Abstract
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, this study introduces the pedagogical approach of Identity Mapping—which helps students to surface hidden layers of identity and bias. The findings contribute to strengthening Public Design Education by articulating perspectives that highlight contextual understanding and inclusivity, hence, cultivating a more thoughtful and socially responsive design practice.
Keywords
Design Education; Critical Self-Reflection; Inclusive Design; Public Design
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.2702
Citation
Seed, C., and Del Gaudio, C. (2026) Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping as a Tool for Inclusive Public Design Learning, in Simeone, L., Gray, C. M., Verhoeven, A., de Götzen, A., Bakırlıoğlu, Y., Zohar, H., Stead, M., and Buwert, P. (eds.), DRS2026: Edinburgh, 8–12 June, Edinburgh, United Kingdom. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2026.2702
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Included in
Beyond Assumptions: Identity Mapping as a Tool for Inclusive Public Design Learning
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, this study introduces the pedagogical approach of Identity Mapping—which helps students to surface hidden layers of identity and bias. The findings contribute to strengthening Public Design Education by articulating perspectives that highlight contextual understanding and inclusivity, hence, cultivating a more thoughtful and socially responsive design practice.