03.04.25, 19:00, Book presentation and Q&A Danah Abdulla, Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region

Danah Abdulla presents her new book Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region in Kunstenbibliotheek. She will be in conversation with researcher Sofie Verclyte. The book presentation is an initiative of Design Museum Gent and the Department of Design of KASK & Conservatorium in collaboration with Kunstenbibliotheek.

Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region

How can we study and teach design in a way that is critical, socially engaged and relevant to place? In this timely book, Danah Abdulla challenges us to imagine a design education and culture that moves beyond blindly borrowing Eurocentric models and frameworks. Drawing on learnings from work with design students, educators and designers in the Arab region, with a particular focus on Jordan and featuring examples from Lebanon, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates, Abdulla creates a dialogue with those who have most at stake in education to imagine how we can develop a collaborative, contextually based and socially relevant design education.

By first contextualizing higher education and design education in the region and examining the issues and challenges that are pertinent to the development of curricula and pedagogy, such as power, bureaucracy, language and access, Abdulla considers the purpose and relevance of design education in contemporary postcolonial societies. She explores how regional identities and class divisions shape the development of design cultures, as well as different perceptions of design and its value. Abdulla highlights design's role in society and the models of curricula and pedagogy appropriate for developing contextually situated design education. Outlining skills and strategies for equipping future designers, she proposes new possibilities for forms of practice and an actionable framework for developing design education.

Danah Abdulla

Danah Abdulla is a designer, educator and researcher interested in new narratives and practices in design that push the disciplinary boundaries and definitions of the subject. She is a Reader (Associate Professor) in Anti/Post/Decolonial Histories, Theories, Praxes at the Decolonising the Arts Institute at the University of the Arts London (UAL). Previously, she was the Head of Graphic Design at Camberwell, Chelsea, and Wimbledon Colleges of Art, UAL. Danah is a founding member of the Decolonising Design platform, and founded Kalimat Magazine. Her research focuses on decolonising design, possibilities of design education, design culture(s) with a focus on the Arab region, the politics of design, publishing, and social design. She is the author of Designerly Ways of Knowing: A Working Inventory of Things a Designer Should Know (Onomatopee, 2022), and Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region (Bloomsbury, 2025).