Shock or Schlock Production

Design Culture and Theory

Thanusha.K
2 min readFeb 14, 2020

Production relies on catering the consumers attention better. Whether or not it be the commercial artist or culture that invent an idea, the use of appropriating and smoothing out the edges for consumer class increasingly becomes mainstream(Calkins).

For Earnest Elmo Calkins, borrowing unique ideas for “new” consumer engineering is a business strategy that stimulates the consumption of goods.

By fixating on palatable designs and testing the tolerance of new ones for consumption, a “once revolutionary, now a product” notion is embraced. Similarly to Raymond Loewy, the goal is raising the level of both manufacture and design. However for Calkins, the goal is every aspect of consumerism to be used up:

Consumer engineering must see to it that we use up the kind of goods we now merely use.

Calkins proposed the belief of obsolescence, styling the goods to keep the traffic in new products progressing. The frequent changes of product design imply a new quality that conforms to mainstream culture.

Mainstream culture communicates design on a global basis that suggests according to Katerine McCoy, “global consumer monoculture”. The constantly evolving interpretations of communities and cultures generate a challenge for diversity and traditions.

By taking advantage of credibility, designers have implied they are authors, initiators of content. Rather than denoting the person who originated or gave existence to a concept, the failed attempt to grab the attention of the consumer has inflicted negative attributes. The term “cultural appropriation”, in relation to design is the adoption of the customs of the society and pertaining the bare minimum research required. McCoy states there is social responsibility when using language and symbolic codes, verbal and visual because it adds a value to cultural legacies.

The contrasting focus on designing products lead extremist responsibilities. McCoy and Calkins suggest innovative products require a strong consumer understanding. Although the need for newer products is implied by media sources and the lively hood of consumerism, all aspects of production leave little room for an appeal to empathy and produce a thoughtful product.

Discussion:

How can a designers re-interpret the same elements in a design over and over again, while keeping it “fresh”?

Do we agree with the statement “nothing is original”?

Work Cited:

Calkins, Earnest Elmo. “What Consumer Engineering Really is”. The Industrial Design Reader. Ed. Carma Gorman. New York: Allworth Press, 2003. 129–132.

McCoy, Katherine. “A Cold Eye: When Designers Create Culture”. Print 56.3 (2002): 26, 181–3.

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Thanusha.K
Thanusha.K

Written by Thanusha.K

than-usha.com — Digital Experience Designer 💻 I write and summarize what I'm learning about UX and UI here! ✍️

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