Chicago Designs: Teaching Community-Based Histories is a workshop for college-level educators to work with local design collections that reflect diverse communities and social movements in Chicago. We invite applications for 15 participants to join us June 17-21, 2024 for 5 days of in-person visits to museums, archives, and community sites led by design history experts with guest lecturers. After the workshop, participants will develop teaching resources to share in an online resource to be maintained by the Design Museum of Chicago.
Leaders of the workshop include:
J. Dakota Brown, Designer and Design Historian, University of Illinois Chicago
Chris Dingwall, Design Historian, Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts
Amira Hegazy, Designer and Design Historian, University of Illinois Chicago
Bess Williamson, Design Historian, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
We invite educators (including professors, archivists/librarians, curators, and graduate students) to apply to join a group of 15 participants in 5-day in-person workshop to include:
Visits to key design history collections for the study of diverse communities and social movements, including Jane Addams Hull-House Museum, the Vivian G. Harsh Collection for African American History, the Art Institute of Chicago, University of Illinois Special Collections, and the Design Museum of Chicago.
Meetings with contemporary artists, activists, and designers working with and from communities less likely to be represented in museum collections, including Black, Latinx, and disabled histories of design and design activism;
Readings and discussions on inclusive teaching approaches in classrooms and museums
Sharing and planning teaching resources, including bibliographies, syllabi, assignment templates, short essays or site highlights.
Graduate students and contingent faculty are encouraged to apply, and several spaces will be reserved for each group.
Applications will be due April 21.
Eligibility
Chicago Designs welcomes applicants who are higher education faculty, graduate students, and museum and library professionals whose roles include a teaching component (broadly defined). Applicants are not expected to have an extensive background in design history and practices, but should have sufficient knowledge to contribute to group discussions.
United States citizenship is not required to apply, however please check the rules of your visa regarding receiving a stipend if you are not a U.S. citizen or green card holder.
We will accept fifteen applicants total. Several spaces will be reserved for contingent (non-tenure-track/tenured) faculty and graduate students.
Full attendance at all in-person and virtual sessions is required in order to be considered for this opportunity. Please do not apply if you have a scheduling conflict that would cause you to miss any of the programming.
Accessibility
The workshop includes multiple site visits in the city of Chicago. All sites are wheelchair accessible and accessible by public transit, although it will be helpful to hear about access needs so that we can plan together. Some visits will include private bus transportation. Please let organizers know of any access needs after acceptance.
Auto-captioning will be available for the virtual sessions.
Stipends, Travel, and Accommodations
Each participant in the Chicago Designs workshop will receive a $250 stipend on the first day.
A limited number of participants who reside outside the Chicago metro area are eligible for partial reimbursement for the cost of travel and accommodations, up to $500.
How to Apply
Applications include the following components, to be submitted through the Google form belowl:
1. Provide information in response to basic questions about yourself, your institution, and your current role
2. Submit a CV of no more than two pages
3. Respond to two prompts (300 word response each) regarding how your research and teaching background makes you a good fit for the workshop, and how this workshop will contribute to your teaching going forward.
Applications are due April 21, 2024. The application form has a 24 hour grace period for submission and will not accept applications submitted after 11:59 on April 22.