Design Intervention

Design can be understood as the planning, shaping, and altering of things, places, and experiences, so the possibilities for its study are boundless. Design is, by its very nature, inclusive. As discussed in this set of Commentaries, design can, and often does, foster discriminatory practices. Yet what is thought of as design, and its commercial connections, provides a broader sense of history, because it touches so many lives. It is the implicit intellectual intent of the four short essays in this special section that studying design permits a deeper understanding of the ways in which material and visual culture reflect, constitute, and construct the larger American experience. The articles in this issue do not encapsulate the entirety of American design history. However, these authors do provide a speculative window into the debates, ideas, and pedagogical conversations that are changing the field of art history.