Table Of Contenti
Editors
Dr Susan Giloi
Mr Herman Botes
The conference proceedings is published by the Design Education Forum of Southern
Africa (DEFSA) on the following website: www.defsa.org.za.
The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and not necessarily of
DEFSA. Papers are published as submitted by the authors, after they have considered and
included recommendations from peer reviewers.
ISBN 978-0-620-78459-7
Title: #Decolonise!: DEFSA 14th National Conference Proceedings
© 2017 Design Education Forum of Southern Africa
All rights reserved. The materials published in this Conference Proceedings may be
reproduced for instructional and non-commercial use, providing that proper reference to
the source is acknowledged. Any use for commercial purposes must be submitted to the
chief-editors.
DEFSA contact details
Dr Susan Giloi Mr Herman Botes
DEFSA President (2017-2019) DEFSA President-elect (2017-2019)
[email protected] [email protected]
ii
Introduction
Conference overview and publication of proceedings
The 14th National DEFSA Conference was hosted by Tshwane University of Technology and Inscape
Education Group at Freedom Park Pretoria from the 27th to the 29th September 2017. The theme of
the conference #Decolonise! Design educators reflecting on the call for the decolonisation of
education, challenged design academics and postgraduate students to scrutinise their educational
practice in relation to calls for the decolonisation of higher education.
The initial call for abstracts published on the DEFSA web site and circulated to member institutions
resulted in the submission of 64 abstracts of which 40 were accepted. Over the two days of the
conference 38 presenters representing eleven institutions presented papers. The third day of the
conference was dedicated to a workshop addressing practice-based research and the evaluation and
funding thereof. Over the three days 95 delegates and presenters attended the conference and
workshop.
All abstracts and papers for the conference and subsequent publication were selected using a double-
blind peer review process. The double-blind review process ensured that both authors and reviewers
remained anonymous during the process. Prior to the conference the submitted papers were peer
reviewed by a group of academics drawn from 16 institutions representing the disciplines of
Architecture, Communication Design, Education, Fashion Design, Fine Art, Graphic Design, Jewellery
Design, Interior Design, Photography and Visual Studies. A list of the peer reviewers is included in the
Conference Proceedings. Authors received feedback in the form of peer review reports and corrections
to papers could be implemented for the Conference Proceedings. Ultimately 26 papers have been
published in the 14th National DEFSA Conference Proceedings.
Forward by Editors Herman Botes and Susan Giloi
As reflected in the presentations at the DEFSA conference and the papers selected for these
proceedings, #Decolonisation offered a fertile theme, concept and related theories for authors to
debate and engage with. The calls to decolonise higher education that have emerged over the past
few years across the world and especially in South Africa provided academics with a critical point from
which to reflect on design education as it has been, and to look forward to what design education
might become. Authors provided positive interpretations of how the decolonisation concept could be
applied to their own design education practices, as well as institutional practices, in order to
strengthen the practice and make it more open to students from diverse backgrounds and experiences.
Through the lens of Decolonisation authors considered curriculum design, pedagogy and assessment
as well as the broader role and objectives of higher education structures and systems. For instance, is
it enough to educate graduates who are employable in a highly commercial industry, or should
graduates have more holistic skills that will equip them to make a positive impact on a world plagued
by complex problems. In scrutinising their own educational practice authors clearly illustrate that
education is never neutral and that current education systems skew access (both physical and
epistemic), accentuate the gap between school and university level design studies, and emphasise
employability in a highly commercial industry rather than addressing local needs for entrepreneurship
and innovative problem solving. The impact of the colonial past on access and equity as well as the
entrenched power dynamics within institutions and faculties are part of the looking back at were
design education comes from. Many authors used the Decolonisation of education as an opportunity
to offer alternate objectives for design education that align more strongly with community, empathy,
social responsibility, emancipation, collaboration and intentional design. With this shift in focus for
design education, comes the potential for design students to learn to become ethical, empathetic,
critical and moral co-designers rather than mere operators of technology driven by a profit motive.
iii
Authors clearly see part of their responsibility in introducing a decolonised curriculum, as an approach
that would equip graduates to transform the existing professional design practice to incorporate
socially and environmentally responsible objectives.
