Author B. Sweeting
Biography: Ben Sweeting is a Principal Lecturer in Architecture at the University of Brighton. He studied at the University of Cambridge and the Bartlett, UCL. In his PhD, supervised by Neil Spiller and Ranulph Glanville and funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, Ben explored epistemological and ethical questions in relation to architecture and design, drawing on second-order cybernetics and radical constructivism as well as on practice-based research methods. He is a member of the American Society for Cybernetics and was awarded the Heinz von Foerster Award in 2014.
Kenniff T.-B. & Sweeting B. (2014) There is no alibi in designing: Responsibility and dialogue in the design process. Opticon 1826(16): 1. https://cepa.info/1001
Kenniff T.-B. & Sweeting B.
(
2014)
There is no alibi in designing: Responsibility and dialogue in the design process.
Opticon 1826(16): 1.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/1001
This paper explores a potential relation between architecture and ethics intrinsic to design processes when understood in terms of dialogue or conversation. We draw on separate but related research interests: one focused on the design process, especially the significance of drawing, and the other on the ethics of designing for the public realm, with reference to Bakhtinian dialogism. Our investigation concentrates on two aspects of the design process, both of which can be thought of in terms of conversation – first, the relation between architect and Other, and second, the act of drawing. Through this, we support the idea that in design the ethical and the aesthetic cannot be meaningfully separated from one another. Instead, their relation must be understood as a dialogue in and of itself, as well as part of the dialogue between all participants in the design process. Relevance: This article develops a cybernetic understanding of the design process, based on the analogy between conversation and sketching (and the work of Glanville and Pask), in relation to the dialogues that designers hold with those they design for; in so doing it suggests a connection between a cybernetic understanding of epistemology and ethical questions.
Sweeting B. (2011) Conversing with drawings and buildings: From abstract to actual in architecture. Kybernetes 40(7/8): 1159–1165. https://cepa.info/1002
Sweeting B.
(
2011)
Conversing with drawings and buildings: From abstract to actual in architecture.
Kybernetes 40(7/8): 1159–1165.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/1002
Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to describe the various movements from abstraction to actuality in the context of design, with particular reference to architecture, first in terms of the design process and second in terms of the interpretation of architecture by observers. Design/methodology/approach – The paper focuses on the designers’ use of forms of representation, such as drawings, with reference to the cybernetic understanding of conversation. This account is then used to discuss the representational properties of architecture itself and to relate this back to the design process. Findings: It is argued that the forms of representation used by designers, such as drawings and physical models, have both abstract and actual properties and that this combination is important for their representational function. The ambiguity in the interpretation of drawings and models is not only useful in generating ideas but also appropriate given the ambiguity in the interpretation of the architecture they represent. Originality/value – The division between the abstract (understood in terms of representation) and the actual is challenged. A connection is proposed between architecture itself as a form of representation and the representation used in its design. Relevance: This article extends and reflects on the analogy between cybernetic conversation and design in relation by understanding our experience of architecture as also a form of conversational exploration.
Sweeting B. (2014) Not All Conversations Are Conversational: A Reflection on the Constructivist Aspects of Design Studio Education. Constructivist Foundations 9(3): 405–406. https://constructivist.info/9/3/405
Sweeting B.
(
2014)
Not All Conversations Are Conversational: A Reflection on the Constructivist Aspects of Design Studio Education.
Constructivist Foundations 9(3): 405–406.
Fulltext at https://constructivist.info/9/3/405
Open peer commentary on the article “Radical Constructivist Structural Design Education for Large Cohorts of Chinese Learners” by Christiane M. Herr. Upshot: Herr’s radically constructivist approach to the technological aspects of architectural education also invites a critical review of the constructivist credentials of the conversational model of design studio teaching that she takes as a point of departure.
Sweeting B. (2015) Architecture and second order science. In: Proceedings of the 59th Annual Meeting of the ISSS 1(1): 1–6. https://cepa.info/2843
Sweeting B.
(
2015)
Architecture and second order science.
In: Proceedings of the 59th Annual Meeting of the ISSS 1(1): 1–6.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2843
Since around 1980, Ranulph Glanville has put forward the idea that rather than seeing research in design as one form of science, we instead see scientific research as a specific form of design. This argument, based on the way that scientific research inevitably involves design activity but not vice versa, and others like it around that time consolidate a shift during the 1970s in thinking about design, from a concern with the scientific method to the idea that design has its own epistemological foundations as a discipline. The attempt to base design on a linear version of the scientific method failed for reasons that have been pointed out by Horst Rittel amongst others: because design involves the creation of the new, design questions cannot be exhaustively formulated in advance. This has marked something of a parting of the ways between design and science as being incompatible in terms of method. Given Glanville’s argument this is not what we might expect: if science is a limited form of design, shouldn’t scientific approaches be commensurable with design even if they are not a basis for it? This apparent disjunction is only the case if we follow the changes in how design was thought about during this period without also following the comparable changes regarding science. Both broadly parallel each other, moving from a concern with method in the 1960s through a critique of this in the 1970s to new foundations from the 1980s onwards, focusing on what designers and scientists actually do in practice. Indeed the key critiques of method advanced by Feyerabend and Rittel, in science and design respectively, have similar structures and, so, what seems at first sight to be a rupture can also be read as a parallel journey. Using this account as a basis, and in the light of recent discussions regarding the idea of second order science, I suggest that we can understand contemporary design research as one example of second order research practice, as is indicated by its continuity with cybernetics. More speculatively, and with reference to the Fun Palace project of Joan Littlewood and Cedric Price, to which Gordon Pask also contributed, I suggest that architecture can itself sometimes be thought of as facilitating such a reflective and participatory enquiry.
