University of Johannesburg

UJ is a vibrant and cosmopolitan university, anchored in Africa and driven by a powerful strategy focused on attaining global excellence and stature. With an emphasis on independent thinking, sustainable development and multiple partnerships, UJ is an international university of choice. The University is guided by the Vice-Chancellor’s vision of “Positioning UJ in the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) within the context of the changing social, political and economic fortunes of Africa.” In the context of FADA, this is framed in terms of ‘Society 4.0’ which recognises the dynamic potential of a multi-disciplinary, creative environment in finding socially responsible, creative solutions to the challenges of our time.

The Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture (FADA) at University of Johannesburg offers programmes in eight creative disciplines, expanding these fields beyond their traditional boundaries through internal and external collaborations. It has a strong focus on sustainability and relevance, and engages actively with the dynamism, creativity and diversity of Johannesburg in imagining new approaches to art and design education. Equipped with state-of-the art, custom-built facilities, the Faculty is staffed by highly regarded academics, artists and designers.

The Faculty is home to approximately 1 300 students who study and work in the custom-built FADA Building on the Bunting Road Campus. 

Many of our graduates are employed in South Africa or internationally in diverse areas of industry, or work as freelance designers, architects or independent artists. Whatever their preference, they have been properly prepared as professionals through creative and entrepreneurial development, which are key factors in the programmes offered.

Creative correspondence: Leveraging design artefacts to generate shared plausible futures

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Design Education Strategy

Design anthropologists Gatt and Ingold's concept of correspondence describes a designed artefact's ability to appropriately represent a given community's perspectives. For design-researchers operating in co-design contexts, correspondence is helpful for ensuring that final outcomes are 'tuned' to the current and aspirational experiences of user-communities.

However, while design-researchers working in practice-led contexts share many concepts and techniques with their design anthropology colleagues, this paper argues that for Design approaches concerned with plausible, anticipatory perspectives, correspondence is a limited concept that can hamper the role of design imagination. In response to this claim, this paper contributes the following outcomes.

The integration of critical thinking and digital manufacturing in interior design product development

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Interior & Furniture Design

In recent years, digital fabrication has become an increasingly popular tool in the design field. By integrating digital manufacturing techniques into the design process, designers can produce more innovative and sustainable products while minimising material waste. In this paper, we present a model of approach that incorporates digital fabrication into the prototyping of interior design products using Origami-based techniques. Origami, the antique art of paper folding, has long been admired for its beauty and precision. One of the main benefits of Origami-based techniques is that they provide a way to create complex forms using only simple folds, transforming a bi-dimensional surface into a 3D object.

Bridging the gap between industry and the lecture hall: Small-scale manufacturing machines for experiential learning within the teaching environment

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Product & Industrial Design

Students in Design Education are equipped to enter their respective creative industries. It is the intention that their skills and capabilities, once they graduate, are matched as closely as possible to the industries into which they will fit. During their time within the higher education faculty, they need to be exposed to relevant technologies and processes. By adapting manufacturing technologies for small-scale use in the classroom, students can gain hands-on experience and integrate these technologies into their learning processes.

Physical meets digital: Advancing industrial design higher education through the incorporation of projection-mapping in undergraduate teaching and learning

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Product & Industrial Design

As emerging digital technologies become increasingly integrated into our everyday lives, it is important to evaluate how they can be used both as beneficial tools in the design process and how they can be effectively integrated into higher education pedagogy to enhance teaching and learning processes. As we enter the fast-changing Industry 4.0, students must be suitably and sufficiently equipped with a wide range of skills that Industry 4.0 requires. This includes the “hard skills” of practically using emerging digital technologies, as well as the “soft skills” required to effectively apply these technologies in sustainable and ethical ways.

It's a zoo in there: Reflections and case studies from collaboration and participation design with Johannesburg Zoo Edu-Centre 2011–2023

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Graphic Design & Visual Art

Over the past twelve years, the University of Johannesburg Department of Graphic Design students have developed many feasible solutions based on human-centred and participation design principles. Implementing these design solutions to foster positive change is often problematic owing to funding and handovers; consequently, many projects remain at the conceptual stage, with few making a positive difference to the external stakeholders. Nevertheless, despite these challenges, students often produce high-end and in-depth results when working with stakeholders.

