Harun Kaygan

Research areas

My teaching and research interests lie in the social and cultural aspects and political implications of design practices and objects, with a focus on new materialist frameworks. I have widely published on design cultural subjects including Turkish design, social design and activism, consumer communities, and gendered design.

My current research focuses on the ways design cultural flows cut across human bodies, with case studies in diverse industries such as medical design, consumer goods, public transportation vehicles, and playgrounds. In my current project, funded by Carlsberg Foundation, we develop a theoretical framework for understanding design as a "somatic expertise:" Designers have increasingly fashioned themselves as professionals concerned with the bodily well-being of their users, within a societal context that is shaped by the neoliberal drives for marketisation and consumer responsibilisation as well as the technological changes that have facilitated their extensive application.