Upcoming deadline – cfp – Design in an Age of Uncertainty – DHS Annual Conference 2026

We create, research, and teach in an age of uncertainty driven by war, mass migration, and climate change.

In 2019, Nancy Fraser invoked Gramsci’s dictum that “the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear,” referring to the failures of neoliberalism and the rise of populism. Today, on a global scale, political and social changes suggest we have reached a critical turning point. The reemergence of discriminatory beliefs and epistemic violence now challenges the hope that design could contribute to progressive social ideals without being questioned; understandings of education and research as fields of open inquiry are increasingly met with hostility. The 2026 DHS conference asks:

1. What are the implications of these shifts for design practice, education and research?

2. What alternative positive models can designers, educators, and researchers in design theory and history offer?

3. What values can design and design history promote in an age of uncertainty?

4. What is the place for activism in design?

The conference welcomes historic, contemporary, and interdisciplinary approaches to the topic, and invites contributions from design historians, scholars, and academics in related fields, as well as design practitioners, educators, museum professionals, and research students.