45,087 research outputs found
Book Review: \u3cem\u3eSacred Matters: Material Religion in South Asian Traditions\u3c/em\u3e
Book Review of Sacred Matters: Material Religion in South Asian Traditions. Edited by Tracy Pintchman and Corinne G. Dempsey. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2015, xi + 221 pp
What does it mean to be a âmaterially attunedâ practitioner?
This paper reports on research in progress that explores the potential role the materiality of things plays as a tool for the critical understanding of the human relationship with man-Ââmade objects. The paper argues that many designers habitually engage with production and consumption of meanings more through the materiality of things than words and symbols. It proposes a hypothesis that materiality is a key to understanding the context, knowledge and information the man-Âmade objects may âembodyâ. Through the case study of an exhibition, the paper examines the ways in which this embodiment may be facilitated. Referring to Heideggerâs notion of "thingness", it further explores the origin of the mediating, and the âengaging capacityâ of objects. The paper draws on the more established analysis of the origin and the experience of the work of art, in its examination of the role that materiality plays in the production and consumption of meaning and in facilitating the experience through objects. While exploring the potential advantage of an anthropological approach to design, the paper suggests that an attunement to materiality and an active reflection on their observations enable the designers to have better insights into the workings of the human-Âobject relationship
What matters to older people with assisted living needs? A phenomenological analysis of the use and non-use of telehealth and telecare
Telehealth and telecare research has been dominated by efficacy trials. The field lacks a sophisticated theorisation of [a] what matters to older people with assisted living needs; [b] how illness affects people's capacity to use technologies; and [c] the materiality of assistive technologies. We sought to develop a phenomenologically and socio-materially informed theoretical model of assistive technology use. Forty people aged 60â98 (recruited via NHS, social care and third sector) were visited at home several times in 2011â13. Using ethnographic methods, we built a detailed picture of participants' lives, illness experiences and use (or non-use) of technologies. Data were analysed phenomenologically, drawing on the work of Heidegger, and contextualised using a structuration approach with reference to Bourdieu's notions of habitus and field. We found that participants' needs were diverse and unique. Each had multiple, mutually reinforcing impairments (e.g. tremor and visual loss and stiff hands) that were steadily worsening, culturally framed and bound up with the prospect of decline and death. They managed these conditions subjectively and experientially, appropriating or adapting technologies so as to enhance their capacity to sense and act on their world. Installed assistive technologies met few participants' needs; some devices had been abandoned and a few deliberately disabled. Successful technology arrangements were often characterised by âbricolageâ (pragmatic customisation, combining new with legacy devices) by the participant or someone who knew and cared about them. With few exceptions, the current generation of so-called âassisted living technologiesâ does not assist people to live with illness. To overcome this irony, technology providers need to move beyond the goal of representing technology users informationally (e.g. as biometric data) to providing flexible components from which individuals and their carers can âthink with thingsâ to improve the situated, lived experience of multi-morbidity. A radical revision of assistive technology design policy may be needed
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Emotional Biosensing: Exploring Critical Alternatives
Emotional biosensing is rising in daily life: Data and categories claim to know how people feel and suggest what they should do about it, while CSCW explores new biosensing possibilities. Prevalent approaches to emotional biosensing are too limited, focusing on the individual, optimization, and normative categorization. Conceptual shifts can help explore alternatives: toward materiality, from representation toward performativity, inter-action to intra-action, shifting biopolitics, and shifting affect/desire. We contribute (1) synthesizing wide-ranging conceptual lenses, providing analysis connecting them to emotional biosensing design, (2) analyzing selected design exemplars to apply these lenses to design research, and (3) offering our own recommendations for designers and design researchers. In particular we suggest humility in knowledge claims with emotional biosensing, prioritizing care and affirmation over self- improvement, and exploring alternative desires. We call for critically questioning and generatively re- imagining the role of data in configuring sensing, feeling, âthe good life,â and everyday experience
Materiality in the future of history: things, practices, and politics
Frank Trentmann is professor of history at Birkbeck College, University of London. From 2002 to 2007, he was director of the ÂŁ5 million Cultures of Consumption research program, cofunded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). He is working on a book for Penguin, The Consuming Passion: How Things Came to Seduce, Enrich, and Define Our Lives, from the Seventeenth Century to the TwentyâFirst. This article is one of a pair seeking to facilitate greater exchange between history and the social sciences. Its twinââCrossing Divides: Globalization and Consumption in Historyâ (forthcoming in the Handbook of Globalization Studies, ed. Bryan Turner)âshows what social scientists (and contemporary historians) might learn from earlier histories. The piece here follows the flow in the other direction. Many thanks to the ESRC for grant number RESâ052â27â002 and, for their comments, to Heather Chappells, Steve Pincus, Elizabeth Shove, and the editor and the reviewer
âMacGyver-Meets-Dr. Ruthâ: Science Journalism and the Material Positioning of Dr. Carla Pugh
This article examines the rhetorical consequences of foregrounding female scientists\u27 materials through an analysis of seven news articles on Dr. Carla Pugh, a surgeon who designs medical patient simulators. Journalists foreground Pugh\u27s materials by positioning her as both âMacGyver,â creatively assembling simulators from everyday objects, and âDr. Ruth,â willingly discussing intimate parts. These positions avoid focusing on Pugh\u27s personal life or body but still ultimately gender her and her work. The MacGyver position associates Pugh with gendered activities, objects, and spaces while undermining her affiliation with the technical aspects of design. Meanwhile, the Dr. Ruth position implies Pugh\u27s knowledge comes from inherent bodily expertise, making certain scientific fields appear more natural for women
Performative ontologies. Sociomaterial approaches to researching adult education and lifelong learning
Sociomaterial approaches to researching education, such as those generated by actornetwork theory and complexity theory, have been growing in significance in recent years, both theoretically and methodologically. Such approaches are based upon a performative ontology rather than the more characteristic representational epistemology that informs much research. In this article, we outline certain aspects of sociomaterial sensibilities in researching education, and some of the uptakes on issues related to the education of adults. We further suggest some possibilities emerging for adult education and lifelong learning researchers from taking up such theories and methodologies. (DIPF/Orig.
Star Architecture as Socio-Material Assemblage
Taking inspiration from new materialism and assemblage, the chapter deals with star architects and iconic buildings as socio-material network effects that do not pre-exist action, but are enacted in practice, in the materiality of design crafting and city building. Star architects are here conceptualized as part of broader assemblages of actors and practices âmaking star architectureâ a reality, and the buildings they design are considered not just as unique and iconic objects, but dis-articulated as complex crafts mobilizing skills, technologies, materials, and forms of knowledge not necessarily ascribable to architecture. Overcoming narrow criticism focusing on the symbolic order of icons as unique creations and alienated repetitions of capitalist development, the chapterâs main aim is to widen the scope of critique by bridging culture and economy, symbolism and practicality, making star architecture available to a broad, fragmented arena of (potential) critics, unevenly equipped with critical tools and differentiated experiences
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