Anna Saraceno, a senior product designer at software company Atlassian, wants to see a wider range of viewpoints in design discourse. Writing for the blog UX Collective, she says she was disappointed with the lack of author diversity in “designer summer readings lists.” So, she made her own list: “10 good design reads that aren’t written by white men.” Saraceno included graphic design professors Nicole Killian and Nontsikelelo Mutiti among her recommendations, highlighting their recent interviews “What does ‘Queering Design Education’ Actually Look Like in Practice?” and “Interrogating the Euro-centric Design Canon,” respectively.
Killian emphasizes “making and not succeeding” as a motivator to encourage students to try new and unfamiliar ideas; while Mutiti says that telling the full history of design requires educators to look beyond the “Euro-centric canon.”
Read the full list at UX Collective.
Image: At the Anderson, visitors discuss work created by African American graphic designers at As, Not For: Dethroning Our Absolutes, an exhibition curated by MICA faculty member Jerome Harris and presented by students in Nontsikeleo Mutiti’s Research as Practice course.