An Analysis of Privilege and Oppression: Feminist Speculative Design

This report examines the intersection of feminist theory and speculative design, focusing on how design can perpetuate or challenge systems of privilege and oppression. It critiques the limitations of speculative and critical design (SCD) in addressing gender inequality and highlights the importance of intersectionality, emphasizing that different forms of oppression intersect to shape individual experiences. The report argues that traditional SCD frameworks often fail to account for the objects and structures that contribute to oppression due to their historical roots in predominantly white, male, middle-class European institutions. It advocates for a feminist speculative design approach to better understand and address gender bias and social inequality in the field of design. The report concludes that a feminist perspective is crucial for creating a fairer and safer design environment for women.

Privilege and
Oppression: Towards
a Feminist
Speculative Design

Contents
INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY............................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION.........................................................................................................................4
REFERENCES.........................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
The world as it stands now has been affected by the complexity of design for a very
long time and in the current scenario, our lifestyles and habits are all ruled an defined around
complex gadgets which multidimensional designs such as smartphones and computers. This
report will include a summary detailing the role of intersectional feminism within the
contextual framework of critical and speculative design theories (Chopra, and et.al., 2022).
MAIN BODY
The role and necessities which are fulfilled and created in the modern society is
closely related to the process of design which has not only led to the establishment of most
social constructs along with majority of goods and services which we see in the open market
nowadays. The discussion around design has been dominated in researches by eminent
researches and theorists in two separate schools of taught, speculative and critical design. The
latter according to Anthony Dunne borrows principles from the former in order to make
social corrections to various events and practices we see in everyday life. Being a subsidiary
of crucial design, speculative design according to Dunne, it provides the justification of the
existence of design concept and also establishes a clear link between there are now by being
forward looking and futuristic by design.
The principal driving force behind critical design is that by challenging pre-conceived
social and technological notions and ideas, the design concept operates in murky territory full
of politically charged discourse and debates. This entire framework has also been labelled as
‘Speculative and Critical design’ (SCD) and has failed in a remarkable fashion as far as
gender norms and intersectionality is concerned as these concepts try to appear critical of
designs but fail to understand the complex relationship between humans and their created
designs. SCD framework and concepts closely borrow from the critical theory which
emerged as a school of thought which was meant to identify and remove coercive agents and
allow people to freely consider where their interests truly lie with the help of critical thought
and arguments (Lupton, 2018). However by borrowing ideologies, both schools of thought
commit the same mistake which is promotion of elitist views by channelling discussion on an
idealistic world. This is majorly due to the fact that the processes and discussions regarding
the development of SCD took place historically in close confines of European dominated
institutions primarily consisting of white, male and middle class crowd which is also the

reason why the concepts of both speculative and critical design often do not account for the
objects which lead to oppression as they fail to address the issue of privilege.
The term intersectionality is generally considered to be coined by Kimberle Crenshaw
in 1989 and it basically refers to the way in which several different forms of oppression can
intersect and interact with each other resulting in individualistic social identity and position.
This example is best understood from the fact that the type of oppression that a European
transgender woman might face will be radically different than the one faced by a disabled
American woman.
When it comes to SCD and design as a tool for creating social awareness, there have
been some obvious shortcomings as not only has the contribution of women in the field of
design has been heavily suppressed by the patriarchal and elitist standards upheld by experts
of SCD but even when acknowledged, they often go under the name of their husband,
brothers, fathers. However just like intersectional feminism has been trying to make the
world a better and more just place for women, SCD and especially speculative design can be
used for better social awareness by studying complex relationships between designs made
primarily by men and their effect on the gaining and conferring of privileges over one social
class and oppressing other and making them realizing their wrongdoings.
It was stated by Hall that there are no clear analytic systems in place which can
closely define and establish the methodology to better study the concept of intersectionality
which proposes an idea wherein the role of technology and especially electronics are
scrutinized from shady websites which publish sensitive images of women as revenge to the
malicious programs which leak their personal data. These changes are only possible if a new
view of design is studied in context of feminism and intersectionality and there is currently a
major need for feminist speculative design to assist their social aid in this gender biased
world (Pennington, 2018).
CONCLUSION
The above report summarized a complex perspective wherein the terminologies and
major theories of design, speculative and critical were studied both in terms of their definition
and combined scope under speculative critical design but also their inability to study and
address the inequality and discrimination that women face in society. It was concluded that

feminist speculative design is the only way forward to make the field of design and debate a
safer and fairer place for women.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Chopra, S., and et.al., 2022, April. Negotiating sustainable futures in communities through
participatory speculative design and experiments in living. In CHI Conference on Human
Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1-17).
Lupton, D., 2018. Towards design sociology. Sociology Compass, 12(1), p.e12546.
Pennington, S., 2018. Taking Care of Issues of Concern: feminist possibilities and the
curation of Speculative and Critical Design.