One theme that was emphasised by the keynote speaker, Pro Dei, and echoed in a number of papers,
was the consideration of a variety of forms of knowledge, accommodating multiple perspectives,
histories, origins and cultures as opposed to a purely Eurocentric understanding of knowledge. Equally
significant was the acknowledgement that it is not sufficient to superficially address these form of
knowledge, but educators and students need to build an understanding of African indigenous
knowledge systems, the history, origins, traditions, practices and principles that have formed and
informed these systems.
Ultimately the DEFSA conference and papers included in the proceedings create a platform for
discussions and suggestions that enrich design education and individual practices.
Keynote Speaker
Prof Dei is considered by many as one of Canada’s foremost scholars on race and anti-racism studies.
He is a widely sought after academic, researcher and community worker, whose professional and
academic work has led to many Canadian and international speaking invitations in the US, Europe and
Africa. Currently, he is Professor of Social Justice Education and Director of the Centre for Integrative
Anti-Racism Studies at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto and
was named a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada in 2017. Professor Dei is the 2015 and 2016
Carnegie African Diasporan Fellow. In August 2012, he received the honorary title of Professor
Extraordinaire from the School of Education, University of South Africa (Unisa). He received the 2016
Whitworth Award for Educational Research from the Canadian Education Association (CEA), awarded
to the Canadian scholar whose research and scholarship have helped shape Canadian national
educational policy and practice. In June 2007, Professor Dei was installed as a traditional chief in
Ghana, specifically, as the Gyaasehene of the town of Asokore, Koforidua in the New Juaben Traditional
Area of Ghana. His traditional stool name is Nana Adusei Sefa Tweneboah I.
iv
Peer reviewers
The 2017 DEFSA Conference peer review group have more than 700 years of combined experience in
Higher Education. The peer review process for the 14th National DEFSA conference and publication of
the conference proceedings followed two phases. In the first phase abstracts were submitted and peer
reviewed in a rigorous double-blind peer review process. The peer reviews and reports were verified
by the peer review committee and based on the outcomes approved abstracts were accepted into the
conference and authors received feedback. In the second phase, full papers were submitted by authors
and again went through a double-blind peer review process before the conference. The papers
selected and approved through this process, and which were presented at the conference, are then
published in this conference proceedings.
The double-blind peer review process ensures that each abstract and paper is reviewed by two people,
and that authors and reviewers who are experts in their field, remain anonymous.
Name Surname Qualification From Position
Herman Botes MAVA TUT HoD: Dept of Visual Comm (acting)
Amanda Breytenbach BArch, MBA, PrArch UJ Vice Dean
Yolandi Burger M-Tech: Design IEG Lecturer
Bruce S Cadle M Tech GD NMU Principal Lecturer & PG Prog Leader
Angus Donald Campbell MTech: Industr Design UJ HoD: Industrial Design
Piers Carey MTech DUT Lecturer
Walter Chipambwa B.Eng ChinhUT Lecturer
Nicolene Coetzee MTech VUT Lecturer
Rudi de Lange PhD TUT Associate Professor
Mary Duker MTech NMU Principal Lecturer
Inge Economou Masters NMU Lecturer and programme leader
Susan Giloi PhD IEG Provost
Brenden Gray MAFA UJ HoD: Graphic Design
Peter Hugh Harrison MTech IEG Content Developer and Lecturer
Christine Gail Henning Mint(prof) IEG Online Academic Manager
Philippa Kethro PhD DUT Lecturer
Runette Kruger PhD Visual Studies TUT HoD Fine and Applied Arts
Thinus Mathee NHD Photo VUT Senior Lecturer
Nailejileji Naila Mollel-Matodzi MTech Private Private
Jolanda Morkel BArch CPUT Senior Lecturer
Margot Müir Mtech GD NMU Lecturer
Allan John Munro PhD VUT Research co-ordinator: Art & Design
Farieda Nazier Masters UJ HoD: Jewellery Design and Manufact
Nina Newman MTech: Fine Arts TUT Lecturer: Jewellery Design
Amira Osman PHD UJ Principal Researcher
Karolien Perold-Bull MAVA SU Lecturer
Deirdre Pretorius D Litt et Phil UJ Associate Professor
v
Ilse Prinsloo MTech Interior Design UJ Lecturer
Finzi Edward Saidi PhD UJ Senior Lecturer
