What is the action?

Context

The aim of our theory module this semester is to help us find the research question of our bachelor thesis. Week by week, the inputs and assignments will help us posing the right question, making a statement and bringing novelty to the field of interaction design.

Two questions about two years

To start the lesson, we had to answer two questions:

• How these past two years contributed my life? (as a person, designer-to-be, student)
• What contribution did I make? (at Interaction Design, in the class, in a certain project)

It took a while to form the thoughts into answers.

The past two years was a rollercoaster to me, so many things changed. Starting the bachelor of interaction design came in a package. I moved to Switzerland, leaving behind my family, friends, jobs, and network. However I am not doing as perfect as planned, I can manage. It is a good feeling to get somewhere without the support I could rely on previously. 2 years ago I came to ZHdK to become a UX designer/ researcher once, but the programme interaction design showed me many perspectives that now I am sure I won’t do screen design. Or yeah, I would but probably this is not the most interesting thing anymore. Also, I realized I became even more analytical and critical with design projects. Now I have more skills, therefore pages of Wired doesn’t impress me in the same way. Instead of thinking “ah wish I could do something like this” I rather ask “hmm, how could I make something similar?”.

My contribution is harder to define as I didn’t give my 100% all the time. I could think of the Internation Design Summer Schools where I could easily facilitate the intercultural communication between Indian and Chinese team members. Also, I introduced the method of design thinking an help adapting it to the field of special education. The latter is probably more significant as I passed on knowledge that I acquired during the studies.

I might come up with further answers along the semester, will note them in the blog.

The class title was What is action? We were shown two movie extracts, one documentary and one fiction, which introduces the underground group Act Up.