Anti-Disciplinary Works, Speculative Words. A Teaching Experience of Communication Design Based on Thinkering and Speculation

This paper aims to present and discuss how the teaching of visual identity and experience design in Communication Design education may be developed within a speculative design framework. By adopting this approach, students can experience the ethics of design practice and explore alternative design values, forms, and representations. They become familiar with the idea of design as a problem-seeking and problem-finding practice, and that encourages the development of concepts, scenarios and results without any predetermined function. The development of each project is based on the principle of learning by doing, which consists of thinkering, making mistakes and trying over and over again to improve the results and acquire competencies and skills. By the analysis of selected students’ work, tested design process and implications of an anti-disciplinary approach, the paper aims to inquire how such perspective may both highlight the pain points of conservative methods and the benefits of non-regulatory practices.