Brisbane

DRS2020 Conference Theme

DRS2020 explores Synergy – the coming together of people and disciplines in design research to create positive impact. While we champion the uniqueness of disciplinary knowledge and creativity, we are also optimistic about how the coming together of different mindsets, backgrounds and perspectives can realise transformative visions of the future. Synergy in design research provides exciting possibilities for answering multi-faceted problems, supporting stakeholder initiatives and participation, and transforming existing situations into desirable ones.

As the influence of design research grows in academia and society globally, we question what new opportunities there are for us to work together, within and beyond our field.  How do disciplines work together in design research? What new methods and tools of design do we need to realise synergistic working? But also, when might Synergy not be desirable? How do we balance the tension between design research specialisms and the new experience design, interdisciplinary design and transdisciplinary design research spaces we find ourselves working in?

While design research is always future focused, 2020 is also a time for us to reflect on what social, cultural, economic, environmental, technological and policy impact the Synergy within and beyond disciplines has had on our evolving field. DRS2020 invites contributions including, but not limited to, the following sub-themes:

Co-Creation

Design researchers increasingly collaborate and co-create with other fields such as healthcare, engineering, political science, social sciences and with a wide variety of societal stakeholders and issues such as wellbeing, as well as addressing developments such as networked, embedded and intelligent technologies. How does design research engage with other fields and support new interdisciplinary ways of working?

Processes

Topics of interest include roles, expertise and multiple voices, inclusion, experience, participation and power distribution, the role of communities and public and private organisations, innovation and management, and the building of partnerships in and for design research.

Situations

How is design research situated in cross-disciplinary collaboration, navigating cultures, diversity, ethics, sense of place and sense of materials, and the habits of different design communities? Under which conditions does design research flourish and is it able to help create positive impact? What are the dynamics between design research, governments and industry contexts?

Impacts

Topics include the value, significance and dimensions of design research and design efforts and how to increase, assess and measure them, responsibility among stakeholders including users, types of impact such as sustainability or economic impact, and scale and locus of impact such as human-object interactions.

Education

How does design education change and need to change? How do working designers and design researchers update their skills to meet the challenges of the present and future?

Calls for Participation

There are lots of ways to participate in DRS2020. See below for details on submission types and deadlines.

Call for Papers

Extended submission deadline: 9 December 2019 16 December 2019

Full original papers (up to 5000 words) are sought that respond to the DRS2020 conference theme of Synergy and its sub-themes, or present emerging design research.

Call for Conversation Proposals

Submission deadline: 17 February 2020 29 February 2020

Conversations engage a limited number of attendees in open exchange in arriving at new understandings about a particular topic. Conversations provide an environment where a constructive dialogue can take place about issues of importance in design research, particularly to promote exchanges about topics not easily captured by the scholarly papers.

Call for Workshop Proposals

Submission deadline: 17 February 2020 29 February 2020

Workshops are half or full day interactive sessions aiming to convey research results hands-on and to bring together design researchers and practitioners in academia, in the public sector, and in business and industry. 

Call for PhD Day

Submission deadline: 17 February 2020 29 February 2020

DRS2020 will comprise a participatory event offering PhD students a forum to present, share and discuss with each other and with senior academics the issues they encounter in doing a PhD in design research.

Need more information? Visit the DRS2020 website at http://drs2020.org/ or follow the conference on Facebook and Twitter.

Contact the program team at submissions@drs2020.org if you have questions about submissions. Contact the conference team at admin@drs2020.org with other enquiries about the conference.