Maker movement in post-industrial Hong Kong

published_or_final_versionMedia, Culture and Creative CitiesMasterMaster of Social Sciences in Media, Culture and Creative Citie

Experimenting with novel socio–technical configurations: the domestication of digital fabrication technologies in FabLabs

Grassroots digital fabrication workshops (such as FabLabs), and associated technologies (such as 3D printers), are attracting increasing attention as a potential source for addressing a variety of social and environmental challenges. Through an analysis of an in–depth case study on FabLabs, this paper aims to provide insights into the practices emerging in these workshops, and realities of the relationship between its members and technologies that are currently under–researched. It does this by drawing upon the domestication literature that concerns itself with how people use, adapt and reject technologies and integrate them into their life. The paper examines the significance of the interactions between people and technologies in FabLabs, and offers concluding reflections on the role of these relationships within broader social and environmental changes

Migration and Questions of Belonging. Migrants in Germany and Florida

Este ensayo describe el enfoque teórico y metodológico que soporta las reconstrucciones de casos empíricos que se tratan en los artículos siguientes. Antes de desarrollar las implicaciones metodológicas, el ensayo también introduce una concepción teórica social-constructivista y biográfica de la creación y la transformación de las construcciones de la pertenencia colectiva. Sobre la base de datos empíricos, este ensayo discutirá el enorme impacto que tiene en la construcción y la reinterpretación de las pertenencias colectivas la interacción entre las historias de la familia e historias de vida y el marco histórico y cultural. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0903191In diesem Beitrag wird der theoretische und methodische Ansatz erläutert, der den empirischen Fallrekonstruktionen zugrunde liegt, die in den folgenden Artikeln vorgestellt werden. Dabei werden eine sozialkonstruktivistische und biografietheoretische Konzeption der Genese und Transformation der Konstruktionen kollektiver Zugehörigkeit vorgestellt sowie deren methodologische Implikationen entwickelt. Auf der Grundlage der empirischen Befunde wird die enorme Wirksamkeit der Familiengeschichte und Lebensgeschichte in ihrer Wechselwirkung mit den historisch-kulturellen Rahmenbedingungen für die Konstruktion und Reinterpretation kollektiver Zugehörigkeiten diskutiert. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0903191This essay describes the theoretical and methodological approach behind the empirical case reconstructions that are discussed in the following articles. The essay also introduces a social constructivist and biographical theoretical concept of the creation and transformation of the constructions of collective belonging before going on to develop the methodological implications. On the basis of empirical findings, this essay will discuss the enormous impact that the interaction between family stories and life stories with the historical and cultural framework has on the construction and reinterpretation of collective belongings. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs090319

Printing a new story : self-representation, disability, and digital fabrication

This essay presents an account of an AHRC Connected Communities Innovation project which used creative writing techniques as a process for generating personally meaningful digitally-fabricated objects, probing the potential of making practices to catalyse cultural change with and for disabled people. This account explores the processes and products of experimental approaches to digital fabrication, speculating that they may be understood as a kind of poetic language, capable of generating counter-hegemonic narratives, which may be read as acts of self-presentation. Digital fabrication’s literal/metaphorical qualities are read through the lens of ‘complex embodiment’, proposing that this technology may be particularly suited to inclusive auto/biographical expression, empowering disabled people to print new stories for and about themselves. Keywords: Digital fabrication; disability; complex embodiment; counter-hegemonic narratives; poetic practic

From 0 to 20: An evolutionary analysis of Open Design and Open Manufacturing

The paper presents an analysis of the evolution of Open Design and Open Manufacturing from 2000 to 2020. The two phenomena are examined by taking into account real experiences in these fields in order to track the most relevant developments. The first step of the research consisted in the identification of the best-known and most often-cited experiences, which have been collected into four different subsets, according to their type, and organised into a chronological visualization.  The second step of the research involved the identification and description of three case studies, one for each of the main types: Instructables, OpenStructures and Precious Plastics. Finally, the paper identifies three main time frames, and expresses the constructive and the critical aspects of the two open processes, concluding with a speculation on three possible futures

From 0 to 20: An evolutionary analysis of Open Design and Open Manufacturing

The paper presents an analysis of the evolution of Open Design and Open Manufacturing from 2000 to 2020. The two phenomena are examined by taking into account real experiences in these fields in order to track the most relevant developments. The first step of the research consisted in the identification of the best-known and most often-cited experiences, which have been collected into four different subsets, according to their type, and organised into a chronological visualization.  The second step of the research involved the identification and description of three case studies, one for each of the main types: Instructables, OpenStructures and Precious Plastics. Finally, the paper identifies three main time frames, and expresses the constructive and the critical aspects of the two open processes, concluding with a speculation on three possible futures

The Political Imaginaries of 3D Printing: Prompting Mainstream Awareness of Design and Making

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. 3D printing is not only a diverse set of developing technologies, it is also a social phenomenon operating within the political imaginary. The past half-decade has seen a surge of “futuring” activity and widespread public attention devoted to 3D printing, which is typically represented as a harbinger of economic revival and political transformation. This article explores how 3D-printed futures are imagined across a broad political spectrum, by undertaking a multidisciplinary analysis of academic and popular literature. Three influential political imaginaries of 3D printing are identified: the maker-as-entrepreneur; the economic revival of the nation state; and commons-based utopias. In spite of stark contrasts in political alignment, these imagined futures share one important thing: an increasing awareness of design, making, and production. This insertion of design into mainstream discourse is an important development for design history and theory, as it potentially enables an increasing public comprehension of the profound significance of design in the world, in both historical and contemporary terms