Critical Making

Critcal Thinking meets the Maker Culture

• Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_making
• https://wac.colostate.edu/docs/books/design/chapter12.pdf

Critical Thinking

• https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kritisches_Denken
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_thinking

Why Critical Thinking?

The Problem

Everyone thinks; it is our nature to do so. But much of our thinking, left to itself, is biased, distorted, partial, uninformed or down-right prejudiced. Yet the quality of our life and that of what we produce, make, or build depends precisely on the quality of our thought. Shoddy thinking is costly, both in money and in quality of life. Excellence in thought, however, must be systematically cultivated.

A Definition

Critical thinking is that mode of thinking - about any subject, content, or problem - in which the thinker improves the quality of his or her thinking by skillfully taking charge of the structures inherent in thinking and imposing intellectual standards upon them.

https://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/defining-critical-thinking/766

Talks

• 35c3: The Critical Making Movement
• RC3 2021: How to add Critical Thinking to your Making
• re:publica 2022: Why Critical Making? What’s Critical about Making or is Making Critical?

Zines

• Critical Making
• Disobedient Electronics

Manifestos

• The Critical Engineering Manifesto
• Maker Manifesto / The Maker’s Bill of Rights - PDF

Books

• DIY Citizenship: Critical Making and Social Media

People

• Garnet Hertz
• Regina Sipos

Summary (attempt)

Critical Making is about adding responsibility and societal meaning back into Maker Culture, based on a MAKE Magazine understanding of maker culture, which is quite “clean”, family friend, (supposedly) non-political. In that sense “Critical Making” vs. Making feels very close to “Hacking” vs. Making.