Abstract
This paper explores how service designers in the public sector can embrace a lens of cultural plurality in their daily design practice. When designing for public services, a gap between the cultural assumptions of the designer and diverse residents is going to emerge. If this gap is not addressed, service design risks enacting harmful oppressive structures. This study develops a process model based on a research through design approach. It describes how a generative feedback loop of critical self-reflection negotiated within design practice could support designers to begin embracing cultural plurality along with concrete examples. The process model addresses the missing how of critical reflection in service design practice and explores how design artefacts can be leveraged to start creating a designerly critical self-reflective practice.
Keywords
cultural plurality, service design, critical self-reflection
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2022.566
Citation
Prakash, S. (2022) Preparing for the pluriverse: Embracing critical self-reflection in service design practice, in Lockton, D., Lenzi, S., Hekkert, P., Oak, A., Sádaba, J., Lloyd, P. (eds.), DRS2022: Bilbao, 25 June - 3 July, Bilbao, Spain. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2022.566
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Research Paper
Included in
Preparing for the pluriverse: Embracing critical self-reflection in service design practice
This paper explores how service designers in the public sector can embrace a lens of cultural plurality in their daily design practice. When designing for public services, a gap between the cultural assumptions of the designer and diverse residents is going to emerge. If this gap is not addressed, service design risks enacting harmful oppressive structures. This study develops a process model based on a research through design approach. It describes how a generative feedback loop of critical self-reflection negotiated within design practice could support designers to begin embracing cultural plurality along with concrete examples. The process model addresses the missing how of critical reflection in service design practice and explores how design artefacts can be leveraged to start creating a designerly critical self-reflective practice.