Towards an anthropology of styles

2021-05-10

6:00 PM - 7:00 PM

COM@xjtlu.edu.cn

Details

  • Time: 18:00-19:00
  • Date: Monday, 10 May 2021
  • Venue: HS436

Abstract

Designing, producing, distributing, and communicating artefacts is a matter of cultural anthropology. It means identifying people’s needs (rather or more than people’s dreams) and turning them into systems of relationships that have to be embodied in that artefact. This has functional and symbolic values. For this reason, the stylistic element becomes doubly functional: as an interface for using artefacts, and to place them in the right context of behaviours. From cultural anthropology to public sociology, from cultural to visual studies, many models can be used to identify what is appropriate to generate innovation, which also means new behaviours and lifestyles. During the talk we will try to identify a general model, and then apply it to concrete cases.

Speaker

Carlo Branzaglia works in strategic design and design education. He teaches in the Academy of Fine Arts, Bologna (Ababo.it) and is the Scientific Coordinator of the Postgraduate School, Istituto Europeo di Design in Milan (led.edu). He delivered lessons and organised conferences and workshops in universities all over the world. He wrote several books (the latest: Design, Innovation and Culture of the Territory, Lupetti, 2020). A partner of the Health Design Network, he is a member of the ADI –“Collezione Compasso d’Oro” Foundation’s Board of Directors (https://www.adi-design.org/fondazione-adi.html).

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