Overview
Welcome to the Design, Technology, and Society (DTS) Minor!
This ‘road map’ will guide you to successfully completing the minor.
What is DTS?
The DTS minor is a design-focused variation of Science, Technology and Society (STS) studies that emphasizes critical analysis of the social dimensions of design processes and projects. Grounded in SUTD’s design curriculum, students in the DTS concentration will be able to cast the critical eye of the social scientist and the reflective sensitivity of the humanist to inform and augment the generation of creative design outcomes that address pressing contemporary issues in a positive, productive way.
The DTS Mission
To educate future design practitioners who can:
- Identify and respond critically, creatively, and constructively to the social, economic, and political forces that drive design trends and social phenomena.
- Reflect on, analyze, and foresee the ways in which their design outcomes will benefit, disrupt, or otherwise affect the lives of individuals, societies, and the natural and built environment.
Course Requirements
To graduate with the DTS minor, students must successfully complete the following courses:
- “Social Science: Understanding Behaviour, Culture & Society” (HASS 02.003, formally “Theorizing Society, the Self, and Culture”)
- The DTS core course, “Interventions in Design, Technology, and Society” (HASS 02.147TS)
- Any combination of four courses from the list below. This list will continue to grow as new courses are added.
Students will know which HASS electives count towards the DTS minor by the ‘TS’ at the end of the course code. HASS electives with ‘HT’ at the end of the course code can also be counted. For example, 02.104TS, 02.135HT.
Step-by-Step Guidelines
- Declare DTS Minor before the beginning of Term 4. This can be done in the student portal.
- Term 4 – Enroll in the DTS core course.
- Term 5 through 8 – Enroll in one of the approved DTS electives from the table below.
For more information on our application process, please refer to this document..
For students who intend to participate in Global Exchange Programme (GEXP), the overseas HASS courses must be approved for DTS mapping. All student’s requests for new course mapping must be submitted with a brief justification on why the class meets the criteria for the minor.
DTS Electives
Course Number | Course Title |
---|---|
02.102HT | The World Since 1400 |
02.104TS | The History of International Development in Asia: The Role of Engineers and Designers |
02.130TS | Slums, Squatters, and Smart Cities: History and Theory of Urban Planning |
02.135HT | The Question of Technology |
02.140TS | Shaping Futures: Innovation, Work and Society |
02.145TS | Surveys and Experiments in the Social Sciences |
02.148HT | Geographies of Money and Finance |
02.151HT | Digital Worlds, Space and Spatialities: Geographical Perspectives on Digitalisation |
02.152TS | Urban Theory |
02.153TS | A History of Nuclear Strategy, Design, Technology and Society |
02.155HT | Design Anthropology |
02.159HT | Equitable Tech: Reimagining Our Digital Infrastructures |
02.160TS | Designing Digital Technology for Children and Teens |
02.165TS | Urban Southeast Asia: Diversity, Sustainability and Change |
02.166TS | Empathy: An interdisciplinary concept (Special Topic) |
02.167HT | Fashion: East and West (Special Topic) |
02.170HT | History of Surveillance in Modern Asia |
02.201TS | Digital Sociology |
02.204TS | Technology and the Self |
02.210TS | Who Gets Ahead? Sociology of Social Networks and Social Capital |
02.212TS | The Visual Culture of Science and Technology |
02.216TS | Human Behaviour, Technology and Design |
02.218TS | Introduction to Psychology |
02.219TS | Rice Cultures: Technology, Society, and Environment in Asia |
02.220TS | How the Things People Make, Make People: Material Things in Social Life |
02.222TS | Unnatural Disasters |
02.225TS | Building, Dwelling, Belonging: An Anthropology of Domestic and Vernacular Architecture |
02.228TS | Design in the Anthropocene |
02.230TS | Health Communication and Behavior Change |
02.231TS | Transportation Policy and Technology in Urban Progress |
Employment Prospects and Industry Support
The DTS minor complements and supplements the students’ technical skills with theoretical, conceptual, and critical frameworks for gauging the impact of their work on wider social, cultural, political, and economic systems.
SUTD students gain practical design skills from their major in either Engineering Product Development, Engineering Systems and Design, Architecture and Sustainable Design, or Information Systems Technology and Design and the DTS minor will round out their mindsets and technical competencies.
Feedback from industry partners:
“Technology has become a critical enabler for economic and social transformation. Hence, it is important for technologists to be keenly aware of the wider sociocultural, political and economic context, and be able to incorporate these dimensions into their design decisions and technological solutions. The introduction of this proposed minor is timely as it will prepare and train SUTD’s engineering and architecture students to develop a much needed well-rounded understanding of the role of technology and design in today’s world.”“What differentiates this Design, Technology and Society minor is its excellent slate of electives that exposes budding practitioners to broader, more macro and often critical aspects of society that new practitioners often lack exposure in. I believe this set of multi-disciplinary electives is a step in the right direction to groom the next generation of more mindful and socially aware design thinkers and technology tinkerers”