Leana Scheffer Honours: Interior Arch IEG Full-time content developer
Desiree Smal DTech: Design UJ HoD; Fashion Design
Mike Swanepoel MTech NMU HoD: Applied Design
Ivor Templar B ARCH GDC Director: Head of academic planning
Schalk van Staden M Tech: FA TUT Section Head: of Visual Comm (acting)
Ria van Zyl MA Information Design Vega National Academic Navigator
Christo Vosloo MArch UJ Associate Professor: Architecture
Carsten P. Walton M.Arch IEG Faculty Dean - Built Environment
Jason Wiggin MInt (Prof) GDC HoD of Interior Design
Cashandra Willemse MA History of Art SADP HoD of Graphic Design
vi
Contents
1. Past + Present = Future? The Potential Role of Historical Visual Material and
Contemporary Practice in De-Colonising Visual Communication Design Courses ................ 1
Piers Carey: Durban University of Technology
2. A Decolonised Approach to Developing Training Materials for Low-Literate
Participants of Rural Sewing Income Generating Projects ................................................. 14
Nicolene Coetzee; Hanlie van Staden: North-West University,
Wilna Oldewage-Theron: Vaal University of Technology
3. Axis Mundi: A Pedagogical Exploration of the Decolonising Potential of Mythology ......... 29
Courtney de Villiers: Inscape Education Group
4. Role with the Students: A Social Constructivist Decolonising Teaching Strategy for
Visual Literacy in Fashion Design Programs ......................................................................... 39
AJC (Lee) de Wet: University of Johannesburg
5. A Holistic Approach to the Decolonisation of Modules in Sustainable Interior Design ...... 48
Giovanna Di Monte-Milner: University of Johannesburg
6. A Decolonial Academy? Addressing the Oxymoron: How a Series of Performative
Art-Science Creative Encounters Might Serve as a Toolbox of Ideas .................................. 59
Mary Duker; Marcus Neustetter; Richard M. Cowling: Nelson Mandela University
7. Student Perceptions on Curriculum Change: Art and Design Theory within a New
Bachelor of Visual Arts Degree at Nelson Mandela University. ........................................... 71
Rachel Collet; Inge Economou: Nelson Mandela University
8. The Benefits of Incorporating a Decolonised Gaze for Design Education ........................... 83
Susan Giloi: Inscape Education Group and Rhodes University
9. Don’t Touch Me on My Discipline! Decolonisation, Disciplinarity and the Problem of
Curricular Coherence. .......................................................................................................... 94
Brenden Gray: University of Johannesburg
10. In Your Hands & Self-Portrait: Introductory Spatial Design Exercises in the First-year
Studio ................................................................................................................................. 104
Zakkiya Khan; Nico Botes: University of Pretoria
11. Design Education as Woke Work ....................................................................................... 118
Runette Kruger: Tshwane University of Technology
12. Decolonising Fashion Education with Athol Fugard's Boesman and Lena ......................... 132
Neshane Harvey; Jacky Lucking: University of Johannesburg
13. History of African indigenous costumes and textiles: Towards decolonising a fashion
design curriculum. .............................................................................................................. 143
Anne Mastamet-Mason; Karla Müller; Nicolette van der Merwe: Tshwane University
of Technology
14. Research Sleeping Dogs in Fashion Design Departments of South African Universities:
A Decolonisation Obstacle? ............................................................................................... 159
Sipho Mbhatha: University of Pretoria
15. Preparing Fashion Students for a Socially Engaged University Project through Zulu
Proverbs ............................................................................................................................. 169
Khaya Mchunu: Durban University of Technology
vii
16. Slow Design (Into Eyilwe Ngokwendeleyo): The Potential for a Decolonized Space
Through Graphic Design ..................................................................................................... 181
Margot Muir: Nelson Mandela University
17. Doing Research to Decolonise Research: to Start at the very Beginning. ......................... 192
Allan Munro: Vaal University of Technology
18. A Humanistic Approach to Designing and Assessing Interactive-narrative Based
