C P Snow’s The Two Cultures (1959) pointed out the issue of having people with knowledge of a range of disciplines (a ‘culture’) unable to understand those from the other ‘culture’, yet needing to work together (it also claimed that there was a pecking order with one culture being more highly esteemed than the other.) Cross, basing his work heavily on a RCA report (1979) proposes a third culture, that of design.
Cross talks of how postgraduate scientists and architects were seen to approach problem solving differently. But although they had learnt methods that suit their discipline, they are possibly failing to learn a range of methods or at least recognise the potential value of other methods for other contexts. Though suggested as an example to demonstrate the distinctiveness of a ‘design culture’, this arguably only goes to show another narrow way in which one might be educated.
As Norman (2013) pointed out “…The hard part is to convince people to understand the viewpoints of the others, to abandon their disciplinary viewpoint and to think of the design from the viewpoints of the person who buys the product and those who use it, often different people.” (p.35)
Without interdisciplinary education, we will continue to hold these separate viewpoints due to a narrowness of experience (and possibly believing in the superiority of our own discipline.) Education across the disciplines and including multidisciplinary teamwork would allow students from any ‘culture’ to become versed in the disciplinary knowledge of their field whilst also coming to appreciate the approaches of others.
References
Cross, N. (1982) ‘Designerly ways of knowing’, Design Studies. (Special Issue Design Education), 3(4), pp. 221–227.
Royal College of Art (1979). Design in general education. London: Royal College of Art.
Snow, C. P., (2001) [1959]. The Two Cultures. London: Cambridge University Press.
