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Decoding The Visual Language Of Embroidery: Making, Knowing, And Recontextualising, Minshu Chen Jun 2026

Decoding The Visual Language Of Embroidery: Making, Knowing, And Recontextualising, Minshu Chen

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper positions textile-making as a way of understanding the world through embodied engagement with materials, processes and relationships. Drawing on Xiang embroidery traditions and the Chinese philosophical concept of Qi-Yun (vital force and resonant rhythm). Through participatory workshops with local communities in Hunan, China, it explores how tacit knowledge emerges in a specific context through inner perception, observation, collaboration and dialogue surrounding material interaction and the accumulation of experience. A triangular methodology is developed to analyse multiple standpoints (traditional practitioners, technical collaborators and spectators) and articulate how different standpoints participate in meaning-making within textile practice. This approach theorises embroidery …


The Transformative Nature Of Food And The Transition Of Traditional Desserts Into Industrial Products: A Case Study Through A Transformational Design Lens, Burcu Torum Jun 2026

The Transformative Nature Of Food And The Transition Of Traditional Desserts Into Industrial Products: A Case Study Through A Transformational Design Lens, Burcu Torum

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper examines the transformation of traditional Turkish desserts into contemporary industrial food products through the framework of transformational design. Grounded in the premise that food functions not only as a biological necessity but also as a carrier of cultural memory, identity, and social meaning, the study explores how traditional foods can be reinterpreted within modern production systems, consumption patterns, and sustainability expectations. Drawing on student projects from a food design course in an industrial design department during the 2024–2025 academic year, the research analyzes how desserts are redesigned according to industrial constraints and contemporary lifestyles. Using thematic analysis, findings …


Queering Empathy In/For/With/By Design, Jessica Meharry Jun 2026

Queering Empathy In/For/With/By Design, Jessica Meharry

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Empathy is widely used as the initial stage of the design process to understand users and meet their needs and desires. Recently these methods have been critiqued for commodifying empathy in commercial practice, centering the designer instead of the user, and failing to account for power dynamics. Empathy is also under attack in political spheres, increasing the dehumanization of others. To address these criticisms, we explore the value of empathy in design processes and examine how queer theory and queering methodologies can help designers move past “walking in someone else’s shoes” towards intersectional design processes rooted in political responsibility. Synthesizing …


Making Worlds Thinkable: Design As Diffractive Sensemaking., Joan Vellvé Rafecas Jun 2026

Making Worlds Thinkable: Design As Diffractive Sensemaking., Joan Vellvé Rafecas

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Across contemporary design practice, an attitude has been consolidating design as diffractive sensemaking. It is not method- or outcome-oriented, nor even necessarily a discipline, but a habit of attention in which fragments, measures and memories, timings and routines, infrastructures and more-than-human traces are placed so they read through one another to develop conscious, situated practices. Often grounded in research practice, these approaches lead to diverse outcomes. In all of them, an ecosophic orientation keeps environmental, social and mental ecologies mutually in play without collapsing them into a single index or metric. In such practices, care appears as activism: framing, positioning, …


The ‘Cuteness Matrix’: Mapping Cuteness As An Affective Strategy For Purpose-Led Communication Design, Guo Yi Xian Yix, Mimi Nguyen, David Preston Jun 2026

The ‘Cuteness Matrix’: Mapping Cuteness As An Affective Strategy For Purpose-Led Communication Design, Guo Yi Xian Yix, Mimi Nguyen, David Preston

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Cuteness is often dismissed as trivial or decorative. Yet research across neuroscience, psychology, and cultural theory reveals it as a powerful affective force that captures attention, evokes empathy, and encourages prosocial behaviour and well-being. Cute’s affective potency also renders it ethically ambivalent, capable of manipulation as much as comfort. Despite its ubiquity, cuteness remains under-theorised in design research, a notable gap for a discipline concerned with communication, emotion, and human connection. Addressing this gap, this study conducts an interpretive systematic literature review of publications from 1943 to 2025, identifying 65 key scholarly sources. Interdisciplinary insights are synthesized into the ‘Cuteness …


