Faggots are the Future: A Research Through Design Query (rtDq)

The following thesis is positioned as a personal and reflexive research through design journey. In this journey, I explore ways which gender and sexual identity are influential constituents in my design and the design field at large. Through the use of queer and feminist points of view I invite the reader to engage in a critical reimagining of the city, of myself, and of the white hetero cis man's design world. Premised on using a queer lens to reimagine Christopher Frayling's notion of research through Design (rtD)–I aspire to find and experiment with strategies that aim at creating space for explorations outside of personal and societal margins, borders, and binaries. The following work outlines my methods as a communication designer, and grounds these methods with queer and feminist underpinnings that encourage the implementation of identity into our design processes. I position the following body of research as a queery or a research through design queery (rtDq); A self-reflexive research journey that emphasizes and uncovers opportunities for design interventions that address elements of ‘other’-ness present in one's identity

Do-It-Yourself Empowerment as Experienced by Novice Makers with Disabilities

Recent HCI research has highlighted the potential afforded by maker technologies for supporting new forms of DIY Assistive Technology (DIY-AT) for people with disabilities. Furthermore, the popular discourse surrounding both the maker movement and disability is one of democratisation and empowerment. Despite this, critics argue that maker movement membership lacks diversity and that within DIY-AT, it is seldom the people with disabilities who are creating such designs. We conducted a qualitative study that explored how people with disabilities experience the empowering potential of making. We analysed online videos by makers with disabilities and conducted fieldwork at two makerspaces. These informed the design of DIY-Abilities, a series of workshops for people with disabilities in which participants could learn different maker technologies and complete their own maker project. Through analysis of participants’ narratives we contribute a new perspective on the specific social and material capacities of accessible maker initiatives

Designing to Restory the Past: Storytelling for Empowerment through a Digital Archive

Storytelling is a frequently used approach to design. Stories and storytelling also have a role in mediating information and contributing to people\u27s understanding of the world around them. Previous research suggests that storytelling can be empowering to marginalized and diverse communities, such as Indigenous peoples, by offering a platform to voice their (hi)stories. In this paper, we present a research through design project in which we explore the design of the living archive. This is a web-based digital archive that encourages a user-based approach to restorying the past by focusing on storytelling for empowerment and involving members of Indigenous People, the Sami. We demonstrate how a digital archive can contribute to (re)storying the past in a manner that preserves Indigenous ways of knowing and ethical archiving of social memory. Through this archive, we provide the digital tools for the communities to take on the role to tell their truth and, in doing so, become central in the design and communication of their own stories. In short, design for storytelling to empower those who need a voice

Designing technologies for intimate care in women

PhD ThesisDesigning for intimate care remains an underexplored area of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI): while technologies for health and wellbeing might be plentiful, technologies for intimate care are limited. Intimate care is associated with personal hygiene, bodily functions and bodily products, and is a lifetime practice that requires well-defined interventions – by the self, or supported by others. With a move to experience, HCI has explored and responded to some of the concepts of intimate care in recent research, by addressing taboo and life disruptions. However, a wider understanding and conceptualization of intimate care work is missing from the broader HCI discourse on health and wellbeing, as well as a distinct framework for negotiating the design of technologies of intimate care. Addressing this space is noteworthy, within a field that designs technologies to support, enhance, and improve human life (Kannabiran et al. 2011). It is possible that this is related to uncertainty regarding the challenges that technology might bring to intimate interactions, particularly the challenges faced in practices that encompass bodywork and proximity to hidden parts of the body, and the impact of troublesome topics upon wellbeing education. The aim of this research is to enquire into the integration of digital technologies and intimate care towards the development of technologies for engagement with intimate care practices in women. I seek to investigate a methodological approach with a focus on the woman to understand the challenges of designing for and with intimate care; explore the qualities of such woman-centered approach in practice. In this thesis I present three case studies that incorporate empirical methods and new designs that I developed throughout this programme of research. These include 1) ethnographic observations of women’s health physiotherapy within a clinic to understand the components of intimate care within a professional setting; 2) a design toolkit that explores e-textiles for teaching female pelvic fitness, delivered through a series of workshops in which discussions that blended humour and laughter made it entertaining and less embarrassing to ask questions and to express curiosity about intimate bodies; 3) Labella, a probe/intimate wearable for self-learning about hidden parts of the female body and a technology which encompasses embodied interaction, that aims to contribute to breaking down the taboo of looking at oneself to help reduce the barrier of selfcare. Furthermore, Labella aims to support knowledge of the other, while exploring perceptions of esteem and reliance towards practices of care within the body. These three case studies begin to explore and offer insights on how designing for intimate care is entwined in woman-centered approaches to design. ! iv! This thesis contributes to interaction design research and outlines a framework for designing technologies for and with intimate care in women. The research highlights how intimate care pervades personal and professional settings, and its significance throughout the lifecourse. Specifically, I contribute to an underexplored area of HCI, women’s health (outside maternal health) by focusing on a woman-centered methodological approach. In doing this, I explore this approach in practice through challenging existing practices of care within women’s health and by offering novel design concepts and devices, in which I explore humour in design as a method to support learning of sensitive topics and as a tool to diminish the taboo nature of the interactions. Lastly, I propose woman-centered design as a novel form of inquiry in design practice research

