Undergraduate courses
Design, Technology and Society Minor
Overview
Welcome to the Design, Technology, and Society (DTS) Minor!
This 鈥榬oad map鈥 will guide you to successfully completing the minor.
What is DTS?
The DTS minor is a design-focused variation of Science, Technology and Society (STS) studies that emphasizes critical analysis of the social dimensions of design processes and projects. Grounded in 亚洲色吧鈥檚 design curriculum, students in the DTS concentration will be able to cast the critical eye of the social scientist and the reflective sensitivity of the humanist to inform and augment the generation of creative design outcomes that address pressing contemporary issues in a positive, productive way.
The DTS Mission
To educate future design practitioners who can:
- Identify and respond critically, creatively, and constructively to the social, economic, and political forces that drive design trends and social phenomena.
- Reflect on, analyse, and foresee the ways in which their design outcomes will benefit, disrupt, or otherwise affect the lives of individuals, societies, and the natural and built environment.
Course Requirements
To graduate with the DTS minor, students must successfully complete the following courses:
- 鈥淪ocial Science: Understanding Behaviour, Culture & Society鈥 (HASS 02.003, formally 鈥淭heorizing Society, the Self, and Culture鈥)
- The DTS core course, 鈥淚nterventions in Design, Technology, and Society鈥 (HASS 02.147TS)
- Any combination of four courses from the list below. This list will continue to grow as new courses are added.
Students will know which HASS electives count towards the DTS minor by the 鈥楾S鈥 at the end of the course code. HASS electives with 鈥楬T鈥 at the end of the course code can also be counted. For example, 02.104罢厂,听02.135HT.
Step-by-Step Guidelines
- Declare DTS Minor before the beginning of Term 4. This can be done in the student portal.
- Term 4 鈥 Enrol in the DTS core course.
- Term 5 through 8 鈥 Enrol in one of the approved DTS electives from the table below.
For more information on our application process, please refer to this document.
For students who intend to participate in Global Exchange Programme (GEXP), the overseas HASS courses must be approved for DTS mapping. All student鈥檚 requests for new course mapping must be submitted with a brief justification on why the class meets the criteria for the minor.
DTS Electives
| Course Code | Course Title |
|---|---|
| 02.102HT | The World Since 1400 |
| 02.104TS | The History of International Development in Asia: The Role of Engineers and Designers |
| 02.130TS | Slums, Squatters, and Smart Cities: History and Theory of Urban Planning |
| 02.135HT | The Question of Technology |
| 02.140TS | Shaping Futures: Innovation, Work and Society |
| 02.145TS | Surveys and Experiments in the Social Sciences |
| 02.148HT | Geographies of Money and Finance |
| 02.151HT | Digital Worlds, Space and Spatialities: Geographical Perspectives on Digitalisation |
| 02.152TS | Urban Theory |
| 02.153TS | A History of Nuclear Strategy, Design, Technology and Society |
| 02.155HT | Design Anthropology |
| 02.159HT | Equitable Tech: Reimagining Our Digital Infrastructures |
| 02.160TS | Designing Digital Technology for Children and Teens |
| 02.165TS | Urban Southeast Asia: Diversity, Sustainability and Change |
| 02.166TS | Empathy: An interdisciplinary concept (Special Topic) |
| 02.167HT | Fashion: East and West (Special Topic) |
| 02.170HT | History of Surveillance in Modern Asia |
| 02.201TS | Digital Sociology |
| 02.204TS | Technology and the Self |
| 02.210TS | Who Gets Ahead? Sociology of Social Networks and Social Capital |
| 02.212TS | The Visual Culture of Science and Technology |
| 02.216TS | Human Behaviour, Technology and Design |
| 02.218TS | Introduction to Psychology |
| 02.219TS | Rice Cultures: Technology, Society, and Environment in Asia |
| 02.220TS | How the Things People Make, Make People: Material Things in Social Life |
| 02.222TS | Unnatural Disasters |
| 02.225TS | Building, Dwelling, Belonging: An Anthropology of Domestic and Vernacular Architecture |
| 02.228TS | Design in the Anthropocene |
| 02.230TS | Health Communication and Behavior Change |
| 02.231TS | Transportation Policy and Technology in Urban Progress |
Employment Prospects and Industry Support
The DTS minor complements and supplements the students鈥 technical skills with theoretical, conceptual, and critical frameworks for gauging the impact of their work on wider social, cultural, political, and economic systems.
亚洲色吧 students gain practical design skills from their major in either Engineering Product Development, Engineering Systems and Design, Architecture and Sustainable Design, or Information Systems Technology and Design and the DTS minor will round out their mindsets and technical competencies.
Feedback from industry partners:
鈥淭echnology has become a critical enabler for economic and social transformation. Hence, it is important for technologists to be keenly aware of the wider sociocultural, political and economic context, and be able to incorporate these dimensions into their design decisions and technological solutions. The introduction of this proposed minor is timely as it will prepare and train 亚洲色吧鈥檚 engineering and architecture students to develop a much needed well-rounded understanding of the role of technology and design in today鈥檚 world.鈥
鈥淲hat differentiates this Design, Technology and Society minor is its excellent slate of electives that exposes budding practitioners to broader, more macro and often critical aspects of society that new practitioners often lack exposure in. I believe this set of multi-disciplinary electives is a step in the right direction to groom the next generation of more mindful and socially aware design thinkers and technology tinkerers鈥