Presentation of the outputs of the assignment in the course Bio-inspired Design
Boga, M. (2024, September 12-13). Bio-inspired Design: A Multidisciplinary Approach for Fostering Ecological Empathy. [Conference presentation]. Envisioning Actionable Transformation for Climate Resilience and Societal Change through Transdisciplinary Dialogues, Zagreb, Croatia.
Abstract:
Bio-inspired Design: A Multidisciplinary Approach for Fostering Ecological Empathy
This proposal explores the outcomes of a Bio-inspired Design course, investigating the intersection of ecology, design thinking, and critical/speculative approaches through digital media. Students designed bio-inspired fictional characters, analyzing their strengths/weaknesses, ecological networks, and the impact of habitat changes. The course fostered student engagement with nature and enhanced biological literacy through scenario-building based on hypothetical creatures and series of events. This multidisciplinary approach is promising for engaging young generations with nature, promoting empathy for non-human life as a more-than-human approach, and encouraging conservation efforts.
The framework employs both agonistic and consensus-oriented aspects. First, a speculative approach is used to manipulate the ecosystem and generate alternative scenarios. This necessitates a critical examination of the subject, leading to engagement, empathy, and, ultimately, a sense of connection with other living beings. Second, the project requires a holistic and critical analysis of the entire system, reflecting both agonistic and consensus-oriented aspects of design thinking. It needs to attack the context (Dorst, 2015) first and reconcile and meditate at some level. Finally, the project utilizes digital game elements, often seen as isolating youngsters from nature, to create a bridge for connecting with the natural world, transforming an agonistic approach into a consensus-oriented one.
This proposal analyzes how industrial design students approached biological entities, ecosystems, and interrelationships by creating fictional game characters and narratives. This process enabled them to grasp cause-and-effect relationships within an ecosystem and the interconnectedness of nature. Bio-inspired approaches in design suffer from designers' lack of biological literacy (Boga & Timur, 2016), and the young generation lacks nature contact (Louv, 2005). The method sees the natural cycle as a narrative to analyze and speculate it by interference and develop scenarios by a critical approach.
The project tasked students with generating scenarios based on the character’s traits and relationship with prey, predators, climate, and topography. This analysis highlighted the cascading impact of even small changes within a system. The paper will unfold the project outputs through a content analysis of the fictional scenarios based on the creature characteristics, ecological dynamics, interrelations of fictional entities, etc. This project is the foundation for a broader game design project to understand young people's motivations and challenges in engaging with nature.
Keywords: Bio-inspired design, Critical and speculative design, Design thinking, More than human, Multidisciplinarity
References:
Boga, M. & Timur, S. (2016). Exploring Biomimicry in the Students’ Design Process. Design and Technology Education: an International Journal, 21(1), 21-31.
Dorst, K. (2015). Frame innovation: Create new thinking by design. The MIT Press.
Louv, R. (2005). Last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature-deficit disorder. Chapel Hill.
Published magazine article about the outputs of a studio project that was held in 2020; in the Packaging World Magazine by ASD Turkish Packaging Manufacturers Association.
Gelmez, K., Boga, M., Efilti, P., Özturan, E., & Yılmaz, O. (2021, April). Dogadan ilhamla ambalaj tasarımı: ITÜ’den örnekler [Nature inspired packaging design: Examples of ITU projects]. Ambalaj Dünyası [Packaging World], 35(177), 76-77.
Published research article in the Design and Technology Education: an International Journal as a selected proceeding in the LearnxDesign: 3rd International Conference on Design Research and Education.
Published full-text proceeding that was presented at LearnxDesign: 3rd International Conference on Design Research and Education, Chicago, IL, USA.
Presentation of the outputs of the master thesis at AIGA Design Educator's Conference: New ventures: Intersections in design education, Portland, OR, USA.
Boga, M. & Timur-Ögüt, S. (2014, September 11-13). Natural analogy in design: A study on the approach of industrial design students. [Conference presentation]. AIGA Design Educator's Conference: New ventures: Intersections in design education, Portland, OR, USA.