Reflecting on lessons-learned for BIM implementation in design curricula in South Africa

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Architecture & Built Environment

In this paper, the authors reflect on the findings from a building information modelling (BIM) literature review, which comprises contemporary literature from the past five years, considering national and international development of BIM implementations, focusing on the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industries. This study acknowledges BIM as a digitalisation breakthrough that emerged in the third industrial revolution (3IR) and evolved rapidly within the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). BIM technology instils the attribute of being a contributive team member in co-designed projects and facilitates effective project outcomes by reducing time, cost, wastage, environmental impact and energy consumption.

Speculative futures: Questioning nanotechnology and sustainable development through industrial design pedagogy

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Design Education Strategy
Product & Industrial Design

The Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) is rapidly blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological worlds through advances in artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, and other technologies. While Industry 4.0 is transforming our future realities, it is essential not to lose sight of human needs and basic human rights. Development must balance social, economic, and environmental sustainability, which is why designers need to engage with ethical considerations and social realities. One example of a technology that has both potential benefits and ethical threats is nanotechnology. Nanobots, machine versions of bacteria or viruses, can perform pre-programmed tasks autonomously at the atomic level.

Design lecturers' pedagogical approach to practical studio sessions during the rapid transition to online learning

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Design Education Strategy
Learning & Interaction Design

Design education revolves around the effectiveness of face-to-face interactions in the design studio for design pedagogy to be effective (Hammershaimb 2018). During the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions in South Africa in 2020, design-specialised lecturers had to rapidly transition their practical-orientated contact classes to online classes. Design education lecturers had to come to terms with students distanced from themselves, the institutional studio, and their peers. Lecturers had to rethink their pedagogical choices while preserving their programmes' academic integrity.

Appreciative inquiry in design research: A case study from interior design

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Design Education Research
Interior & Furniture Design

In the 2021 publication, 'The Ontology of Design Research', Miguel Angel Herrera Batista argues that the ongoing development of postgraduate programmes in design has led to a growing focus on establishing the field of inquiry as an independent and differentiated research area. For design research to contribute to disciplinary development, researchers need to focus not only on procedural rigour but also on ensuring that the philosophical foundations of selected methodological approaches align with the ontological reality of design. It is, therefore, necessary to encourage postgraduate students to investigate both familiar and novel research methodologies in the search for appropriate approaches to design research projects.

Decolonising speculative design: A South African perspective on design and futures thinking

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Design Education Strategy
Software, UX & Game Design

Speculative design is being promoted as a critical approach to design. Speculative design does not attempt to predict the future. Instead, it attempts to create debate and discussion about preferable futures (Dunne & Raby 2013). Design educators and practitioners from the Global South have become increasingly critical of speculative design practices (Martins 2014). This paper provides an account of a speculative design project set for final-year students pursuing a degree in Digital Media Design at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. The paper describes the project brief, the purpose of the assignment and the intended outcomes. Three student designs are presented and explored using a textual analysis methodology.

Publish or parent: Reflective, creative work on the cost of parenting for female academics pre-, mid- and post- the COVID-19 pandemic

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Design Education Strategy

Despite the change over time in academia's gender profile, educationalists Bradley and Oldham (2020) challenge what they perceive to be the perpetuation of "gendered norms of productivity and the mythical notion of work-life balance". Bradley and Oldham (2020) argue that these concepts "endlessly complicate the conceptualisation and operationalisation of the female academic's success" and take the position that "[w]omen cannot give in to this concept of two separate worlds, which splinters the self". They propose a reflective practice that prompts female academics to "claim our entire personhood, professional and parent if we are to seek freedom from feeling 'torn' between these spheres".

Designing furniture for the future: Integrating advanced digital technologies into the design process

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Interior & Furniture Design

This paper aims to evaluate how teaching and learning can better equip future designers by integrating advanced digital technologies into the design process. During the continuous unfolding of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) in South Africa, it is important to consider how to advance design curricula in order to prepare design students for an ever-changing working world. Both the South African Department of Trade Industry and Competition and the South African Furniture Initiative have shown increasing interest in cultivating our local furniture industry. This shows potential for re-imagining the pedagogical approach to furniture design, a traditional avenue within Industrial Design, for a local and advancing industry.

Buna Africa: The participatory design of an online aquaculture platform

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Learning & Interaction Design
Software, UX & Game Design

Aquaculture has become the fastest-growing animal production sector globally, with production in Africa especially, steadily increasing. The move from subsistence to commercial fish farming requires emerging farmers to access technical information and support services. In order to address this need, the Rural Fisheries Programme, a developmental unit with the Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science at Rhodes University, South Africa, developed Buna Africa.

