A Design Seminar Course Addressing Issues of Ethics + Sustainability

Paul J. Nini, Professor, Visual Communication Design, The Ohio State University
A Design Seminar Course Addressing Issues of Ethics + Sustainability

I have offered a seminar course in recent years titled "Design + Society = Roles and Responsibilities" that's available to graduate students and senior-level industrial design, interior design, and visual communication design undergraduate students. Within the course we look generally at ethical issues related to design practice (consumerism, gender-balance, design for under-served populations, ecology, etc.). The main goal of the course is to increase awareness of the large scope of issues that occur in a consumer society, and to explore ethical and sustainable paths for future design practice. My presentation covers the structure of the course, its results, and comments from students concerning their experiences with content that's often beyond their initial conception of their chosen career paths.

Students read the following texts and lead discussions on the readings: Design For Society (Whitely); Design For the Real World (Papanek); and Cradle to Cradle (McDonough + Braungart). We also view and discuss the following DVDs: An Inconvenient Truth: A Global Warning; The Corporation; Who Killed The Electric Car?; A Convenient Truth: Urban Solutions From Curitiba, Brazil; and Energy Crossroads: A Burning Need To Change Course. Students are then asked to identify particular issues from the readings and DVDs, to research them further, and to apply them within a small project related to their discipline. These explorations result in design concepts that show a greater sensitivity to both user needs and sustainable practices.