Posts tagged sustainability
CFP: More for less – design in an age of austerity (Nov 2013, Dublin Ireland)
Today’s global recession forces design practice, research and education to address questions such as how design can stimulate sustainable economic growth. The Cumulus conference is intended to act as platform for sharing ideas and concepts about contemporary design research in this age of austerity.
Abstracts due May 31, 2013.
November 7-9, 2013, National College of Art and Design, Dublin, Ireland. http://www.cumulusdublin.com
Today’s global recession forces design practice, research and education to address a number of questions:
- Growth – How can design stimulate sustainable economic growth?
- Research – Is design research and development a luxury we can still afford?
- Education – How can we change pedagogical content and delivery methods to become more efficient while maintaining standards?
- Environments – How can we use design to create places and spaces for renewal and growth?
- Wellbeing – How can design improve our wellbeing and welfare in the face of public sector cuts and financial hardship?
- Communities – How can design bring local communities together to work on projects that improve how we live, work and play?
We propose that in the deepest recession since the great depression of the 1930s we need to turn the modernist mantra ‘less is more’ on its head as the reduced budgets of governments, business and people demand ‘more for less’, and develop a ‘New Deal’ for design.
Masters thesis: Opening oportunities on outdated electronics
The disposal of electronic waste is becoming one of the growing problems that the planet is facing. This waste is perceived as useless by our society, and this project aims to challenge that idea by looking at sustainable ways of manipulating electronics.
Authors: Oko Mambo-Matala, Ngatye-Brian, Umeå University
Fulltext available here: http://umu.diva-portal.org/smash/record.jsf?pid=diva2:540139
ABSTRACT - The disposal of electronic waste is becoming one of the growing problems that the planet is facing. Tons of electronic waste is dumped illegally to 3rd world countries. Consequently the local people in those countries are exposed to levels of toxicity that could cause them serious diseases as well as the degradation on the natural ecosystems. The electronic waste is perceived as useless by our society, and this project aims to challenge that idea by looking at sustainable ways of manipulating electronics.
CFP: “Green issues” in media studies
The direct link between media, ecology, and/or sustainability is an important strand that we want to address in this special section of Necsus. This may include reflections on sustainable practices for cultural production and dissemination, as well as philosophical uses of eco-critical tools to deconstruct cultural practices, applying concepts from eco-critical thinking to existing texts.
#3, Spring 2013, ‘Green’. NECSUS: European Journal of Media Studies.
Abstracts due Oct 1, 2012.
SELECTED TOPICS
- media ecology (including contributions that address the ‘three ecologies’ of the mind, the social, and the environment)
- sustainability and green media activism
- (media) technology and nature
Read full call: http://www.necsus-ejms.org/portfolio/3-spring-2013-the-green-issue/
Aca-articles: The open and participative city - from Cumulus 2012
The papers from the Cumulus conference in Helsinki has now been posted online. The theme this year was “Open, participative city: how design knowledge can support public services in the development of open, participative city environment”.
You find papers on these themes:
- open interactive city
- innovative services
- designing sustainability
- what is the function of art in contemporary society, and what is artistic research?
- dialogue of art and design in education
Access here: http://cumulushelsinki2012.org/academic_papers/
New Book: Sustainable City and Creativity - Promoting Creative Urban Initiatives
This book offers a coherent set of articles on sustainable and creative cities and addresses modern theories and concepts relating to research on sustainability and creativity. It analyzes principles and practices of the creative city for the formulation of policies and recommendations towards the sustainable city. It brings together leading academics with different approaches from different disciplines to provide a comprehensive and holistic overview of creativity and sustainability of the city, linking research and practice.
Authors: Luigi Fusco Girard, Universita degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Napoli, Italy, Tuzin Baycan, Istanbul Technical University, Istanbul, Turkey and Peter Nijkamp, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Available on Amazon: http://www.amazon.ca/Sustainable-City-Creativity-Promoting-Initiatives/dp/1409420019
About the book
The notion of ‘creative cities’ - where cultural activities and creative and cultural industries play a crucial role in supporting urban creativity and contributing to the new creative economy - has become central to most regional and urban development strategies in recent years. A creative city is supposed to develop imaginative and innovative solutions to a range of social, economic and environmental problems: economic stagnancy, urban shrinkage, social segregation, global competition or more.
Cities and regions around the world are trying to develop, facilitate or promote concentrations of creative, innovative and/or knowledge intensive industries in order to become more competitive. These places are seeking new strategies to combine economic development with quality of place that will increase economic productivity and encourage growth.