MORE WOMEN IN BUSINESS: A participatory approach to empower women entrepreneurs

It is no exaggeration to say that we are living in an era of emerging startups. However, although women's presence in business has become more prominent, they still experience systemic discrimination in such areas as access to resources or capital. Statistics demonstrate that only 16% of Canadian small and medium-sized enterprises are owned by women (Grekou, Li, & Liu, 2018). Moreover, women often encounter more obstacles in starting and running businesses compared to their male peers (Guzman & Kacperczyk, 2019). One way of closing this gap is empowering women entrepreneurs and offering them solutions specifically catered to their needs. This project is a design-led investigation into empowering women entrepreneurs in Canada using participatory design methodologies to identify their major problems in order to generate appropriate solutions. The research explores the following questions: What are the main difficulties for women entrepreneurs before and after launching their businesses? How can women entrepreneurs be empowered to effectively tackle the underlying problems and continue their businesses with fewer obstacles? In this regard, this research went through needs-finding phases, including resource analysis (articles, interviews, online platforms, podcasts, forums, etc.), deep interviews, and co-creation workshops with generative activities. During the participatory activities, a broad spectrum of people who can be affected by design solutions —women business owners, investors, and mentors— were engaged in order to generate insights on women entrepreneurs’ activities, challenges, and achievements. This project demonstrated that even though women encounter different obstacles due to a variety of factors, accessing mentorship and connection to the right community is a frequent request among women. This can have an enormous impact on the success of their ventures. Furthermore, the investigation revealed that, by and large, entrepreneurs struggle with finding available resources or have no idea what already exists — which consequently imposes financial and time costs. To discuss the identified needs and offer feasible solutions, ideation sessions were organized with creative thinkers, entrepreneurs, and mentors. Reaching out to the target group for this research was challenging, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, requiring a tailored strategic approach fitting the new situation. The research uncovered two potential opportunities. First, a space for women entrepreneurs to connect with other entrepreneurs, share their experiences and ask and answer questions. And second, a space to refer to and share entrepreneurship resources. In this regard, an interactive and collaborative platform is offered to facilitate communications between entrepreneurs along with a library of entrepreneurship resources accessible to beginners and experienced entrepreneurs alike.Women empowermentGender parityParticipatory desig

Spimes:A Multidimensional Lens for Designing Future Sustainable Internet Connected Devices

