Doing Things with Research through Design: With What, with Whom, and Towards What Ends?

This workshop provides a venue within CHI for research through design (RtD) practitioners to present their work and discuss how, with whom, and why it is used. Building on the success of prior RtD and design research workshops at CHI, this workshop will focus on how RtD artifacts are used, with the goal of connecting diverse works with broader methodologies in HCI and Design

Strange and Unstable Fabrication

In the 1950’s a group of artists led by experimental composer John Cage actively engaged chance as a means to limit their control over the artworks they produced. These artists described a world filled with active and lively forces, from the sounds of rain to blemishes in paper, that could be harnessed in creative production to give rise to new aesthetics and cultivate new sensitivities to the everyday. This approach to making was not simply act of creative expression but active attempt at creative expansion—a way of submitting to a world of creative forces beyond the self for the sake of seeing, hearing, or feeling things anew. I use these practices as a lens to reflect on the way human-computer interaction (HCI) researchers think about and design for making, specifically as it relates to the present day “maker movement.” I focus on how the design of digital fabrication systems, like 3D printers, could make room for creative forces beyond the maker and why such modes of making are worth considering in HCI research. Since digital fabrication technologies have catalyzed the maker movement and are often described as key instruments for “democratizing” manufacturing, this project joins broader efforts to reflect on values in maker technology as a means of expanding the design space of digital fabrication in ways that could potentially increase the diversity of participants associated with the movement. By weaving through post-anthropocentric theories of the new materialisms, design practice, art history, and HCI, I contribute a theory of making that accounts for the creative capacity of nonhumans as well as design tactics to make room for nonhuman forces in the design of digital fabrication systems. I argue that nonhumans exert material-semiotic forces upon makers that shape their perspectives on stuff and culture in tandem. I then suggest that tools that are both strange and unstable create a space for makers to perceive and work with these forces in ways that honor the unique life and agency of nonhuman matter. As a whole, this work adds dimensionality to HCI’s existing focus on making as a process of self-expression by suggesting new design territories in fabrication design, crossings between critical reflection and creative production. I close this work by speculating on how tools that trade control, mastery, and predictability for chance, compromise, labor, and risk could become valuable within a broader landscape of making

Strange and Unstable Fabrication

In the 1950’s a group of artists led by experimental composer John Cage actively engaged chance as a means to limit their control over the artworks they produced. These artists described a world filled with active and lively forces, from the sounds of rain to blemishes in paper, that could be harnessed in creative production to give rise to new aesthetics and cultivate new sensitivities to the everyday. This approach to making was not simply act of creative expression but active attempt at creative expansion—a way of submitting to a world of creative forces beyond the self for the sake of seeing, hearing, or feeling things anew. I use these practices as a lens to reflect on the way human-computer interaction (HCI) researchers think about and design for making, specifically as it relates to the present day “maker movement.” I focus on how the design of digital fabrication systems, like 3D printers, could make room for creative forces beyond the maker and why such modes of making are worth considering in HCI research. Since digital fabrication technologies have catalyzed the maker movement and are often described as key instruments for “democratizing” manufacturing, this project joins broader efforts to reflect on values in maker technology as a means of expanding the design space of digital fabrication in ways that could potentially increase the diversity of participants associated with the movement. By weaving through post-anthropocentric theories of the new materialisms, design practice, art history, and HCI, I contribute a theory of making that accounts for the creative capacity of nonhumans as well as design tactics to make room for nonhuman forces in the design of digital fabrication systems. I argue that nonhumans exert material-semiotic forces upon makers that shape their perspectives on stuff and culture in tandem. I then suggest that tools that are both strange and unstable create a space for makers to perceive and work with these forces in ways that honor the unique life and agency of nonhuman matter. As a whole, this work adds dimensionality to HCI’s existing focus on making as a process of self-expression by suggesting new design territories in fabrication design, crossings between critical reflection and creative production. I close this work by speculating on how tools that trade control, mastery, and predictability for chance, compromise, labor, and risk could become valuable within a broader landscape of making

The Fundamental Uncertainties of Mothering: Finding Ways to Honor Endurance, Struggle, and Contradiction

Present day ideals of good parenting are socio-technical constructs formed at the intersection of medical best practices, cultural norms, and technical innovation. These ideals take shape in relation to the fundamental uncertainty that parents/mothers face, an uncertainty that comes from not knowing how to do what is best for one's children, families, and selves. The growing body of parent-focused smart devices and data-tracking platforms emerging from this intersection frame the responsible parent as one who evaluates, analyzes, and mitigates data-defined risks for their children and family. As these devices and platforms proliferate, whether from respected medical institutions or commercial interests, they place new demands on families and add an implicit emphasis on how humans (often mothers) can be augmented and improved by data-rich technology. This is expressed both in the actions they support (e.g., breastfeeding, monitoring food intake), as well as in the emotions they render marginal (e.g., rage, struggle, loss, and regret). In this article, we turn away from optimization and self-improvement narratives to attend to our own felt experiences as mothers and designers. Through an embodied practice of creating Design Memoirs, we speak directly to the HCI community from our position as both users and subjects of optimized parenting tools. Our goal in this work is to bring nuance to a domain that is often rendered in simplistic terms or frames mothers as figures who could endlessly do more for the sake of their families. Our Design Memoirs emphasize the conflicting and often negative emotions we experienced while navigating these tools and medical systems. They depict our feelings of being at once powerful and powerless, expressing rage and love simultaneously, and struggling between expressing pride and humility. The Design Memoirs serve us in advocating that designers should use caution when considering a problem/solution focus to the experiences of parents. We conclude by reflecting on how our shared practice of making memoirs, as well as other approaches within feminist and queer theory, suggest strategies that trouble these optimization and improvement narratives. Overall, we present a case for designing for mothers who feel like they are just making do or falling short, in order to provide relief from the anxiety of constantly seeking improvement