Design in Multi-Species Worlds

The symposium will explore the timely field convergence of posthumanism and environmental design, especially with regard to how the posthumanist perspective can challenge, guide and even inspire new ways of thinking about the environment and the life that is dependent on it. This in turn can offer new insights into landscape design and the ways that designers think about animals and plants. Part of the mission of the symposium will be to explore and critique what ensues from this perspective.

Several provocative questions follow from this approach:· For whom do we design? How can humans coexist in a world shared with animals? What happens when we conceive of animals and plants as architects? What happens when we conceive of animals and plants as clients? We will engage these and many more queries about the impact of newly emerging understandings of agentic and communicative capabilities beyond the human.

The symposium will bring together scholars, artists, design professionals and students to consider how we might actualize the principles of multi-species cohabitation and co-design. Public lectures, participatory events, the showcasing of student design work, and transdisciplinary collaborative discussions will take place.