Michael R. Gibson
Coordinator, M.A. in Interaction Design Program
Professor, Communication Design: User-Experience Design
Department of Design
Dialectic producer and co-managing editor
Michael.Gibson@unt.edu
940-565-3621
Art Building, Room 304
Gibson oversees learning experiences for M.A. candidates in Interaction Design and M.F.A. candidates in Design Research, including the supervision of sponsored projects, capstone experiences and thesis and practicum projects. He also teaches classes in Interaction and user experience design, critical writing/critical methods, design research theory and methods, and communication design history.
As a co-coordinator of sponsored human-centered, interaction design and user experience design projects, Gibson works with fellow faculty members Keith Owens and Troy Abel. These sponsored projects are facilitated on behalf of North Texas-based businesses, government and non-government organizations, local communities and community groups and educational institutions.
More about Professor Gibson
Michael R. Gibson is an ex officio member of the National Steering Committee for the Design Educators’ Community of the American Institute of Graphic Arts. His articles on integrating and teaching others to integrate select design processes with emerging technologies to positively affect the design of complex information systems have appeared in journals such as "Visible Language," "Information Design Journal," "The International Journal of the Humanities," "Zed: A Journal of Design Thinking," "Design Education in Progress" and several others. He also has lectured widely and operated a private visual and interaction design consultancy for more than 30 years.
Gibson’s experiences as a design educator and researcher have taught him that collaboratively engaging in inclusive design processes can help people construct knowledge-cum-understandings that forge and sustain connections between social perceptions, practices and behaviors. These ideas have guided the work he has undertaken over the past two decades to affect positive changes in design education, children’s healthcare and education, and how people interact with computerized, information delivery systems.
Gibson is the producer and co-managing editor of Dialectic, a scholarly journal of thought leadership, education and practice in the discipline of visual communication design. For more information about Dialectic, please visit the Dialectic website.
He earned a B.F.A. in graphic design at the Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, Mo., and holds an M.F.A. in graphic design with a specialization in design research from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.
Dialectic
Feb. 6, 2022: The latest issue of "Dialectic," the scholarly journal of the American Institute of Graphic Arts Design Educators’ Community has been published by the University of Michigan Publishing Services. Volume III, Issue 1 of this peer-reviewed, open-access publication is available on the Dialectic website. The publication is co-founded and co-edited in part by Michael Gibson and Keith Owens, CVAD professors of communication design. "Dialectic" has a diversely populated, international readership. It has also developed a strong reputation for publishing work that critically examines intersections between design as an academic and professional discipline and other academic and professional disciplines that include the social sciences, information technology, human-computer interaction, marketing and business management. In so doing, Dialectic exists as an extension of how design is taught, researched and critically analyzed within and around the curricula facilitated by UNT CVAD’s Department of Design.
Communication Design Highlights
2021
July 31: Using Professional Practice to Get Tenure (and Promotion) - YouTube
July 29: Strengthening Academic Writing in Design - YouTube
2020
July: Design Decision-Making, Throwing Out Assumptions, and Creating for the User: UNT Professor of Visual Communication Design Michael Gibson explains why, in design, he celebrates failures for their learning potential.
June: UxD students’ design work nominated for international “new talent” design award
April: User Experience and Interaction Design Students Design Prototype for a Dallas-Based “Zero-Waste” App
April: CVAD comm design students take 16 awards, 61 percent of prize money and UNT garners 'best school' in this national competition