Nicole Roberts MFA Thesis Visual Component Artwork - Savannah ...

EXPECTATION 7 | social responsibility
Amongst industry professionals, the notion
of social responsibility also spawns discussions
concerning the need for students to increase their
cultural awareness prior to entering the twentyfirst
century workplace. “Today’s new pluralism
in graphic design must be seen as a response to the
greater multiculturalism of today’s global society.” 33
With the opulence of technology and our expanded
global demands, the audience for which we design is
increasingly important. Design history lectures will
always idolize the “universal” design solutions of
Bauhaus Modernism as the true “international style”
of yesteryear. But with the new wave of social media
and other forms of technology that broaden our
communicative abilities, there is no longer such a thing
as a universal audience. 34 With each project, students
must learn to become experts on “the audience’s
values, symbolic codes, and communicative styles;
and preferred media and distribution channels must
inform how we shape the written message.” 35 The First
Things First manifesto reminds us that designers have
the potential to create messages that have a profound
impact on the world. Opportunity for pedagogical
change rests in infusing practical principles of design
ethics in students by requiring each studio project to
fully research the global audience’s perspective and
incorporate aspects of social responsibility by concept,
process, and production.
Design is directed toward human beings.
To design is to solve human problems by
identifying them & executing the best solution.
Ivan Chermayeff
33 Fiell, 8
34 Katherine McCoy, “Maximize the
Message: Tailoring Design for Your
Audience in a Multicultural Era,” in The
Education of a Graphic Designer, ed.
Steven Heller, (New York, NY: Allworth
Press, 2005), 279.
35 Ibid, 283.
The First Things First manifesto
was published in January 1964.
Inexplicably, reverberations are
still apparent.
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