Designing Narrative Reconstruction From Bamboo Slips: A Rag-Agent Approach For Cultural Scene Generation, Qijun Tian, Yuqian Yao, Zhengyu Chen, Hanling Zhang Jun 2026

Designing Narrative Reconstruction From Bamboo Slips: A Rag-Agent Approach For Cultural Scene Generation, Qijun Tian, Yuqian Yao, Zhengyu Chen, Hanling Zhang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As large language models (LLMs) become increasingly integrated into cultural heritage research, practices such as artifact reconstruction, content generation, and virtual restoration are rapidly advancing. Generative artificial intelligence is unlocking new narrative potential for jiandu (bamboo and wooden slips), offering innovative approaches to cultural expression and historical reconstruction. However, general-purpose language models often face limitations in domain knowledge and semantic reliability, making it difficult to ensure accuracy and traceability in jiandu-based generation. To address these challenges, this study proposes a virtual restoration framework for jiandu narratives based on Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) and agent mechanisms. Using the Liye Qin slips as …


Exploring Value Perceptions And Identifying Integrated Value Propositions Of Ai-Enabled Smart Homes For Solo-Living Older Adults’ Wellbeing, Sanqi Yang, Lei Tang, Jaehyun Park Jun 2026

Exploring Value Perceptions And Identifying Integrated Value Propositions Of Ai-Enabled Smart Homes For Solo-Living Older Adults’ Wellbeing, Sanqi Yang, Lei Tang, Jaehyun Park

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As the population of solo-living older adults grows, hundreds of AI-enabled smart home solutions have entered the gerontechnology market, yet adoption remains below 15%. Technology- or market-driven solutions often overlook integrated, multi-stakeholder value perceptions. Guided by Service‑Dominant Logic, we explored how misaligned stakeholder value perceptions hinder the development of compelling value propositions. We conducted 20 in-depth interviews across three stakeholder groups: users (solo-living older adults, their family members, and their caregivers), design experts, and technology experts. Through thematic analysis, we elucidated three value perceptions: (1) orchestration needs, (2) relational maintenance, and (3) transparency and explainability. Based on these findings, we …


How Does Costume Illustration Sketching Mediate Between Visual Development Concept Art And The Practical Construction Of Film Costumes?, Sophie Fretwell, Jon Burgess Jun 2026

How Does Costume Illustration Sketching Mediate Between Visual Development Concept Art And The Practical Construction Of Film Costumes?, Sophie Fretwell, Jon Burgess

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Sketching is a vital form of communication across creative industries. As an essential part of the filmmaking process, costume illustration functions as a mediating design practice where sketching translates concept art into wearable garments. Historically rooted in hand-drawn fashion illustration, contemporary costume sketching has evolved into a globalised digital practice that bridges artistic vision and physical construction. Through this lens of design mediation and embodied expertise, the study draws on industry interviews and reflective practice to examine the costume illustrator’s changing role as translator between the digital concept and physical costume. Costume sketching solves practical challenges based on knowledge of …


From Edgeland To Gentrified-Land: Graphic Communication As Intermediary For Negotiating Place Identity In Hackney Wick, London, Angelina Hang Pan, Jennifer Mchugn, Jingnan Bian Jun 2026

From Edgeland To Gentrified-Land: Graphic Communication As Intermediary For Negotiating Place Identity In Hackney Wick, London, Angelina Hang Pan, Jennifer Mchugn, Jingnan Bian

