The Monthly Scientific Journal of Bagh-e Nazar

Postcolonial Redesign of Iranian-Islamic Identity in Contemporary Iranian Industrial Design, with an Emphasis on the Concept of Borderline Agency

https://doi.org/10.22034/bagh.2025.528965.5901
Volume 22, Issue 153
March 2026
Pages 21-30
The Monthly Scientific Journal of Bagh-e Nazar

Document Type : Original Research Article

Authors

Meysam Khodashenas
Fatemeh Taji
Siamak Pedrammehr

Department of Industrial Design, Faculty of Design, Tabriz Islamic Art University, Iran

Abstract
Problem statement: In the context of postcolonial and globalization discourses, industrial design in peripheral countries, such as Iran, has evolved into a complex arena for redefining cultural, religious, and historical identities. Therefore, the comprehensive objective of the present study is to analyze how Iranian-Islamic identity is represented in contemporary Iranian industrial design, particularly under conditions where design is no longer viewed as a neutral activity but rather as a site of discursive and cultural contestation itself.
Research objective: This study aims to examine the re-articulation of Iranian–Islamic identity in contemporary Iranian industrial design through a postcolonial lens, with particular emphasis on the concept of border agency. It seeks to analyze the role of industrial designers as cultural agents operating within the tensions between the local and the global, tradition and modernity, and center and periphery, and to explore the possibilities and constraints of identity construction in this in-between condition.
Research method: The present study adopts a theoretical-analytical approach, utilizing the concept of “Borderline Agency “ as a framework to explain the designer’s position situated between the dualities of local/global, tradition/modernity, and center/periphery.
Conclusion: Through a discursive analysis of design artifacts and theoretical documents, the article demonstrates that Borderline Agency is both an opportunity and a challenge: on the one hand, it provides Iranian designers with the chance to recreate meaning and cultural agency; on the other, it exposes them to dualities, identity tensions, and pressures from the global market. The analysis indicates that many products designed in Iran carry efforts to integrate traditional elements with contemporary design language. However, this synthesis is not always successful or tension-free, as designers are compelled to operate in a ‘gray space’ between indigenization, modernization, and cultural representation. Furthermore, the findings reveal that industrial design in Iran has evolved beyond mere technical function and aesthetics, becoming an arena for cultural confrontation, negotiation, and even resistance—a site where the designer, as a border-agent, is engaged in a continuous process of meaning-making and identity-construction within an uneven power structure.

Keywords

Postcolonial Studies
Globalization
Peripheral Countries
Industrial Design
Borderline Agency
Iranian-Islamic Identity.
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