In the opening section of their book, Are We Human? Notes on an Archaeology of Design (2016), authors B. Colomina and M. Wigley suggest a dual relationship between “design” and “archaeology”.

The human beings, as an animal species has, to date, covered the Earth on which it lives with designs of its own creation. To critically rethink the process that has led to this point, it is not enough to start from conventional modern design and designers; it is necessary to excavate the historical accumulation on a scale that could be called geological. If we call this an “archaeological” approach, then on the other hand, the methodology of the original archaeology has also relied on the presence of design. This is because the work of determining the age and style of artefacts buried underground is based on the fact that the artefacts found there were ‘designed’ with a specific intention for their users.

Indeed, one might even say that it was inevitable that design and archaeology, two fields that seem worlds apart at first glance, would seek each other out. Rather than focusing on the privileged human subject of the designer, attention should be given to the physical operation and the effects of design as an artificial object. This approach to historical research, often referred to as “media archaeology,” has already advanced, particularly within the fields of film history and audiovisual culture studies, predating its emergence within design history.

Media archaeology refers to an approach that attempts critical examination by comparing past historical accumulations with current media technologies. It particularly aims to stimulate critical thinking about the progressive historical view and technological determinism underlying contemporary media environments. This is achieved by excavating technologies and institutional frameworks surrounding media that were less prominent, fell into disuse, failed to become mainstream, or remained mere imaginings difficult to realize – thereby charting alternative trajectories that could have been. This approach emerged simultaneously in film and media studies within the English-speaking and German-speaking worlds during the 2000s, and has since developed deep connections with the fields of art and design.

The choice of the term ‘archaeology’ has two specific implications. Firstly, as mentioned earlier, it treats the historical accumulation of media technologies as a multi-layered stratum, employing the metaphor of excavating buried artefacts from within it.

One field that adopted this approach early on was film history, particularly research into early cinema. While the experience of viewing films on a large screen in darkness has remained the mainstream form to this day, watching films on televisions, monitors, or tablets can be seen as a reproducible, albeit scaled-down, version of that (and the latter may now be the mainstream). However, the viewing format of the cinema, as its prototype, only became institutionalised from the 1920s onwards. The early films that appeared before this, at least from the late 19th century, were dominated by what film historian T. Gunning termed their nature as “attractions”. These focused more on creating surprise and spectacle through the use of trick shots and editing techniques than on developing narratives. Regarding viewing formats, these originated with Edison’s Kinetoscope, where individuals peered at images alone, and the Lumière brothers’ Cinématographe, initially enjoyed amidst the noisy environments of cafés and circuses. This evolved into the Hales Tour, where footage shot dispassionately from the front carriage of a train was viewed in an environment resembling passenger seating, and the Cinéorama, which offered omnidirectional panoramic views from a balloon-like carriage. In other words, virtual experiential devices were also being developed.

Viewed this way, the historical transformation of cinema as a medium cannot be confined solely to the cinema and its equivalents that have existed to the present day; indeed, it could be said that it has buried the potential for alternative designs. The numerous instances thus overlooked should form a crucial archive for reconsidering what has constituted the mainstream of contemporary cinema and in what sense it might evolve towards “new” technologies. From this perspective, one aim of the media-archaeological approach is to excavate the actual technical details and diverse modes of use, thereby sketching out what might have been possible.

Another implication of “archaeology” concerns the theoretical background of this approach. Among these, Michel Foucault’s work, The Archaeology of Knowledge, published in 1969, must be indispensable. To summarize his arguments broadly, Foucault proposed a method of historical analysis that focuses on the accumulation of what has been said or written (the archive), separating it from human subjects, in contrast to traditional intellectual histories that continuously depict great figures or those in power as reference points. This approach aimed to remain at the empirical level of what was said, rather than interpreting someone’s utterances or writings, thereby revealing the various rules and historical discontinuities through which such discourses formed as specific sciences or fields. Media archaeology, inspired by this approach, similarly attempts to analyse media technologies and artefacts themselves—often created by anonymous or unnamed individuals within the political, economic, and technological contexts of their era—rather than the intentions or motivations of their developers, authors, or designers. It seeks to reveal the patterns and genealogies demanded or conceived through media histories.