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Hackney Wick has long been regarded as an urban edgeland, marked by significant poverty since the 1860s, with distinctive topographic and socio- economic features. Yet in the early 2000s, it saw a rapid transformation into a creative space as artists began to occupy abandoned warehouses, building a live- work culture and quickly establishing itself as one of Europe’s most vibrant artistic communities. More recently, the development of the London Olympic infrastructure and government-led urban regeneration initiatives have accelerated gentrification and drive for social capital, whilst intensifying social exclusion and community marginalisation amongst disadvantaged communities. This paper integrates visual ethnography (graphic …


Deep Materialities - Investigating The Complex Socio-Technical Entanglements Of Materials Towards The Designing Of Resilient Futures, Emile De Visscher, James Auger Jun 2026

Deep Materialities - Investigating The Complex Socio-Technical Entanglements Of Materials Towards The Designing Of Resilient Futures, Emile De Visscher, James Auger

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Each material production entails an ecosystem of interrelations linking geopolitical, economic, technological, cultural, social and sanitary dimensions, sometimes on a global scale. As designers, we are rarely conscious of these realities, and limit our actions to material selection at the scale of the artefact in constrained industrial and cultural settings. However, at a time of ecological crisis, tracking, revealing and understanding these complex systems is becoming an imperative if we are to transition towards resilient futures rooted in socio-economic realities. This article will present a pedagogical approach developed with Design Research MA students, where investigation and speculation stem from a …


From Waste To Opportunity, Upcycling Innovation In The South African Context: The Case Of Clothes To Good, Jennifer Murray, Lindsey Carey, Desiree Smal, Adelaide Sheik Jun 2026

From Waste To Opportunity, Upcycling Innovation In The South African Context: The Case Of Clothes To Good, Jennifer Murray, Lindsey Carey, Desiree Smal, Adelaide Sheik

DRS Biennial Conference Series

South Africa is a country which is facing significant textile waste problem. High volumes of second-hand products are entering the marketplace and represent an opportunity to SMEs and micro-businesses. Clothes to Good (CTG), a South African charitable organisation, are working to offset this challenge by creating upcycling programmes which repurpose these products through micro-business models designed to empower mothers of neurodivergent children. Neurodiversity is rising in South Africa and sensory stimuli products are an opportunity to repurpose second-hand clothing to products to support these consumers. This research represents the pilot study of a larger project investigating micro-business programmes creating weighted …


Situated Knowledge In Rural Craft Practices: A Context-Sensitive Approach To Craft–Design Collaboration In Fife, Scotland, Peining Sheng, Ayaan Ahmed Jun 2026

Situated Knowledge In Rural Craft Practices: A Context-Sensitive Approach To Craft–Design Collaboration In Fife, Scotland, Peining Sheng, Ayaan Ahmed

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper explores how craft, as an unselfconscious design practice and embodied knowledge, contributes to situated design research, based on an ethnographic field study in Fife, Scotland, and a co-creation workshop in Edinburgh. The study points out that existing studies and practices promoting craft–design collaboration tend to focus on urban contexts and designer-led methods, often resulting in a lack of context-sensitive consideration and the presence of imbalanced relationships. Thus, this study underscores that understanding the local knowledge of rural-based craft practitioners and the distinct attributes of rural settings can respond to the challenges of rural craft practices and the barriers …


Learning To Design With Communities: Situated Public Design Education Through The Roots Project In The Gambia, Mireia Sierra, Juan José Ramos, Ramon Bragos Jun 2026

Learning To Design With Communities: Situated Public Design Education Through The Roots Project In The Gambia, Mireia Sierra, Juan José Ramos, Ramon Bragos

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper presents the ROOTS Project, developed by interdisciplinary student teams from Esade, UPC, and IED within Fusion Point's Challenge-Based Innovation framework, in collaboration with IdeaSquare at CERN. As part of a challenge proposed by IDAEA-CSIC (Spain) and the Sankandi Youth Development Association (SYDA, The Gambia), students co-designed low-cost environmental monitoring tools to support community-led mangrove restoration in the River Gambia region. A two-week field deployment in Sankandi embedded the project within a layered local governance structure (the Alkalo, the Village Development Committee, and its Environmental Committee) through which the technology was formally adopted and transferred. Drawing on student reflections …


Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping As A Tool For Inclusive Public Design Learning, Corie Seed, Chiara Del Gaudio Jun 2026

Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping As A Tool For Inclusive Public Design Learning, Corie Seed, Chiara Del Gaudio

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Recent studies in Design Education emphasize the importance of teaching Design as a contextually situated practice, and ways for leveraging local knowledges and embracing plural epistemologies. Within this framework, it becomes crucial for designers to be able to acknowledge their own assumptions, biases, and identities and how they influence their design decisions when dealing with cultural complexity. Yet, an effective practice for cultivating this awareness, defined as critical self-reflection, remains underexplored in Design Education. This paper aims to outline key ways to foster the practice of critical self-reflection in teaching and learning Public Design. Drawing on interviews with design educators, …


Toward A Culturally Situated Perspective: Rethinking The Role Of Ai In Intangible Cultural Heritage Pattern Creation, Xiaojing Yuan, Xiang Yuan, Sanyi Wang, Hao Li, Mengzhi He, Duoduo Zhang, Nick Bryan-Kinns Jun 2026

Toward A Culturally Situated Perspective: Rethinking The Role Of Ai In Intangible Cultural Heritage Pattern Creation, Xiaojing Yuan, Xiang Yuan, Sanyi Wang, Hao Li, Mengzhi He, Duoduo Zhang, Nick Bryan-Kinns

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Research on generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in cultural design has primarily focused on generative control and creative efficiency, often overlooking the misalignment between AI task definition and cultural creation. This study explores how GenAI can be culturally adapted within traditional pattern-making practices. Using an ethnographically informed generative probe, field experiments were conducted in the Huayao cross-stitch community, which practices a form of Chinese intangible cultural heritage. The findings reveal how cultural practitioners negotiate creative logic and cultural judgment when collaborating with AI, identifying four key orientations: liveliness, locality, creation-in-progress, and community creativity. Building on these insights, the paper redefines AI’s …


Re-Voicing Identity: Care Ethics And The Politics Of Unsilencing After Total Laryngectomy, Gala Lucia Gonzalez Barrios Jun 2026

Re-Voicing Identity: Care Ethics And The Politics Of Unsilencing After Total Laryngectomy, Gala Lucia Gonzalez Barrios

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Voice loss after total laryngectomy disrupts identity and quality of life yet current assistive technologies reproduce techno-ableist assumptions, prioritizing speech mimicry over identity restoration while systematic marginalization excludes laryngectomees from research and innovation. This paper presents a care-centred participatory design agenda bridging a propositional approach “Singing Without a Larynx”, a vowel-based vocal interface for singing, with cross-cultural photovoice research in the United States and Argentina. Grounded in care ethics, we operationalize attentiveness, responsibility, and relational accountability, positioning participants as co-designers whose embodied knowledge shapes technological imaginaries, and community challenges and assets. We propose: (1) a critical framework integrating care ethics, …


Recognize Ourselves, Understand And Transform: An Approach To A Latin American Feminist Design Methodology, Dora Sánchez-Hidalgo Jun 2026

Recognize Ourselves, Understand And Transform: An Approach To A Latin American Feminist Design Methodology, Dora Sánchez-Hidalgo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper presents a first approach to a Latin American feminist design method based on three actions proposed by the Chilean feminist sociologist Julieta Kirkwood who said feminist praxis required to (1) know the structures of oppression, (2) recognize our place in them and (3) transform them through our practice. Although the intersection between design and feminism has successfully pointed out the false neutrality in design practice and its potential to imagine more equal futures, practical approaches are still needed as a guidance to put feminist design into practice. Therefore, this design method based on understanding, recognizing ourselves and transforming …