Social Interventions. ........................................................................................................... 202
Hadassah Myers: University of Johannesburg
19. Decolonizing Thought Practices with Discussion Approaches for Built Environment
Educators ........................................................................................................................... 213
Inge Newport: Tshwane University of Technology
20. “Community” as the basic architectural unit: rethinking research and practice
towards a decolonised education ...................................................................................... 224
Amira Osman: Tshwane University of Technology,
Innocent Musonda: University of Johannesburg
21. Object Biographies as a method for Communication Design students to construct
knowledge in the Design Studies classroom ...................................................................... 234
Deirdre Pretorius: University of Johannesburg
22. Reinventing design teaching in an era of exponential growth .......................................... 246
Ilse Prinsloo: University of Johannesburg
23. Contesting the Decolonisation Narrative: Towards an Entrepreneurship Based
Graphic Design Curricula .................................................................................................... 256
Pfunzo Sidogi; Tumelo Rasedile: Tshwane University of Technology
24. Using Digital Imaging Technology to Decolonize Education in a Museum Context .......... 267
Mlungisi Ronald Shangase; Anneke de Klerk: Vaal University of Technology
25. Transforming Fashion Education to Design with Intent .................................................... 277
Desiree Smal; Neshane Harvey: University of Johannesburg
26. Reimagining Design Education Through Empathy ............................................................. 288
Laskarina Yiannakaris: University of Johannesburg
viii
14th National Design Education Conference 2017
Hosted by Tshwane University of Technology & Inscape Education Group
#Decolonise!
Design educators reflecting on the call for the decolonisation of education
Past + Present = Future? The Potential Role of Historical Visual
Material and Contemporary Practice in De-Colonising Visual
Communication Design Courses
Piers Carey
Durban University of Technology
Abstract
This paper suggests two possible approaches to researching and conceptualizing aspects of a de-
colonized design education for Graphic Design/Visual Communication Design (VCD). Concepts from
Post-colonial theory, such as Ngugi wa Thiongo’s decolonization of the mind, Afrocentrism, Homi
Bhabha’s hybridity, and appropriation, along with aspects of Social Identity theory are drawn on as
means of investigating these approaches.
The first approach suggests that knowledge of visual communication content from pre-colonial and
colonial African societies (African Graphic Systems) can be employed as a means of contributing to a
sense of both collective and individual identity, and either as African and/or as South African. Enabling
such a sense of identity requires a greater inclusion of these indigenous visual traditions than may be
common in South African VCD courses, and necessitates a re-definition of visual communication and
the researching and construction of its history in this continent. In this regard examples will be
introduced of visual communication traditions from the over eighty indigenous alphabetic and graphic
systems identified in literature. This approach can enable South African students to broaden the
definition of History of Graphic Design and contest the existing canon, which has been defined almost
exclusively in Europe and America, in terms of scribal writing and typography, and for print. Recovery
of these visual traditions is thus advocated as a means of validating and re-developing an independent
identity.
Moving from the historical to the contemporary, a second approach discusses some separate and
tentative steps towards such an identity. Examples of recent BTech projects in the Graphic Design
Programme at the Durban University of Technology (DUT) suggest ways in which students can progress
towards a post-colonial relationship with the hegemonic Graphic Design culture. These examples
consider, amongst other aspects, the experience of young black designers in the commercial white-
dominated design world; their concern about the loss or deterioration of aspects of indigenous
culture; and the role of VCD in non-Westernized life and culture; as experienced by black students.
