MUO-E8023 - Values in Design Futures D, 21.04.2021-26.05.2021
This course space end date is set to 26.05.2021 Search Courses: MUO-E8023
Final essay: Speculations on machines, human passions and designed futures
Summary
This assignment is an individual, summative assignment in which you are asked to synthesise what you have learned on the course: consider how alternatives to predominant socio-technical-ecological arrangements can be explored through fictional, speculative means. Situate your discussion in the context of a wealthy industrial society by referring to the 1909 short story by English author, E. M. Forster, The Machine Stops, and by referencing relevant later examples of experiments and explorations in design futures. Write from a “values in design futures” perspective, referring to course materials as well as other appropriate sources.
Aims
· With reference to societal context, to analyse how futures can be imagined, used and promoted.
· To reflect in a coherent, informed and critical way on values and futures as they appear in fictional designed environments. (Put differently, consider how design and narration operate as ways of making shared situations more or less reasonable, more or less concerning.)
Deliverables
● An essay of no more than 2000 words (not including references), in pdf format.
Assessment
Weighting: Assignment 2 = 50% of total course grade
Due Date: June 2, 17:00, to be uploaded on MyCourses
Assignments submitted after the due date/time without an approved extension or application for special consideration will not be marked.
The Brief:
Read The Machine Stops. Pay particular attention to how the author imagines the future. Note both “material” qualities such as objects, places, climate, etc. and “immaterial” qualities such as relationships between individuals, power structures, political-economic system etc. Survey the course materials to get a sense of 1) how concerns for the future have been articulated in the recent and more distant past and 2) how one might approach design futures critically.
We suggest you develop your essay be selecting one or two themes from the course that are also reflected in the short story, and elaborate on these. You are not expected to write about the short story as such. Use it as inspiration to help you identify and then write about themes that allow values, desires and concerns to be projected in (descriptions of) designed worlds. Using illustrations from the course literature, the short story and from media and other reports and your own experience, analyse how fictional speculations and imagined situations help make sense of the present and near futures.
You may use the title we have provided or create your own, as long as you respond to the brief.
Key Requirements
The essay should:
● Be approximately 2000 words plus references;
● Have a cover page with assignment title, title of your essay, date and your name;
● Use a language appropriate for scholarly work;
● Use figures, images and illustrations as needed to support the ideas and arguments presented, keeping the file size below 3MB;
● Grammar/spell-checked, proofread, and, formatted and referenced in line with APA convention (please do a search on how to write reports and how to reference materials in APA convention).
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