Unlike some in critical disability studies, the authors of this book (interdisciplinary disability studies, the University of Maine) embrace the usefulness of the category of disability and show how it can be used to redesign spaces and equipment for those with disabilities and how it can be used in material and visual culture to rebrand disability in local and global communities. The first part of the book considers disability as a designed and branded phenomenon. Part 2 gives principles and examples of redesign and rebranding of mobility and medical equipment, parks and other public spaces, and medical treatment spaces. B&w photos throughout the book show equipment and spaces. The books readership includes those in disability studies, social science, and design and engineering for disability. Annotation ©2014 Ringgold, Inc., Portland, OR (protoview.com)
Over the past fifty years, design and branding have become omnipotent in the market and have made their way to other domains as well. Given their potential to divide humans into categories and label their worth and value, design and branding can wield immense but currently unharnessed powers of social change. Groups designed as devalued can be undesigned, redesigned and rebranded to seamlessly and equivalently participate in community, work and civic life. This innovative book argues that disability as a concept and category is created, reified, and segregated through current design and branding that begs for creative change.
Transcending models of disability that locate it either as an embodied medical condition or as a socially constructed entity, this book challenges the very existence and usefulness of the category itself. Proposing and illustrating creative and responsible design, DePoy and Gilson include thinking and action strategies that are useful and potent for "undesigning", redesigning, and rebranding to meet the full range of human needs and to enhance full participation in local through global communities. Divided into two parts, the first section presents a critical examination of disability as a designed and branded phenomenon, exploring what exactly is being designed and branded and how. The second part investigates the redesign of disability and provides principles for redesign and rebranding illustrated with examples from high-tech to place-based sustainable strategies.
The book provides a unique and contemporary framework for thinking about disability as well as providing relevant design and branding guidance to designers and engineers interested in embodiment issues.
