Objective Stories: Looking at Migration through Designed Things

Gastvortrag

Objective Stories: Looking at Migration through Designed Things

Gökhan Mura will analyse the material and visual culture of migration through examples from the intersecting biographies of Turkish labor migrants in Europe and the things they have encountered, used, appropriated and transferred to Turkey to be used or as gifts. Through the medium of the designed objects, and through using a design perspective and vocabulary Mura intends to interpret the impact of Turkish labor migration on the visual and material culture of the migrated countries as well as Turkey through the conceptual framework of the value shift and the changing reception of designed objects. “Objective” perspective provides new tools of interpretation in understanding the economic, social and historical impact of migration on the members of the transnational societies from an individual and an “objective” account, through an alternative medium of narrative.

The presentation complements the core interest of the Research Centre “Migration and Globalisation” and “Cultures in Contact” as well as of the doctoral colleges in the Research Area “Cultural Encounters – Cultural Conflicts” to examine personal perceptions, positions, and involvement, by offering a new materialist approach to critical, theory-based migration research.

Professor Gökhan Mura PhD
Izmir University of Economics

Gökhan Mura, PhD, is a design researcher and an academic at the Department of Visual Communication Design, Izmir University of Economics. He completed his Bachelor of Industrial Design degree at Middle East Technical University in 2001 and master of Arts degree in Visual Communication Design at Istanbul Bilgi University in 2004. He received his PhD degree in Industrial Design from Istanbul Technical University in 2014 with his research on the creative use of user-generated photographs for empathic and creative idea generation in design. During his PhD, he spent an academic year in Malmö University School of Arts, Culture and Communication working on interaction design and later worked as a Research Associate at Loughborugh University Design School working for ENGAGE project that aimed to collect tools and methods for designing for emotions. He has been teaching undergraduate Visual Communication Design studio courses and graduate courses in Design Studies. His research interests involve various design disciplines with a keen interest in the narrative capabilities of design, human and technology interaction, and visual and material culture of migration. He is currently working on migration and design where his recent research focuses on transnational objects, migrant gifts, migrant spaces and material manifestation of migration narratives through designed forms in post migrant societies.