Sweeting B. (2015) Conversation, design and ethics: The cybernetics of Ranulph Glanville. Cybernetics & Human Knowing 22(2–3): 99–105. https://cepa.info/2845
Sweeting B.
(
2015)
Conversation, design and ethics: The cybernetics of Ranulph Glanville.
Cybernetics & Human Knowing 22(2–3): 99–105.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2845
One of the major themes of Ranulph Glanville’s work has been the intimate connection between cybernetics and design, the two principle disciplines that he has worked in and contributed to. In this paper I review the significance of the analogy that he proposes between the two and its connection to his concerns with, firstly, the cybernetic practice of cybernetics and, secondly, the relation between cybernetics and ethics. I propose that by putting the cybernetics-design analogy together with the idea that in cybernetics epistemological and ethical questions coincide, we can understand design as not just a form of cybernetic practice but also one in which ethical questions are implicit.
Sweeting B. (2015) Cybernetics of practice. Kybernetes 44(8/9): 1397–1405. https://cepa.info/3041
Sweeting B.
(
2015)
Cybernetics of practice.
Kybernetes 44(8/9): 1397–1405.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/3041
Sweeting B. (2016) A Theatre for Exploring the Cybernetic. Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 619–620. https://cepa.info/2895
Sweeting B.
(
2016)
A Theatre for Exploring the Cybernetic.
Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 619–620.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2895
Open peer commentary on the article ““Black Box” Theatre: Second-Order Cybernetics and Naturalism in Rehearsal and Performance” by Tom Scholte. Upshot: The parallels that Scholte has drawn between cybernetics and theatre open up a new avenue for exploring cybernetic ideas. This complements the way that cybernetics has invoked design as a way of questioning the relationship between cybernetics and action.
Sweeting B. (2016) Author’s Response: Beyond Application. Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 591–597. https://cepa.info/2888
Sweeting B.
(
2016)
Author’s Response: Beyond Application.
Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 591–597.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2888
Upshot: I reinforce the idea of broad connections between cybernetics, design and science that become apparent when the messy processes implicit in each are reflected on more explicitly. In so doing, I treat design not as a field in which cybernetic ideas are to be applied, but one in which they are reflected on and pursued.
Sweeting B. (2016) Design Research as a Variety of Second-Order Cybernetic Practice. Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 572–579. https://cepa.info/2880
Sweeting B.
(
2016)
Design Research as a Variety of Second-Order Cybernetic Practice.
Constructivist Foundations 11(3): 572–579.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2880
Context: The relationship between design and science has shifted over recent decades. One bridge between the two is cybernetics, which offers perspectives on both in terms of their practice. From around 1980 onwards, drawing on ideas from cybernetics, Glanville has suggested that rather than apply science to design, it makes more sense to understand science as a form of design activity, reversing the more usual hierarchy between the two. I return to review this argument here, in the context of recent discussions in this journal regarding second-order science (SOS). Problem: Despite numerous connections to practice, second-order cybernetics (SOC) has tended to be associated with theory. As a result, SOC is perceived as separate to the more tangible aspects of earlier cybernetics in a way that obscures both the continuity between the two and also current opportunities for developing the field. Method: I review Glanville’s understanding of design, and particularly his account of scientific research as a design-like activity, placing this within the context of the shifting relation between science and design during the development of SOC, with reference to the work of Rittel and Feyerabend. Through this, I summarise significant parallels and overlaps between SOC and the contemporary concerns of design research. Results: I suggest that we can see design research not just as a field influenced by cybernetics but as a form of SOC practice even where cybernetics is not explicitly referenced. Implications: Given this, design research offers much to cybernetics as an important example of SOC that is both outward looking and practice based. As such, it bridges the gap between SOC and the more tangible legacy of earlier cybernetics, while also suggesting connections to contemporary concerns in this journal with SOS in terms of researching research. Constructivist content: By suggesting that we see design research as an example of SOC, I develop connections between constructivism and practice.
Sweeting B. (2018) Radical Constructivism and the Decolonisation of Epistemology. Constructivist Foundations 13(3): 326–327. https://cepa.info/5291
Sweeting B.
(
2018)
Radical Constructivism and the Decolonisation of Epistemology.
Constructivist Foundations 13(3): 326–327.
Fulltext at https://cepa.info/5291
Open peer commentary on the article “Heterarchical Reflexive Conversational Teaching and Learning as a Vehicle for Ethical Engineering Curriculum Design” by Philip Baron. Upshot: Baron locates the decolonisation of the curriculum within the classroom, repurposing radically constructivist approaches to teaching and learning and giving them a sense of social and political urgency. The inclusion of students’ worldviews in the curriculum is best thought of as the beginning of a process rather than an end in itself. This leads beyond the pedagogic focus of Baron’s article, raising questions about the status of professional knowledge and whose terms equality is offered on.
Export result page as:
·
·
·
·
·
·
·
·