and rhetoric are utilised to boil down the moral justifications of our actions. When we leave this context and begin to bring these manifestos into existence within the everyday, they often become diluted or ignored. Why is this? Is it because we give the context or the 'institution' ownership of the manifesto, only existing as a group ideal, and as individuals we leave our responsibility for its maintenance at the door?
Does the manifesto only truly exist in its essence as a trace within the physical space it was defined? Is this physical space, this room, this studio, library, kitchen, cafe, pub, the place that holds potential to maintain the true quality of the manifesto. What if this place could always exist in its original state, a place where the manifesto makers could revisit to rekindle their ideals and refurbish their moral calculators?
What does a place like this afford us?
(Utilizing the unreal worlds of interactive gaming to create a forum in which discussion can happen)
A real, and yet unreal world, accessible anytime. A world in which the actual architecture can be defined to enhance debate/discourse and rhetoric, shaped and molded to expand and focus the practise of manifesto making. A space in which physical mapping can be enacted by representations of ourselves (our ideal selves) and recorded, documented and replayed. A space where extreme actions of debate can be tested, played and refined. Manifesto the game!
Wednesday, 27 August 2008
Ingredients of a Manifesto
I agree with the need for a radical reflexivity in design - it's an essential part of developing a rich and thoughtful design practice - how, as a designer, one articulates and declares your own positions, values and prejudices is important if a clear direction, or manifesto, is to be reached.
I'm interested in trying to work out the structure of a manifesto - a meta-manifesto or metafesto - what does a manifesto need to contain? Reflexivity is one key element, the self-reflexive engagement with your own, internalised, design process (i.e. We shall design by... ), but also it needs elements of engagement with outside agents and contexts. Now this starts to move into a ethical dimension, so it's important to keep the language and mechanism of articulation open and flexible.
I like the idea of creating heat, forging an idea in the fires of discourse ;-) How does a design position emerge from heated debate? What drives the debate - could it be any controversy?
I'm interested in trying to work out the structure of a manifesto - a meta-manifesto or metafesto - what does a manifesto need to contain? Reflexivity is one key element, the self-reflexive engagement with your own, internalised, design process (i.e. We shall design by... ), but also it needs elements of engagement with outside agents and contexts. Now this starts to move into a ethical dimension, so it's important to keep the language and mechanism of articulation open and flexible.
I like the idea of creating heat, forging an idea in the fires of discourse ;-) How does a design position emerge from heated debate? What drives the debate - could it be any controversy?
Tuesday, 26 August 2008
Reflexivity
The idea of creating a frictional space for contradiction and discourse is brilliant, with its mechanical references of steel rubbing steel in motors, creating heat! The heat we create is debate, but how do we create a forum, perhaps a mechanised one, that creates heat without the fire?
I have been reading a bit about ‘situational analysis’ at the moment, the sociological methodological practise that attempts to take into account the ‘postmodern turn’. It uses cartographical approaches to solve some of the issues of complexity.
1. situational maps that lay out the major human, nonhuman, discursive and other elements in the research situation of inquiry and provoke analysis of relations among them;
2. social worlds/arenas maps that lay out the collective actors, key nonhuman elements, and the arena(s) of commitment and discourse within which they are engaged in ongoing negotiations---mesolevel interpretations of the situation; and
3. positional maps that lay out the major positions taken, and not taken, in the data vis-à-vis particular axes of difference, concern, and controversy around issues in the situation of inquiry.
...[The] maps center on the ‘situation’ of inquiry. The situation per se becomes the ultimate unit of analysis and understanding its elements and their relations are the primary goals...It's an on going analysis where enquiry is seen to also have an affect that must be taken into the picture.
Adele E. Clarke’s SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS: GROUNDED THEORY AFTER THE POSTMODERN TURN
(Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005).
These mapping techniques, although quite dry and to us designers quite naive perhaps, do look at interesting ways of reflexive analysis. This is something that as designers I have always felt we do not do enough of- looking back at ourselves, our practises, our processes, our outcomes and the decisions/beliefs/ethics that drive us. Does this ‘space of contradiction’ , this ‘forum of friction’ exist within practises that enable better reflexive analysis?
Latour below talks about the practise of looking deeper into the situations in which we practise, what i like about this quote in particular is the element of having to look with others. This I believe could be at the heart of the significance of creating an machine in which groups of people can debate and through this process create manifestos that test their own design practises.
In opening the black box of scientific facts, we knew we would be opening
Pandora’s box. There was no way to avoid it. . . . Now that it has been opened, with plagues and curses, sins and ills whirling around, there is only one thing to do, and that is to go even deeper, all the way down into the almost empty box, in order to retrieve what, according to the venerable legend, has been left at the bottom—yes, hope. It is much too deep for me on my own; are you willing to help me reach it? May I give you a hand? (Latour)
I have been reading a bit about ‘situational analysis’ at the moment, the sociological methodological practise that attempts to take into account the ‘postmodern turn’. It uses cartographical approaches to solve some of the issues of complexity.
1. situational maps that lay out the major human, nonhuman, discursive and other elements in the research situation of inquiry and provoke analysis of relations among them;
2. social worlds/arenas maps that lay out the collective actors, key nonhuman elements, and the arena(s) of commitment and discourse within which they are engaged in ongoing negotiations---mesolevel interpretations of the situation; and
3. positional maps that lay out the major positions taken, and not taken, in the data vis-à-vis particular axes of difference, concern, and controversy around issues in the situation of inquiry.
...[The] maps center on the ‘situation’ of inquiry. The situation per se becomes the ultimate unit of analysis and understanding its elements and their relations are the primary goals...It's an on going analysis where enquiry is seen to also have an affect that must be taken into the picture.
Adele E. Clarke’s SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS: GROUNDED THEORY AFTER THE POSTMODERN TURN
(Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2005).
These mapping techniques, although quite dry and to us designers quite naive perhaps, do look at interesting ways of reflexive analysis. This is something that as designers I have always felt we do not do enough of- looking back at ourselves, our practises, our processes, our outcomes and the decisions/beliefs/ethics that drive us. Does this ‘space of contradiction’ , this ‘forum of friction’ exist within practises that enable better reflexive analysis?
Latour below talks about the practise of looking deeper into the situations in which we practise, what i like about this quote in particular is the element of having to look with others. This I believe could be at the heart of the significance of creating an machine in which groups of people can debate and through this process create manifestos that test their own design practises.
In opening the black box of scientific facts, we knew we would be opening
Pandora’s box. There was no way to avoid it. . . . Now that it has been opened, with plagues and curses, sins and ills whirling around, there is only one thing to do, and that is to go even deeper, all the way down into the almost empty box, in order to retrieve what, according to the venerable legend, has been left at the bottom—yes, hope. It is much too deep for me on my own; are you willing to help me reach it? May I give you a hand? (Latour)
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