This style of historiography had already been introduced in the English-speaking world from the latter half of the twentieth century into the fields of art history and (as previously noted) film history. However, it was Friedrich Kittler who pioneered a distinctive media philosophy by incorporating Foucault’s methodology more explicitly and critically. From the 1980s onwards, Kittler, starting from literary theory, had developed his own historical perspective, theories, and concepts, and extended to contemporary computers, applying Foucault’s arguments—which had primarily focused on analysing archives such as writing and books—to technological media like the gramophone, the film, and the typewriter, interweaving Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalysis. This led to the bold assertion that the media technologies of each era determine the content or the subjects in letters or images. This idea is often criticized as technological determinism (akin to McLuhan’s), but regardless, his argument, which focused on the material level of media technology’s operation rather than the intentions of inventors or users, or their ideological and conceptual backgrounds, exerted no small influence on what later became media archaeology (though he himself did not call it that).

Influenced by the discussion thus far, we should also touch upon the leading proponents who explicitly advocate “media archaeology”. Drawing inspiration from the earlier studies of early cinema, T. Elsaesser and F. Cassetti have developed the media archaeology of cinema precisely at a time when the cinema as institutions is transforming. E. Huhtamo traces back to pre-cinematic visual cultures, physically collecting artefacts such as the magic lantern and peep-show devices that served as prototypes for projection equipment, or coin-slot arcade games, linking them to the works of contemporary media artists. From a similar perspective, W. Strauven also develops an “archaeology of the touchscreen” by refining the history and theory of visual culture encompassing cinema, toys, and television. Meanwhile, in Germany, scholars such as S. Zylinski and W. Ernst, building more directly upon Kittler’s work, have developed theoretical and philosophical analyses closely linked to the history of science and technology, offering sharp critiques of cybernetics, computers, and digital devices. Despite differing objects of analysis and theoretical backgrounds, these studies share a common focus on the concrete operation and usage levels of media technologies, seeking to reveal complex divergences and underlying currents that contrast with the linear history of technological progress.

Jussi Parikka, who published his book What is Media Archaeology? in 2012, positions his own work following these studies as the ‘second act of media archaeology’ in his theoretical systematization. Particularly in relation to design, its characteristics and significance can be summarized in the following two points. The first point lies in the fact that an archaeological approach questioning the materiality of media technology has emerged precisely in our current era of digital dominance. Amidst a world where everything seems to be reduced to data and centralized online, it becomes increasingly essential to critically re-examine how media technologies have been designed as concrete objects, or conversely, how they have shaped our bodies, actions, and perceptions.

Secondly, there is its close interconnection with art and design. Parikka contends that media archaeology should function as a “methodology for creative practice”. Indeed, Huhtamo himself cites artists such as Toshio Iwai and Paul DeMarinis, referring to them as artists who had already begun media archaeological investigations before me. Whether it be the former, weaving 19th-century optical toys with contemporary technology, or the latter, developing works paying homage to inventor Edison, what they share is the figure of the practitioner who engages in critical thinking while repairing or tinkering with media technology, as Huhtamo terms the ‘T(h)inker’. The significance media archaeology brings to design, therefore, extends beyond mere technical practice; it is directed towards recasting the very history of design itself. (Nobuhiro MASUDA)

Related Classes

• Design Future Course, Design Aesthetics
• Design Literacy Subjects, Design Theory 1/2

References

• Colomina, Beatriz and Mark Wigley (2016) Are We Human? Notes on an Archaeology of Design, Zürich: Lars Müller Publishers
• Crary, Jonathan (1990) Techniques of the Observer: On Vision and Modernity in the Nineteenth Century, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
• Foucault, Michel (1969) The Archaeology of Knowledge, Trans. A. M. Sheridan Smith. London and New York: Routledge, 2002
• Gunning, Tom (2025) The Attractions of the Moving Image: Essays on History, Theory, and the Avant-Garde, Chicago: University of Chicago Press
• Huhtamo, Erkki and Jussi Parikka (eds.) (2011) Media Archaeology: Approaches, Applications, and Implications, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press
• Kittler, Friedrich (1986) Gramophone, Film, Typewriter, Translated by Winthrop-Young, G. and Wutz, M., Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999
• Parikka, Jussi (2012) What is Media Archaeology?, Cambridge: Polity Press