We at Code Z have gone on record with our frustration over the blinding whiteness of the graphic design press in the US, but we were never sure whether to aim our death rays at the press or at the design industry itself for its lack of diversity.
Apparently, some AIGA members felt the rub internally as well, as that organization has launched a nationwide drive to diversify the design industry, using its own membership as a bulwark. Albert Whitley, the Atlanta chapter's Membership Director and Diversity Taskforce Advocate, tells us that the organization has assembled its national taskforce and has begun the work of recruiting more Black and Latino designers into its ranks.
The taskforce has adopted national guidelines for its chapters, including recommendations to step up recruitment from technical colleges and community colleges, as well as aiming to place at least one designer of color on each chapter's board. The taskforce is also working on a design archive and traveling exhibition (working title: The Pioneers of Invisible Design) that will highlight the work of designers that have been overlooked by history dating back to the 18th century. Albert tells us that this effort is designed to counter the invisibility of design as a career option among communities of color.
AIGA is the design profession's organization of record, and chapter president Bill Grant has called diversity "an ethically and economically sound issue" for the organization to take up.
