Pragmatic Imagination: Prequel to Design Unbound

By Ann Pendleton-Jullian and John Seely Brown

Pragmatic Imagination is a small book that presents a valuable resource for navigating our broadly connected, rapidly changing, and radically contingent world. It begins from an assumption that agency in the world today requires a productive entanglement of imagination and action. It then presents a framework for unpacking the imagination as a wide range of mental activity that can be put to purpose in this world. This is the Pragmatic Imagination - a concept and framework of six principles. This book was also published as the last chapter of a larger work, Design Unbound: Designing for Emergence in a WhiteWater World . It is both parent and child of this book, which provides a tool set for agency and impact in our world today. Like a single released before an album, this previews the larger work, introducing concepts and themes that both anticipate and encapsulate the larger project. But also like a single, it can stand alone because of the way in which it anticipates and encapsulates the larger project with a singular coherence. From the Back Cover: This book offers a fresh and immensely insightful look at the mystery of imagination. It will change the way you think about imagination, and quite possibly, the world around us. - Paul Saffo, Chair, Future Studies and Forecasting, Singularity University Pragmatic Imagination provokes a radical rethinking of of the central importance of the imagination as a driver of pragmatic action. A gorgeously written and produced volume about the emerging science of creativity by two of today's most intellectually ambidextrous thinkers and doers, this book lays out a social theory to guide both artists and scientists. - Beth Noveck, Professor NYU and Director, The Governance Lab A bold synthesis that ranges from the Surrealists to Sherlock Holmes, Pragmatic Imagination is a manifesto for how to process and reshape the world. - Henry Jenkins, Professor University of Southern California Ann Pendleton-Jullian and John Seely Brown combine their considerable and distinctive sources of expertise to offer a path through our complex an whitewater world. It is a book all social scientists should read. - Margaret Levi, Director CASBS Stanford University Pragmatic Imagination not only provides an intelligent and thought-provoking analysis of how imagination operates but it also offers ideas about how to spark the process of imagination. It should be required reading for anyone who wants to understand how to unleash more innovation, or simply lead a richer life. - Gillian Tett, Editor Financial Times and author, The Silo Effect Architect/designer visionary Ann Pendleton-Jullian and innovation guru John Seely Brown's narrative is a powerful reminder that, if we want to be relevant in the 21st century and beyond, we need to train ourselves to imagine differently. - David L. Morse, CTO and Executive Vice President, Corning Inc.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0CW6593JQ
• ISBN13: 9798879830804
• Release Date: October 2016
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 156 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.4" x 6.0"