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535-Boehnert-Symbolic-Violence-DRS2016-Conv.pdf (1.16 MB)

Design a symbolic violence: Addressing the ‘isms’

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conference contribution
posted on 2018-11-29, 15:03 authored by Joanna Boehnert, Bianca Elzenbaumer, Dimeji Onafuwa
Design embeds ideas in communication, artifacts, services and spaces in subtle and psychologically powerful ways. Feminist, class, race and indigenous scholars and activists describe how oppressions (how patriarchy, racism, colonialism, etc.) exist within institutions and also within cultural practices. The theory of symbolic violence sheds light on how design can function to naturalise oppressions and then obfuscate power relations around this process. Through symbolic violence, design enables the exploitation of certain groups of people and the environment they (and ultimately ʻweʼ) depend on to live. Design functions as symbolic violence when it is involved with the creation and reproduction of ideas, practices, processes and tools that result in structural and other types of violence (including ecocide).

History

School

  • The Arts, English and Drama

Department

  • Arts

Published in

DRS2016: Design + Research + Society: Future Focused Thinking

Citation

BOEHNERT, J., ELZENBAUMER, B. and ONAFUWA, D., 2016. Design a Symbolic Violence: Addressing the ‘isms’. A conversation held at DRS2016: Design + Research + Society: Future Focused Thinking on June 29th 2016, University of Brighton.

Publisher

Design Research Society

Version

  • VoR (Version of Record)

Publisher statement

This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

Acceptance date

2016-06-01

Publication date

2016

Notes

This document contains conversation proposal (from p. 1) and documentation (from p. 6). This is an Open Access Article. It is published by Design Research Society under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

Publisher version

Language

  • en

Location

University of Brighton

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