Make It So(Und): Speculative Sonic Metaphors As Boundary Objects For Design Research, Kc Collins Jun 2026

Make It So(Und): Speculative Sonic Metaphors As Boundary Objects For Design Research, Kc Collins

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper investigates how speculative sound design can employ metaphors as boundary objects to mediate shared understanding across users and designers. Because sound is ephemeral and difficult to describe, participants often rely on metaphor, drawing on nature, human behaviour, or emotion. We surveyed 72 people online to respond to textual prompts with descriptions of futuristic sound objects, and analysed their responses using several methods. We present results and outline suggestions for re-deploying sonic metaphors as design prompts, and discuss their potential to support sound design.


The Meandering Practitioner: When Research Emerges In Relational Resistance And Intentional Ambiguity, Markus Wernli, Kam-Fai Chan, Jonathan Yu, Josh Wolper Jun 2026

The Meandering Practitioner: When Research Emerges In Relational Resistance And Intentional Ambiguity, Markus Wernli, Kam-Fai Chan, Jonathan Yu, Josh Wolper

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper theorizes meandering as a dispositional heuristic in design research, foregrounding how researchers can encounter complexity through nuanced, situated journeying. Drawing on the case of SoilTrust nutrient-cycling praxis in Hong Kong, the study identifies four key dispositions – nimble resistance, contextual reasoning, temporal suppleness, and deliberate ambiguity – that enable practitioners to respond to structural challenges with humility, curiosity, and strategic indirection. Rather than pursuing fixed goals, meandering researchers cultivate relational awareness, embrace uncertainty, and reconfigure material and social systems through iterative, practice-led inquiry. Anchored in agential realism and indirect action, meanderability reframes design as a life-embedded mode of …


Biodiverse Design And The Ethics Of Bioempathy In Practice, Delphine Lewandowski Jun 2026

Biodiverse Design And The Ethics Of Bioempathy In Practice, Delphine Lewandowski

DRS Biennial Conference Series

This paper investigates biodiverse design as a practice through which environmental ethics can inform architectural production. Drawing on the concept of bioempathy—understood as the recognition of the intrinsic value of the biotic community—it develops an ethical and operational framework for guiding design reasoning. This framework is then applied to a reflective analysis of biodiverse wall prototypes developed by the author with an interdisciplinary team, used as an empirical ground to examine how ecological intentions were translated into material and spatial decisions, and how observations of plant establishment and spontaneous colonisation contribute to reassessing the assumptions embedded in those intentions. The …


Critical Assembly: Exploring The Role Of Critical Making In Complex Technology Relationships, Chuan Khoo Jun 2026

Critical Assembly: Exploring The Role Of Critical Making In Complex Technology Relationships, Chuan Khoo

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Critical making often assumes that practitioners possess or can acquire sufficient technical and fabrication skills to balance reflective inquiry with material engagement. Yet, as digital and networked technologies grow more abstract and complex, they risk constraining critical making by privileging technical proficiency over critical reflection. This tension raises questions about accessibility and the depth of engagement required for meaningful participation, as reliance on pre-integrated solutions may distance both practitioners and lay participants from interrogating technology’s societal roles. Still, uncovering the components of technological systems remains essential to critical engagement. This article proposes critical assembly as an extension of critical making, …


“Everything That No Longer Relates To Anything”: Discard Studies For Thinking Through Waste In Design, Timothy Cowlishaw, Joan Soler Adillon, Laia Blasco Soplon Jun 2026

“Everything That No Longer Relates To Anything”: Discard Studies For Thinking Through Waste In Design, Timothy Cowlishaw, Joan Soler Adillon, Laia Blasco Soplon

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Existing attitudes to waste in sustainable design treat it as a quantity to be minimized: reduced, reused, or recycled. However, according to the field of Discard Studies, waste, and the act of wasting, are shaped by wider social, political, and material systems of interest to design (Liboiron & Lepawsky, 2022), therefore working with waste can have broader implications for design practice. We introduce the principles and methods of Discard Studies, through a report on the participatory project "L'Arxiu de Rastres Tecnològics de Vic", carried out in Vic, Catalonia, in autumn 2025. The project used Discard Studies methods to encourage participants …


