As part of the module Critical and Creative Thinking the master students of communication design got the task to create a design intervention which highlights, discusses and questions a norm of their choice. The developed concepts span over a wide range of themes and explores questions about language, values, gender, heritage, culture and social behaviour.

“The real secret of the success of our species is that we alone can talk about things that do not exist […] except in our own imagination.” Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens – A Brief History of Humankind

The imagined realities, described by Yuval Noah Harari, refers to the different agreements made between humans which forms a structure for our social life and behaviour. Language, money, manners, nations or legal systems can only exist because we have agreed on a set of rules which we are expected to follow. Our social norms are also enabled through such agreements and acknowledging that design can either reinforce or question status quo is the first step in taking on a norm-critical design perspective.