Further development of these students’ approaches to their projects, as an explicit teaching strategy,
could enable students to appropriate Graphic Design processes and technologies, and use these
Westernized forms to articulate the perceived post-colonial realities of their lives.
The intention of the paper therefore is to suggest that rootedness in historical knowledge, combined
with contemporary tactics, can enable students to construct design identities that are authentic yet
capable of engaging with globalized industry, and of contesting a hegemonic disciplinary discourse
through a South African-centred approach.
Keywords: Identity, appropriation, African graphic systems, visual communication, postcolonialism
© Copyright 2017 by the Design Education Forum of Southern Africa (www.defsa.org.za) 1
Introduction
Recent South African student protests against university fees (the "Fees Must Fall" movement)
have incorporated demands for the "de-colonization" of university curricula. What these
demands entail for design disciplines needs clarification, given the European origins of not just
design curricula, but virtually the whole tertiary education system. Colonial period aspects include
the qualifications, the scientific method, and the concept of universal education as a social good,
so demands for de-colonization may have far-reaching consequences.
Tertiary education for Graphic Design, or Visual Communication Design (VCD), has also developed
from colonial models of vocational and technical education. Consequently, VCD is conceptualized
as having at its foundation explicit preparation for employment in the design industry. At the
author's institution, the discipline's links with industry are considered fundamental: the National
Diploma Course in Graphic Design is substantially integrated with industry, and the BTech in
Graphic Design emphasizes employability, integrated with personalized design projects. De-
colonization of the curriculum should preferably therefore be balanced against enabling students
to achieve employability. This balance is of course skewed by the pervasive influence of globalized
technological capital on the industry.
The paper therefore briefly discusses globalization and some responses to it from Post-colonial
thinking. It then offers two possible approaches to researching and conceptualizing aspects of a
de-colonized design education for Graphic Design/Visual Communication Design (VCD). The first
suggests that knowledge of indigenous, historical, visual communication content (African Graphic
Systems) can contribute to a sense of both collective and individual identity. The second discusses
some tentative individual steps towards such identities and approaches, using examples from
recent BTech projects and one MTech in the Graphic Design Programme at the institution. These
examples suggest ways in which students can construct post-colonial relationships with the
hegemonic Graphic Design culture. Together the two components may contribute to a
decolonized curriculum in Visual Communication Design.
The Context of De-colonization
Ashcroft, Griffiths and Tiffin define Globalization as "the process whereby individual lives and local
communities are affected by economic and cultural forces that operate world-wide" (2007, 100),
a process enormously accelerated and empowered by the recent revolution in electronic
technology.
Globalization may be included in the older concept of Neo-colonialism, defined as:
any and all forms of control of the ex-colonies after political independence … [but]
in a wider sense the term has come to signify the inability of developing
economies… to develop an independent economic and political identity under the
pressures of globalization (Ashcroft, Griffiths &Tiffin 2007, p. 146),
and first coined by Nkrumah (1965). Post-colonial critique of neo-colonialism can therefore still
be substantially applied to globalization.
Post-colonial concepts were first articulated by Edward Said (1978), when he discussed the
relationship between the West and the "Orient" (as defined by the West), and its construction,
over hundreds of years, of the inhabitants of the Orient as European culture's “deepest and most
recurring image of the Other” (Said 1978, p. 1). He defined the "other" as a negative stereotype
projected on to another society, in opposition to Western positive self-stereotypes:
On the one hand, there are Westerners, and on the other, there are the Arab-
Orientals: the former are, in no particular order, rational, peaceful, liberal, logical,
capable of holding real values, without natural suspicion; the latter are none of these
things. (Said 1978, p. 49)
© Copyright 2017 by the Design Education Forum of Southern Africa (www.defsa.org.za) 2
Description:This paper suggests two possible approaches to researching and conceptualizing aspects of a de- colonized design education for Graphic Design/Visual Communication Design (VCD). Concepts from. Post-colonial theory, such as Ngugi wa Thiongo's decolonization of the mind, Afrocentrism, Homi.