There are numerous loud and powerful voices promoting the Internet of Things (IoT) as a catalyst for changing many aspects of our lives for the better. Healthcare, energy, transport, finance, entertainment and in the home – billions of everyday objects across all sorts of sectors are being connected to the Internet to generate data so that we can make quicker and more efficient decisions about many facets of our lives. But is this technological development completely benign? I argue that, despite all their positive potential, IoT devices are still being designed, manufactured and disposed of in the same manner that most other ‘non-connected’ consumer products have been for decades – unsustainably. Further, while much fanfare is made of the IoT’s potential utility for reducing energy usage through pervasive monitoring, little discourse recognises the intrinsically unsustainable nature of the IoT devices themselves. In response to this growing unsustainable product culture, my thesis centres on the role that sustainability can potentially play in the design of future IoT devices. I propose the recharacterisation of IoT devices as spimes in order to provide an alternative approach for facilitating sustainable Internet-connected product design practice. The concept of spimes was first introduced in 2004 by the futurist Bruce Sterling and then outlined further a year later in his book Shaping Things. When viewed simply, a spime would be a type of near future, internet-connected device which marries physical and digital elements with innate sustainable characteristics. Whereas the majority of sustainable design theory and practice has focused on the development of sustainable non-connected devices, a credible strategy for the design of environmentally friendly Internet-connected physical objects has yet to be put forward. In light of this, I argue that now is the right time to develop the spimes concept in greater depth so that it may begin to serve as a viable counterpoint to the increasing unsustainability of the IoT. To make this case, my thesis explores the following three key questions: • What are spimes? • Can we begin to design spimes? • What does spime-orientated research mean for unsustainable Internet-connected design practice? I outline how, in order to explore these important questions, I utilised a Research through Design approach to unpack and augment the notion of spimes through three Design Fiction case studies. Each case study concretises different key design criteria for spime devices, while also probing the broader implications that could arise as a result of adopting such spime designs in the near future. I discuss the significance of reflecting upon my Spime-based Design Fiction Practice and how this enabled me to develop the spimes concept into a multidimensional lens, which I contend, other designers can potentially harness as a means to reframe their IoT praxis with sustainability baked-in. The key aspects of my process and its outputs are also summarised in form of a design manifesto with the aim of inspiring prospective designers and technologists to create future sustainable Internet-connected devices

Unwrapping DIY enquiry: The study of 'enquiry' in DIY practice at individual, community & place levels

Do-It-Yourself (DIY) enquiry represents ownership over learning and action: figuring things out by oneself, experimenting, and questioning the state of things to find potential solutions to local concerns. It is an identifiable collective behaviour of self-reliance exhibited throughout our history but in the digital age and in societies with increasing levels of education, the way DIY practice unfolds is little understood. Traditional studies on public engagement in science and technology and perspectives on production of knowledge and technology have focused primarily on institutionally mediated methods of public participation and the validity of public contributions to established fields. This thesis research makes empirical, theoretical, and methodological contributions: using a multi-method approach and grounded theory for qualitative data analysis to explore DIY enquiry in practice, community, and place. The three in-depth case studies explore the nature of the production of knowledge, the role of technologies, and the barriers and opportunities to public engagement in DIY enquiry. Participant observation of a community of DIY practice reveals its inner processes, interactions, and framings of science and technology and how DIY practice is performed through DIY tool use and development. The design and facilitation of a DIY workshop series demonstrates the initial stages of engagement in DIY enquiry and reveals that barriers and opportunities to engagement are mediated by frame of mind, setting, facilitation, and interactions. The observation of place-based citizen initiatives of DIY enquiry reveals its range of interconnected actions: development of techniques and strategies for tool development, data interpretation, and leveraging of knowledge and stance for advocacy. Together the cases reveal the transformative power of DIY enquiry, how it builds knowledge, culture, and identity and that engagement requires curiosity, courage, commitment, and foundational competencies. They also reveal an inherent tension between DIY enquiry framed as a means (seeking collective/organised actionable goals) and as an end (enabling personal empowerment). This research facilitates a better understanding of the democratic potential of public engagement in science in our time but it also promotes the leveraging of knowledge production between professional/institutional science and civil society

Constructed Desire: Using Design to Address Notions of Contemporary Sexuality in the Western World

This body of work presents a series of design propositions that seek to address notions of contemporary sexuality in the Western world, particularly in urban North America and Europe. Our evolved sex and love drives find themselves confronted with an ever-changing cultural landscape where sexual norms are enforced and underly- ing instincts are sometimes used for the advancement of agendas and financial gain. Critical theorists and designers translate and expose the existence and operations of ideology, patriarchy, and the unconscious. Using a ‘research through design’ approach and pulling from attitudes and methodologies found in the realm of ‘critical design’ I present a sequence of explorations that are meant to act as proposals, as vessels through which people can reach their own interpretations and opinions about the influence of media culture on how we think about sex, how we have it, and how we talk about it.In support of the fulfillment of the degree of Master of Design at Emily Carr University of Art and Design.Evolutionary PsychologyHuman sexualityCritical designResearch through designSexSexual scriptingPornograph

