Situating radical heritage futures

The pedagogic methodology that we enact has emerged through a collaboration which is informed by our disciplinary backgrounds in fine art and innovation design, along with a sensitivity to inter- and trans-disciplinary research. Creative practice emerges from agentic entanglements of the human, environment, and culture, but what of the non-human agencies at play? If situatedness considers the human mind to be co-extensive with the world, which other agencies might contribute to creativity? Furthermore, how might we approach teaching to support an imaginative inquiry which makes the self and world mutually porous through narrative, heritage and the senses? During our presentation we outline a multi-sensory workshop that took place at The Glasgow School of Art’s Highlands & Islands campus in the rural north of Scotland. Through storying and multi-sensory learning we brought the heritage of the region to life, creatively re-imaging the practices and cultures of ancient farming systems of Scotland. To do this we designed an immersive culinary experience for a group of innovation design students which engaged the senses and emotions in a multi-sensory environment. The purpose was two-fold: to engage the students in deep learning about aspects of Scotland’s food heritage; and to demonstrate an innovative, experience-based pedagogy of wonder that the students could emulate in their own innovation design practice. Situatedness was a crucial aspect of the learning design: the location and surroundings of the learning experience had significant affect on the students’ understanding and engagement with the content. Experiential learning using food to engage students in conversations about culture proved to be a powerful and effective way to deepen their understanding of heritage and place. We invite you to join us to explore situated, radical, heritage, futures