Design anthropology : object culture in the 21st century

Design Anthropology: Object Culture in the 21st Century

What makes a product iconic? How did IKEA really conquer the home -furnishings market from Sweden to China? Why do design innovators spend more time observing consumers than making new things? Design Anthropology charts the radical turn to `the user' that has transformed our contemporary object culture.

Featuring leading design thinkers, Design Anthropology offers a provocative insight into how different groups, from South London urbanites to Australian aborigines, use designed objects to make sense of their everyday lives. As design corporations `go native' they now look to us---our homes, our spiritual worlds and our intimate rituals, for their inspiration.

Design Anthropology is a must-have read for everyone in design, creative industries, sociology, anthropology, marketing and cultural studies---and for anyone interested in what is really at stake in our material world, Alison J. Clarke.