Music 256a hw8
Reading response
Principle 8.10. Design for invisible needs.
While reading Chapter 8 of Artful Design, I found myself reflecting a lot on why I design / on why certain projects have felt more fulfilling than others and why I feel so drawn to them. Looking back on my experiences with design over the past few years, I realize just the range which they’ve all spanned: projects in ed-tech, accessibility, language-learning, and digital art.
Oftentimes, all of these projects feel really unrelated and even random, which is true. However, I’m often tempted to try to find a through-line or commonality between them, to find some cohesion between all these sorts of things I’ve worked on and invested so much time and effort into. I don’t necessarily know why I do this. I think some of this temptation comes from wanting to feel validated in a way, and somehow, being able to articulate and put words to why you do what you do in some sort of neat, perfectly encapsulated box feels makes all these endeavors more “worthwhile” — as if they’re all building up to designing some mega solution and serving one larger goal. It often feels like you need this sort of larger, “noble” need in order to justify why it is that you design what you design in order for it to be vaguely important, and I think it’s this perceived need that’s made me sometimes quick to define myself as the “ed-tech designer” or the “accessibility designer,” etc. and only that. I’ve often felt like I have to define the “deficiency” that I’m designing for for it to feel at all meaningful; in other words, it’s often felt like I have to be designing for visible needs for it to feel “real.” Perhaps it’s because it’s easier to point to a visible need as a concrete motivation for your work.
However, upon reflection, I think that the parts that I’ve really enjoyed about designing in these projects have to do with invisible needs — things like belonging, aesthetics, and feeling seen. This isn’t to say that visible and invisible needs can’t overlap at all or that you can only do one without the other, but I just really appreciated how Chapter 8 specifically called out these needs as a priority, as something worth designing for. For example, one project I worked on was an extension to remind and guide sighted users through the process of writing quality alt texts on the images they uploaded to social media. While it is true that alt text is a “visible need” for people who use a screen reader since they may have no other way of engaging with visual content, I think I was especially drawn to this project as a way of helping screen-reader users feel more included and increase belonging. Similarly, for my Data Visualization class, I design a visual essay breaking down the dialogue from the TV show “Ted Lasso” for my final project. It quite literally solves no problem and serves no visible need, but designing this for my own aesthetics and exploratory understanding of this show was an incredibly fulfilling process.
I do think the fulfillment of these sorts of invisible needs are the kinds of things that most inspire me and feel most compelled to design. Things like visual essays and data visualizations that don’t necessarily solve any immediate problem posed by society are some of my favorites. Some examples that come to mind are entries from pudding.cool and Vox.
As my time at Stanford is coming to an end, I really want these sorts of values and categorical imperatives about invisible needs to be a large part of whatever step is next.