More Than Concrete: The Tacit Knowledge Of Construction Workers Through Material Cognition And Embodied Experiences, Enza Migliore, Mirna Zordan, Peiyue Lin Jun 2026

More Than Concrete: The Tacit Knowledge Of Construction Workers Through Material Cognition And Embodied Experiences, Enza Migliore, Mirna Zordan, Peiyue Lin

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Concrete builds the assets and aesthetics of contemporary cities. This research suggests that concrete also shapes emotions and cognition, generating a tacit body of valuable experience. Construction workers, who engage with this material daily, embody expertise through their bodily practices. Yet their insights remain unheard and underrepresented in the design discourse. This study adopts a material engagement approach, using concrete samples as probes and conducting semi-structured on-site interviews with 14 workers in Shenzhen, China. Analysing 280 minutes of video and audio data thematically, the research reveals that workers and materials mutually shape each other. Workers develop their understanding of concrete …


How Sound Knowledge And Education Can Support Designers In Creating Museum Experiences: Insights From Semi-Structured Interviews With Experts In Acoustics/Sound, Yi Zhang Jun 2026

How Sound Knowledge And Education Can Support Designers In Creating Museum Experiences: Insights From Semi-Structured Interviews With Experts In Acoustics/Sound, Yi Zhang

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Today, the growing demand for sound in shaping multisensory museum experiences requires exhibition designers to acquire relevant sound knowledge. However, designers often find it difficult to identify applicable insights across the vast and interdisciplinary fields of acoustics and sound studies. Thus, this paper conducts twelve semi-structured interviews with experts in acoustics and sound-related disciplines. The findings establish a basic sound knowledge framework comprising four thematic areas with related concepts: fundamentals of acoustics, sound and space, sound and audience experience, and sound control and technology. In addition, the paper explores interdisciplinary communication and collaboration in sound design practices within exhibition productions. …


Exploring How Packaging Transparency And Processing Level Affect Acceptance Of Edible Insects In Taiwan, Wei-Chen Chiu, Chun-Heng Ho Jun 2026

Exploring How Packaging Transparency And Processing Level Affect Acceptance Of Edible Insects In Taiwan, Wei-Chen Chiu, Chun-Heng Ho

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As global food systems face growing sustainability challenges, edible insects are emerging as a viable alternative protein source. This study explores how transparent window size and food processing level in packaging affect Taiwanese consumers’ purchase intentions toward insect-based foods. A 2 (window size: small vs. large) by 3 (processing level: unprocessed, semi-processed, fully processed) experiment with 359 participants, categorized by attitudes into acceptance and rejection groups, revealed that processing level significantly influenced purchase intention. Fully processed products received the highest acceptance across both groups. Window size had a minor effect, slightly increasing purchase intention among the rejection group when smaller …


Belonging Across Borders: A Framework For Transnationally Resonant Retail Design, Zakkiya Khan Jun 2026

Belonging Across Borders: A Framework For Transnationally Resonant Retail Design, Zakkiya Khan

DRS Biennial Conference Series

As global cities become increasingly transnational, retail environments have become key sites where mobile publics negotiate belonging through spatial and commercial experience. While transnational consumers are widely theorised, the spatial implications of their participation in global retail remain underexplored. This conceptual paper draws from transnational and diaspora studies to argue that retail design operates as a transcultural interface where familiarity and difference coexist, shaping plural modes of belonging. It proposes the concept, ‘Transnationally Resonant Retail Design’, a conceptual framework outlining how affective resonance, cultural mediation, and social recognition foster civic belonging within commercial spaces. These principles are illustrated by the …


