Arlene Oak
Arlene is an Assistant Professor in the department of Human Ecology at the University of Alberta, and an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Culture and Communication at the University of Calgary. She has taught the historical and social context of design to students in design practice programmes, and helped develop an MA in the History of Printed Graphics (now part of the Critical Studies component of the MA in Graphics Practice) at University College Northampton. Her PhD research analysed how language is used during design practice (in tertiary-level design education) to express, and help constitute, the personal identities, social relations, cultural values, and assumptions that inform the creation of objects of material culture.
She completed her PhD in Cambridge under the supervision of David Good, investigating spoken discourse in design studio teaching.
Crucible projects:
