Design Discourse

Although design infuses every object in the material world and gives form to immaterial processes as well, it is only recently that design itself has become the focus of intellectual debate. In "Design Discourse", Victor Margolin gathers together a body of new writing in the emerging field of design studies. The contributors argue in different ways for a rethinking of design in light of its cultural significance and its powerful position in today's society.


Contents:

Acknowledgments
Introduction by Victor Margolin

SECTION I: AFTER THE MODERNISTS
Maurizio Vitta – The Meaning of Design
Andrea Branzi – We Are the Primitives
Maurizio Morgantini – Man Confronted by the Third Technological Generation
Francois Burkhardt – Tendencies of German Design Theories in the Past Fifteen Years
Gert Selle – There is No Kitsch, There is Only Design!
Marco Diani – The Social Design of Office Automation
Abraham A. Moles – The Comprehensive Guarantee: A New Consumer Value

SECTION II: THE INTERPRETATION OF DESIGN
Richard Buchanan – Declaration by Design: Rhetoric, Argument, and Demonstration in Design Practice
Dieter Rams – Omit the Unimportant
Richard Porch – The Digital Watch: Tribal Bracelet of the Consumer Society
Abraham A. Moles – The Legibility of the World: A Project of Graphic Design
Robin Kinross – The Rhetoric of Neutrality
Ellen Lupton – Reading Isotype
Frances C. Butler – Eating the Image: The Graphic Designer and the Starving Audience
Jack H. Williamson – The Grid: History, Use, and Meaning
Hanno H. J. Ehses – Representing Macbeth: A Case Study in Visual Rhetoric
Clive Ashwin – Drawing, Design and Semiotics

SECTION III: WRITING DESIGN HISTORY
Clive Dilnot – The State of Design History, Part I: Mapping the Field
Clive Dilnot – The State of Design History, Part II: Problems and Possibilities
Cheryl Buckley – Made in Patriarchy: Toward a Feminist Analysis of Women and Design

Postwar Design Literature: A Preliminary Mapping by Victor Margolin

List of Contributors