Central But Decentered: Repositioning The Practitioner In Design Research Involving Practice, Luis Vega, Julia Valle-Noronha Jun 2026

Central But Decentered: Repositioning The Practitioner In Design Research Involving Practice, Luis Vega, Julia Valle-Noronha

DRS Biennial Conference Series

Design research involving practice affords a unique mode of inquiry facilitated by acts of making, generative thinking, and iterative experimentation. The practitioner’s perspective is central because it foregrounds the significance of personal engagement with the research problem at hand. Current efforts in the field are nonetheless aiming to expand this inward-looking gaze by attending to the systemic and entangled dimensions of designing. With the increasing turn to relational, posthuman, and decolonial approaches towards that end, it becomes imperative to reconstrue what counts as ‘practice’ and reexamine whose perspectives are included in such a reconstrual. The present track brings together five …


Opening Up Design Impact Assessment: From Singular Metrics To Plural Understandings, Cyril Tjahja, Barbara Predan, Joana Meroz, Petra Černe Oven, Harun Kaygan, Flavia Piancazzo, Ines Tolic, Annamari Vänskä Jun 2026

Opening Up Design Impact Assessment: From Singular Metrics To Plural Understandings, Cyril Tjahja, Barbara Predan, Joana Meroz, Petra Černe Oven, Harun Kaygan, Flavia Piancazzo, Ines Tolic, Annamari Vänskä

DRS Biennial Conference Series

The theme track Opening Up Design Impact Assessment: From Singular Metrics to Plural Understandings addresses the limitations of conventional approaches that rely on standardised and predominantly quantitative metrics. The ten contributions in this track therefore explore alternative ways of understanding design impact, considering it as a situated, relational, and interpretative phenomenon. Instead of proposing a single evaluative framework, the papers collectively demonstrate how impact emerges through diverse practices, contexts, and forms of knowledge. The track is organised into two complementary sessions: one that reconfigures structured approaches to assessment, and another that foregrounds lived experience and participatory processes. Together, they point …


Social Innovation In The Peacebuilding Sector, Michelle Helman, Phd, Katherine Ronderos, Mariafernanda Burgos-Ariza Jun 2026

Social Innovation In The Peacebuilding Sector, Michelle Helman, Phd, Katherine Ronderos, Mariafernanda Burgos-Ariza

Peace and Conflict Studies

Social innovation is an expanding practice in the peacebuilding sector. In this article, three peace scholar-practitioners reflect on our experiences as peacebuilders and consider the utility, tensions, and possibilities for peace and social innovation in theory and in practice. We draw insights gleaned through a focus group workshop with peacebuilding colleagues and highlight three case study examples from Colombia, the Philippines, and Kenya, each demonstrating the challenges and opportunities of social innovation in the peace sector. In doing so, we offer a reimagining of- and recommended action steps to engage innovation through a collaborative, feminist design approach. This article contributes …


Entre La Magia Y La Carga: Género, Trauma Y Otredad En Encanto, Sergio García Cabezas, Ángel Serrano Valverde Jun 2026

Entre La Magia Y La Carga: Género, Trauma Y Otredad En Encanto, Sergio García Cabezas, Ángel Serrano Valverde

GDI. Revista de investigación de Género, Diseño e Innovación

Este artículo analiza la película Encanto (Disney, 2021) desde una perspectiva de género, memoria y representación, con el objetivo de desentrañar cómo los personajes femeninos encarnan presiones sociales y culturales que trascienden la narrativa fantástica. A partir de un enfoque cualitativo basado en el análisis narrativo y semiótico, se examinan cuatro figuras centrales: Luisa, como metáfora de la sobrecarga física y emocional; Isabela, como encarnación de la prisión de la perfección estética; Mirabel, como representación de la invisibilización y la otredad; y Abuela Alma, como símbolo de la transmisión transgeneracional del trauma. Junto a ellas, los principales símbolos de la …