Defamiliarising Design

Light, A., Blythe, M and Reed, D. (2008) Defamiliarising Design, Design Principles and Practices 1(4) pp63-72

Runner up, best paper award

This paper asks what might make for a design-friendly culture as more people are implicated in the making of everyday interactive systems. The tools offered below are exercises to broaden the view at the start of a design process, even before the space of the problem is contemplated. They are intended to sit well with user-centred design processes, bringing a dash of fun with some serious intent. They are thought games to occupy the 'trading zones' (Galison 1997) in multi-disciplinary teams as they learn about each other and the project before them. They are experiential, in as much as they are more concerned to teach by doing and raise awareness through experience (Dewey 1938) rather than solely convey information.