BRIEF:
Voluntary, self-initiated project that employs film and video to concretize wicked problems that are often discussed in the abstract.
TIME RUNNING:
November 2018–February 2020
ABOUT THE FILM SERIES
Cameron Tonkinwise started a film series in Carnegie Mellon’s School of Design called "Movies You Cannot be a Designer Without Having Seen." In continuation of that legacy, I started a "Wicked Problems Series" where, instead of showing films that highlight beautiful filmmaking or storytelling, I wanted to show documentaries and films that address the nuances of the complex, wicked problems that we as conscientious designers need to be aware of in our work. At every event we invite a subject matter expert to view the film with us and help lead a discussion afterwards. Films are screened every three to four weeks in the evenings.
A bit of context on why this film series is important: In the school of design, especially at the graduate level, we talk a lot about wicked problems, complexity, systems, and serious problems like climate change, but always in the abstract. We also talk a lot about empathy, but what does it really mean for the people directly experiencing those problems? Yes, at the Interaction Design or Product Design level, we can do user research, but when talking about global, complex problems, we don’t really know what it’s like for the people in the midst of it—those suffering the most or those in the arena who are fighting to create change.
I believe the true visual storytellers when it comes to wicked problems are documentary filmmakers—not only do they make these issues real and palpable by putting you in the place of people who are most directly affected, but they are very adept at capturing the nuance and complexity of the problems.
As we know, there are no solutions to wicked problems, so we do not intend to arrive at any answers through these films. But the hope is that, by raising these concerns in our consciousness, we become more informed, more critical, nuanced, and sensitive designers who can then go on to use our unique skills to work towards more sustainable and just futures.
PAST SCREENINGS
February 27, 2020
Topic: Fast Fashion
Film: The True Cost
Guest Facilitators: Dr. Jonathan Chapman, Professor in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University; Dr. Erica Owen, Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Pittsburgh
Co-hosted by: Net Impact Club at Tepper School of Business, CMU
November 5, 2019
Topic: Media and Narrative
Film: Won’t You Be My Neighbor?
Guest facilitators: Sarah Moore, Visiting Lecturer in Film & Media Studies at University of Pittsburgh; Tammar Zea-Wolfson, fourth-year student in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University
October 3, 2019
Topic: Climate Change
Film: The Island President
Guest facilitators: Dr. Neil Donahue, University Professor of Chemical Engineering, Chemistry, and Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University; Hilary Schenker, group leader of the Pittsburgh chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby
September 5, 2019
Topic: Behavior Change
Video: TED Talk by Jose Miguel Sokoloff
Guest facilitator: Dr. Dan Lockton, Assistant Professor in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University
April 18, 2019
Topic: Change Makers
Film: Tomorrow
Guest facilitators: Dr. Gideon Kossoff, Adjunct Professor in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University; Dr. Edson R. Severnini, Assistant Professor of Economics and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University
March 28, 2019
Topic: Cooperative Economic Model
Film: Food for Change
Guest facilitator: Francis Carter, PhD candidate in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University
March 6, 2019 (co-organized by Langston Wells)
Topic: Cities in Transition
Episode: Parts Unknown: Pittsburgh
Guest facilitator: Dr. Joel Tarr, Professor of History and Policy at Carnegie Mellon University
February 6, 2019
Topic: Creative Policy Change
Film: Life is Sacred
Guest facilitator: Sofía Bosch Gomez, PhD candidate in the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University
November 15, 2018
Topic: Gentrification
Film: San Francisco 2.0
Guest facilitators: Stefani Danes and Stefan Gruber from the School of Architecture at Carnegie Mellon University
November 8, 2018
Topic: Indigenous Land Rights
Episode: Rise, a Vice documentary about the Dakota Access Pipeline
Guest facilitators: Dr. Noah Theriault from the Department of History and Dr. Alexa Woloshyn from the School of Music at Carnegie Mellon University
September 22, 2017
Topic: Race and Police Brutality
Film: La Haine (Hate)
Guest facilitators: Silvia Mata-Marin and Kevin Jarbo, PhD candidates at Carnegie Mellon University
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“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly;…who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
—Theodore Roosevelt