User Experience: Understanding Culture for Design

About This Course

This course teaches anthropological theories and research methods--including ethnography, empathy, interpretation and semiotics—and how to apply these methods to create human-centred designs that are attuned to culture and cultural difference. Co-developed by an anthropologist and an industry-based design consultant, the course will introduce cutting-edge theories of culture and demonstrate how these theories are being applied in the design, consulting and branding industry today.

Cultural difference is a crucial challenge and opportunity for contemporary design, especially in Asia with its vibrant (but also at times conflictual) diversity of cultures, traditions, and religions. Furthermore, today’s cultures are no longer limited to traditional ‘national’ cultures but extend to organizational, professional, and online cultures. Understanding how users will interpret the meaning of new product designs and incorporate them into ways of life is essential to human-centred design. Yet cliches about culture and cultural difference are not always helpful, suggesting cultural appropriation rather than sensitivity. Rigorous training in the research methods of anthropology—the social science devoted to the understanding of cultural difference—will cultivate a new generation of human-centered designers able to specify designs for real needs and target iterations for cultural diversity.