Designing parametric matter:Exploring adaptive self-assembly through tuneable environments

3D digital models can be created using generative processes, which can be transformed and adapted almost infinitely if they remain within their digital design software. For example, it is easy to alter a 3D structure’s/object's colour, size, geometry and topology by adjusting values associated with those attributes. However, when these digital models are fabricated using traditional, highly deterministic fabrication processes, where form is imposed upon materials, the physical structure typically loses all of these adaptive abilities. These reduced physical abilities are primarily a result of how design representations are fabricated and if they can maintain relationships with the physical counterpart/materials post-fabrication. If relationships between design representations and physical materials are removed it can lead to redundancy and significant material waste as the material make-up of a physical structure can’t accommodate fluctuating design demands (e.g. aesthetics, structural, programmatic). This raises the question: how can structures be grown and adapted throughout fabrication processes using programmable self-assembly? This research explores and documents the development of an adaptive design and fabrication system through a series of ‘material probes’, which begin to address this aim. The series of material probes have been carried out using research through design as an approach, which enables an exploration and highlights challenges, developments and reflections of the design process as well as, the potentials of rethinking design and fabrication processes and their relationships with materials. Importantly, the material probes engage with material computation (e.g. self-assembly/autonomous-assembly) and demonstrate that various patterns, shapes and structures can have various material properties (e.g. volume, composition, texture, shape) tuned and adapted throughout the fabrication process by inducing stimuli (e.g. temperature, magnetism, electrical current) and altering parameters of stimuli (e.g. duration, magnitude, location). As a result, the structures created can tune and adapt their material properties across length scales and time scales. These adaptive capacities are enabled by creating what is termed ‘tuneable environments. Significantly, tuneable environments fundamentally rethink design and fabrication processes and their relationships with materials, since inducing stimuli and controlling their parameters can be used as an approach to creating programmable self-assembly. Consequently, the material platforms’ units of matter do not have to have pre-design properties (e.g. geometries, interfaces) This research points towards future potentials of structures that can physically evolve and lead to the decarbonising of urban contexts where they could behave like ‘living material eco-systems’, and resources are shared to meet fluctuating demands through passive means

Design Principles for More-than-Data Walks

With the rise of the data-driven society, there is a danger of losing insights of unique, nuanced, and complex dynamics that are critical to our understanding of and engagement with place. This research establishes how the use of walking reveals the concept of More-than-Data. This concept forms the basis of a series of design principles capable of engaging with complex, unique, and temporal placed-based data, information, knowledge, wisdom and lived experience. Our understanding and experience of the places we inhabit are being increasingly mediated by technologies, many of which are driven by quantitative, automatically gathered data. These types of data can provide us with huge amounts of information once processed and analysed, however this data-driven mediation of our spaces and places is but one way of understanding and experiencing the world in which we live. Whilst these types of automatically gathered data enable us to gain valuable insights into our world, the reliance upon outsourcing our senses and collecting data are often illegible to many people who do not possess the skills or equipment to engage in these modes of quantifying and mapping place. Other, valuable types of data exist in place, but these are often latent within place or people and more difficult to access. Therefore, those who have much to contribute to increasing knowledge about our world, are often excluded. This research explores the knowledge gap that exists in understanding how these data-driven and situated modes of understanding place might be synthesised and contributes to a growing body of research that explores how we might interrogate the data-driven society through the practice of walking. This nascent approach answers calls for critical approaches to understanding the impact of the data-driven society by moving through a place and exploring what data means in that location. Through the exploration of practices that are located within the data-driven realm the concept of More-than-Data emerged and is defined as “a heuristic guide that encourages and embeds the collection, conceptualisation, interrogation, storage and re-use of data, information, knowledge, wisdom and lived-experience in, from and through place.” To explore how More-than-Data can be embedded within a practice, five walks were designed and carried out. The insights developed through the walks have been synthesised with findings from literature and interviews carried out, to form the basis for a set of design heuristics. The three key contributions to knowledge presented in this research are: 1. The concept of More-than-Data 2. A set of design principles that can be used by a wide range of people that embed More-than-Data in place. 3. The “Pathways Forward” Method that can be used to collate and make sense of emergent findings that brings together diverse types of research data and artefacts