Against this increasing interest in creative cities, this volume offers a coherent set of articles on sustainable and creative cities and addresses modern theories and concepts relating to research on sustainability and creativity. It analyzes principles and practices of the creative city for the formulation of policies and recommendations towards the sustainable city. It brings together leading academics with different approaches from different disciplines to provide a comprehensive and holistic overview of creativity and sustainability of the city, linking research and practice. In doing so, it puts forward ideas about stimulating the production of an innovative knowledge for a creative and sustainable city, and transforming a specific knowledge into a general-common knowledge, which suggests best future policy actions, decision-making processes and choices for the change towards a human sustainable development of the city.
Available on Amazon: http://www.amazon.ca/Sustainable-City-Creativity-Promoting-Initiatives/dp/1409420019
New Design Journal: Zoon Technica - focusing on social justice, equity, diversity and critical thinking
A variety of designers and researchers address issues of concern to contemporary design thinking in this first issue of Zoontechnica. All grapple with questions about how design can, in more substantial ways, contribute to sustaining those things that need to be sustained, like social justice, equity, diversity and critical thinking.
ZoonTechnica - The Journal of Redirective Design is run by the Design Department, Queensland College of Arts, Griffith University, Australia.
Call for Papers: Sustainable HCI through Everyday Practices (due Feb 1)
To date, sustainable HCI research has focused on changing individuals’ behavior in order to help address large-scale societal concerns such as climate change. In this special issue of ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction, we explore new research opportunities derived from redirecting emphasis from individual behavior to everyday social and cultural practices. This special issue will bring together works that use empirical case studies of everyday practices and/or develop theoretical perspectives on everyday practice to critically and creatively re-think how HCI researches and designs for sustainable HCI.
Deadline for Abstract Submissions: February 1, 2012
Details of this call: http://tochi.acm.org/si/sustainable.shtml
CFP: Open, Participative Cities - how design knowledge can support public services in the development of open, participative human environment
Towards Open and Participative Cities
24-26 May, 2012. Helsinki, Finland, hosted by Aalto University School of Art and Design.
Under the umbrella of Cumulus International Association of Universities and Colleges of Art, Design and Media that is the only global association representing art, design and media education in the world. It was founded in 1990 and has today 176 prominent members from 44 countries”.
The Cumulus conference, interlinked in the World Design Capital Helsinki 2012, is organized in the premises of Aalto University, in the School of Art and Design, Helsinki, Finland and in the neighboring city of Espoo. The conference program has the opportunity to include pre-conferences and site events.
The Cumulus conference organizing committee is pleased to announce the first call for abstracts/proposals.
We invite proposals for papers from the following themes
1. OPEN, INTERACTIVE CITY
Public space is interesting question. Is it declining? Transport is supposed to be more public in the future, but there is a privacy demand in the public spaces of transportation. Is a space only public when there is interaction discussion and politics involved? Or does shared material environment or share objects make a space public? Ethical consumption initiatives, and the politics involved in private consumption, make the commercial spaces public in a new way.
2. INNOVATIVE SERVICES
How are traditional product-service-systems changing? What are the new ways to organize production chains (car sharing etc.)? What kind of actors are/can be engaged in provision of services? What is the role of public authorities, civic society, small business etc.? What about co-operatives? What kind of spaces and interactions do particular services imply?
3. DESIGNING SUSTAINABILITY
Can we have sustainability in design, what kind of sustainability results from interventions by design professionals? How various design tools and other elements of the design profession fit into this? What kind of sustainabilities are issued, based on these tools, such as LCA?
4. WHAT IS ARTISTIC RESEARCH?
What is artistic research? What is the role of artworks in it? How is artistic research related to various traditions of combining art and research: a) Research for art, b) Research of art, c) Art for research, d) Art + theory = research? Why are (some) artists trying to combine art and research? What can be gained with it? What are the possible dangers or failures of it? What is it needed for? What is “artistic knowledge” or “art’s own knowledge”? What is included in it, what separates it from so called scientific knowledge? In what sense is art research? How should art and research be combined in the university context?
5. DIALOGUE OF ART AND DESIGN IN EDUCATION
Design has its roots in artistic expressions, hands on practice and in the rethinking of the existing. What is the role of art in design education? How is design integrated in art education? How do these two go about? This track welcomes submissions that reflect these questions from art education to industrial design and beyond.
6. FUNCTION OF ART IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIETY
Is art a) a way of killing time and a way of momentarily forgetting the reality, or b) a potentially profitable commercial business like any other, or c) a way of facing and changing the reality? How can art, artistic knowledge and artistic practices be used or embedded in society, for example in dealing with social and political issues?
For submission information, see cumulusassociation.org
T O P I C S
This blog is run by Medea, a research centre at Malmö University, Sweden.
