Pick of the day- Defining Design in Indian language

Here is some knowledge, I picked up from the discussions in yahoogroup, on what is the word in Hindi/Sanskrit for DESIGN-

"It is neither surprising nor sad that we are not ableto get an exact equivalence to 'design', an English word that during last eighty years has gathered layers after layers after layers of meanings, nuances and interpretations. The French who are at least ten times as fiercely proud of their language as we are ofSanskrit (or Hindi or Bangla, or Tamil or any of thefourteen Indian languages) have recenly settled downfor DESIGN with no change of spelling. Germany had alredy done the same while Russians (quite cleverly, Ithought) desided to add an entirely new word to theirlanguage, spelled DIZAIN"- H. Kumar Vyas

'Seeking Authenticity'- New Trend -UPolitical

This comment caught my eye, aftermath the UP elections....a perfect case for 'Rootine' trend that Onio has proposed for the year 2007.

"Running a single-handed campaign, sans celebrities, catchy advertisements, audio-visual displays or any other vote-pulling antic, Mayawati only concentrated on her new social engineering experiment of wooing the once "untouchable" Brahmins to act as a catalyst to reinforce her strong base of Dalits in a highly caste-ridden Uttar Pradesh."

Maturity of Design lead Economy

While design community in India is trying to gaze the shape of the the elephant, like the legendary blind men, some things are but predictable. Contexutal differences in applying the 'design best practices' is different from stages of maturity of the market or business practice. What would be maturity of the design business in India? Will it be just a replication of what Scandanavian countries are today? Will it just mean better looking products, thriving companies, improved infrastructure, ethnic craft based product boom and masses consuming more of thoughtful products? Will it mean that the way my carpenter works will change; they way maid mops the floor will change; the way bank treats me will change; the way goverment collects my personal data will change; the way buildings look in rural side will change; the way communication sweeps aross media will change? Probably all of them together....

Does it mean that a ditto copy of what has happened in mature economies+local needs, is the 100% projection of India as the design lead economy?

I see every country brings a tweak to the 'design' world from its own perspective. Recently I read that China is now one of the biggest manufacturer and exporter of cosmetics in the world. The world is guzzling what chinese aestheic senses are producing...China is shaping the beauty of the world (in a way). One can sense the chinese colour pallette in toys and plasticware already. World's kids are getting moulded to certain sensibilities through these toys and plasticware. There is democratised, more accessible and affordable to everyone, new toy on the shelf everyday for sure. So Taiwan, Korea and China have learnt the tricks of European design and mixed with their own sensibilities to evolve a new design language. India is yet to speak that language. Whenever that becomes visible there is going to be visual changes for sure, but there should be some thought level changes are but expected. I won;t be surprised if some of the thoughtlines create flutters in the design world across the shores.

Coming back to maturity stages, it appears to me that it is only a matter of time that cetain things will happen-
a) Design becomes integral part of corporate world
b) Design becomes a tool for SMEs for growth
c) Sensing paradigm takes root in market faced innovations
d) Disruptive processes are borne out of the shear madness that Indian market presents
e) 'Art' comes back in day-today objects
f) Multiple organisational bodies are formed to channelise certain efforts in this segment (Design council or not..
g) Industry shake-up happens as world wakes up to design service market potential in India (Kishor Biyani of Pantaloon is 'outsourcing' the IT needs to IBM in India...does it ring bells?)
h) 'Design' is broken up into more specific sectors. 'Furniture and Retail Design', 'Animation Design'...etc. Creative Services would be the overall gamut to address.
i) Boom in regional markets in the interiors of India will bring the crafts back..(it would be surprising..that craft revival will not be because of the Walmart sourcing from these people, but because of the own countrymen becoming conscious of their needs).

Current generation would be the 'speedy' generation who want things accomplaished all in their life time...next one would surely take a pause and reflect....:))

Appliances are brcoming a beautiful furniture

Here is an example of this trend....