The value of anthropology in Design Thinking
It seems like everybody is talking about Design Thinking these days. In case you havent, design thinking is a methodology that has become very popular in contexts of…
Tag: Design
Kurze Abhandlung über eine Wand im Lombardischen
Eine Wand, die es in sich hat: Unterschiedliche Wandstärken, zum Teil in Sichtbeton, zum Teil in einer anderen Betonart ausgeführt, deren Name ich nicht kenne. Dazu kommen, sozusagen…
Vom Wirsing in der Frankfurter Küche
Der altmodische Wirsing und die moderne Frankfurter Küche in einer Karrikatur von Martha Bertina aus dem Jahr 1930. Titel: „Modernes Gemüse“ Das naturbelassene Gemüse ist zu unkontrollier…
Alltagsbalkondesign
Welch einfache Gestaltungsmöglichkeiten es doch gibt: Der zweckmoderne Balkon bekommt eine Gitterstruktur, die ein wenig an Sprossenfenster und somit an einen anderen Stil erinnert und die rote Farbe…
Listening to/with Technology: Meditation Apps as the New Voice of Mental Health
Shortly after giving birth to her son, Jessica[1] began to experience a health problem that she describes simply as “pain everywhere.” About one month after we initially met…
Lilly Irani on her book, Chasing Innovation
https://press.princeton.edu/titles/13362.html Lilly Irani, in conversation with Christopher Kelty (Note: Interview was transcribed, unlike many other interviews on this site which are conducted by e…
Sharing & Communicating User Research
This blog post is a transcript of a podcast / interview I did earlier this year with Zack Naylor, the CEO of Aurelius. Among other things, we discussed…
The Nature of the Copy
From the dead center of an all-white eye, a lone sapling rose two feet tall. Cyclical ridges and valleys, etched in bioplastic by an unseen watchmaker, encircled the…
Voided Spaces: Architectural indices of ravines in Guatemala City
Photo by Jorge Villatoro: Ravine in Zone 3, Guatemala City Deep, canyon-like ravines fracture forty-two percent of Guatemala City. Covered in thick, wet, and dense foliage, these ravines…
Writing disability
Writing inequalities Writing disability through rewriting representations of inequality and vulnerability. Image: R. Cupitt 2018 When writing inequalities, the language we use and our writings betray …
A chat with the Advancing Research community
An abbreviated reprise of my UX Camp Chicago keynote, where I field questions from Lou Rosenfeld’s Advancing Research community about tackling interdisciplinary collaboration in a practical, empatheti…
One woman, three disciplines: Semiotics, design & anthropology.
With this entry, we are closing the series of interviews on Design Anthropology that we have published this year 2018 on the occasion of Why the world needs…
An Uneasy Truce
Over the past few decades, much has been written about the ways in which project teams bring technologies to market. In this context, social scientists typically partner with…
Design Anthropology: an essential tool for innovation. Interview with Alisson Avila
With almost 20 years of multidisciplinary work between Lisbon, São Paulo and Porto Alegre, and a huge sense of adventure towards work, Alisson Avila is a key actor…
Collaboration by Design
In the opening keynote for UX Camp Chicago, I spoke integration and amplification. How do we deepen our focus on interdisciplinary collaboration, in order to deliver better experiences…
Thick Data in Product Development: The Go-Gurt Case
Thick Data refers to all those data obtained in an immersive/ethnographic way aiming at revealing the cultural, social and emotional contexts of one or several study groups. Thick…
Participatory approaches to design digital cultural futures. An interview with R. C. Smith
Rachel Charlotte Smith is assistant professor of design anthropology at Aarhus University. Her research focuses on relations between design, culture and technology, specifically on social chang…
Book Review: Callous Objects: Designs Against the Homeless by Robert Rosenberger
In Callous Objects: Designs Against the Homeless, Robert Rosenberger explores the growth of ‘hostile architecture’ and reflects on what it suggests about society’s attitudes towards …
Designs for the Pluriverse — [book review]
In Designs for the Pluriverse : Radical Interdependence, Autonomy, and the Making of Worlds, theorist and distinguished critic of development Arturo Escobar joins a chorus of works that…
How to Book an Appointment Online when you have Aphasia
I’m meeting a fellow speech therapist researcher at a weekly drop-in session for people with aphasia when Markus* comes in, brandishing an envelope. “I went!” he exclaims. Markus…
Consulting, Big Data and Social Justice w/ Dr. Tricia Wang – This Anthro Life
Dr. Tricia Wang sees her work consulting as sitting at the crossroads of data and social justice. As a global tech ethnographer, Dr. Wang is obsessed with how…
Anthropology can give designers the tools to do better their job
Hugo Rocha is a graphic designer with an MBA in marketing. Even though he told me that nowadays he thinks design shouldn’t really fit with marketing. For him,…
The Power of Small Things: Trustmarkers and Designing for Mental Health
At my office we put tennis balls on the legs of the chairs to reduce the noise of the scraping chairs against the parquet floors. They are hard…
David Parisi on his new book, Archaeologies of Touch
Archaeologies of Touch (US & Canada: use promo code MN82600 for 30% off): https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/archaeologies-of-touch Archaeologies of Touch (EU: use promo code f…