213: Omari Souza

Diversity in design for Black people is an important issue, but a lot of its focus tends to go towards employment rather than education. Design researcher Omari Souza has approached the topic from a different angle, and his thesis reveals some startling insights.

Omari shared how he first got into design and how his education at Cleveland Institute of Art and Kent State University inspired his push into design research. Omari is also a new full-time professor at La Roche College in Pittsburgh, so we talked about the importance of representation in design education and even about the design community’s silence around political issues concerning Black Americans. We do cover a lot in this interview, and I’m glad we have design researchers like Omari to examine and document this kind of work!

• “Chasing Vertical: Diversity & Recognition in the field of Graphic Design” (PDF)
• Omari Souza at La Roche College’s Design Division

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