The spectrum of disability representation in new media

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Photography, Film & Multimedia

More than 650 million people worldwide suffer from a disability, be it visible or invisible. As a communication designer, I began to question the design of the International Symbol of Access  – in particular, how it failed to represent invisible disabilities. As my investigation deepened, I encountered the full range of disabilities represented in YouTubeä advertisements.

Problem placement in fashion design practice: Reflections and recommendations for fashion design education in an era of complexity

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Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design

This paper identifies the desired design outcomes and problem domains of experienced Johannesburg fashion designers, to provide recommendations for fashion design practice and education. Traditional fashion design education often emphasises aesthetics and technical construction before strategically deciding on where the design effort needs to be focused within complex integrated systems. However, within the context of the fourth industrial revolution (4IR), complex integrated systemic thinking is becoming increasingly important. As such, this paper provides an overview of the design outcomes of practising fashion designers and explores the correlation between the problems they manage and Buchanan’s (1998) seminal proposition of problem framing and placement domains.

Exploring the potential of design thinking in the age of fourth industrial revolution in South Africa

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Design Education Strategy

Design thinking (DT) has recently re-emerged as an essential mindset and skillshift for modern organisations seeking to improve innovation performance in the fourth industrial revolution (4IR). However, despite recent popularity and success especially in the tech industry, DT has lacked critical academic engagement and scholarly enquiry especially in Africa. Hence, this paper sets out to provide empirical evidence on how DT can help create opportunities and innovation in an AI/Algorithm-driven 4IR era, and why the design curriculum in higher education should be updated to include DT competencies.

Learning from a distance: A conceptual teaching framework that supports positive emotions and novelty during independent fashion design processes

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Fashion, Jewellery & Textile Design

The importance of cultivating a creative mindset in fashion design students to eventually thrive in the rapidly changing work environment that demands novelty in design is becoming increasingly relevant from an educational perspective. In addition, the challenges to enhance creative design processes of students have been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which caused a sudden transformation from traditional contact education, to online and later blended learning. This implies that educators are challenged to re-think traditional strategies of teaching creativity to align to the shifting conditions.

A systemic framing of the challenges faced in design education during the COVID-19 lockdown

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Software, UX & Game Design

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the deep cracks of inequality within the South African educational system (Gustafsson & Deliwe, 2020). The fourth industrial revolution (4IR) has presented a range of new technology applications (Lacy, Long, & Spindler, 2020). These technologies can be leveraged to provide more equal access to the technology needed for remote learning (Du Preez & Sinha, 2020). This paper uses a systemic design approach to reflect on the challenges faced in design education during the COVID-19 pandemic. Student feedback on the online learning experience during the COVID-19 lockdown was reflected on. Observations were organised in themes and then explored using the first step of Namahn and shiftN’s Systemic Design Toolkit (Van Ael & Vandenbroeck, 2016).

The influence of the fourth industrial revolution: A multi-discipline approach for design education

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Design Education Strategy

Klaus Schwab defines the word "revolution" to convey the "abrupt" and "radical" change, which brought about the first, second, third and fourth industrial revolutions. Schwab explains that the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) will transform the way humans communicate, socially connect, function day to day and operate their jobs. The 4IR is not only about technology; its fundamental difference is due to these technologies combining: as a result, the physical, digital and biological spheres overlap.

Developing an educational strategy for emerging technology in design: A case study of the FabLab at FADA, UJ

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Design Education Strategy

Emerging technology is developing at an exponential rate and has a direct impact on design education. This boom in innovation has been dubbed the fourth industrial revolution (4IR). This economic initiative was framed at the 2015 World Economic Forum by Klaus Schwab and has been echoed since 2016 by South African politicians as a government and education policy transformation catalyst to South Africa’s struggling economy. Academic scholars are critical about these objectives against the face of high unemployment, poor education and developing foundational skills in South Africa. Educators are confronted with very little support to address this technological development, often leaving design educators with scepticism.

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DEFSA conferences

DEFSA promotes relevant research with the focus on design + education through its biennial conferences, to promote professionalism, accountability and ethics in the education of young designers. Our next conference is a hybrid event. See above for details.

Critical skills endorsement

Professional Members in good standing can receive a certificate of membership, but DEFSA cannot provide confirmation or endorsement of skills whatsoever. DEFSA only confirm membership of DEFSA which is a NPO for Design Education in South Africa (https://www.defsa.org.za/imagine).