Feminist Killjoy Design Pedagogy: On Emphasizing Joy

Drawing on Sara Ahmed’s notions of the feminist killjoy and complaint to trace the workings of whiteness in the design school and explore pedagogies that confront it.

As someone whose pedagogy and politics are deeply shaped by Black feminism, working in a design school frequently compels Elizabeth Chin to name the whiteness of the institution and its culture. Institutional whiteness is political, and also problematic. Furthermore, naming the whiteness becomes political, and also creates problems.

Drawing on Sara Ahmed’s notions of the feminist killjoy and complaint, this lecture embraces the killjoy. Rejecting the idea of seeking “solutions,” instead, it dives into the messy and long-lasting issues within design education.

Elizabeth Chin (she/her) is an anthropologist and ethnographer with a varied practice that includes performative scholarship, collaborative research, vernacular electronics, and experimental writing. Her work interrogates race and racism with fieldwork in the US and in Haiti. Currently, Elizabeth is Editor in Chief of American Anthropologist.

This lecture was part of Design Educators* Unite!—a lecture series for design teachers, researchers, and students that shares feminist practices from within.

Feb 22 | 6 pm CET – special free event
Roundtable Discussion
Navigating the Past, Envisioning the Future: Unearthing Feminist and Decolonial Threads in Design Education
with Cherrypye (she/her) Creator, Educator & Researcher
Clara Meliande (she/her) Designer, Researcher & Educator
and Josefina Vidal (she/her) Designer & Researcher

Mar 21 | 6 pm CET
Lecture
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with Layla Gharib (she/her)
Designer, Researcher & Educator

Apr 11 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
Queering Design: Moving Towards Emergent Practices
with Sloan Leo Cowan (they/he)
Community Designer, Facilitator & Educator

May 2 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
Social Design Practices: From the Popular Neighborhoods to the Faculty of Design
with Giuliana Córdoba (she/none)
and Emilia Odriozola (she/her)
from the Student Movement Auge FADU

June 6 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
Feminist Killjoy Design Pedagogy: On Emphasizing Joy
with Elizabeth Chin (she/her)
Anthropologist & Ethnographer

June 13 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
Design and Other Ways of Knowing
Ramia Mazé (she/her)
Design Researcher

June 19 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
Crip Spacetime and Utopias of Care
with Nina Mühlemann (they/none)
Artist & Disability Scholar

July 4 | 6 pm CEST
Lecture
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with Francisco Quiñones Cuartas (she/he)
and Virginia Silveira (she/her)
from Travesti-Trans Non-binary Popular High School Mocha Celis