Design Anthropology: Object Culture in the 21st Century
Decades ago, product designers utilised basic market research to fine-tune their designs for consumer success
– today the design process has been radically transformed; the user is now centre-stage in the design process. From design
ethnography to cultural probing, innovative designers in the 21st century are relying on anthropological methods to illicit
the meaning, rather than the mere form and function of stuff. The work offers the definitive guide to the issues facing the
shapers of our increasingly complex material world. How has user-experience transformed our understanding of design? And how
do leading design corporations, from IDEO to INTEL, harness the insight of anthropologists in generating future visions? Why
are new disciplines, like digital anthropology, shaping our increasingly de-materialised product cultures?