I’m an Assistant Professor in the Digital Media program in the School of Literature, Communication, and Culture at the Georgia Institute of Technology. I study the products and processes of interaction design. My research draws together the humanities, science and technology studies, and design to increase public engagement with technology and analyze the social and political uses of digital media.
Research Interests
Participation, Politics, Sustainability, Public Design, Civic Media, Political Design, Small-Scale Agriculture and Alternative Food Systems, Information Design for Food, Sensing Technologies and Practices, Information Visualization and Maps
My first book, Adversarial Design, is part of the Design Thinking / Design Theory series on MIT Press.
In this book I examine the ways that technology design can provoke and engage the political. I explore the political qualities and potentials of design by examining a series of projects that span design and art, engineering and computer science, agitprop and consumer products. I view these projects– which include computational visualizations of networks of power and influence, therapy robots that shape sociability, and everyday objects embedded with microchips that enable users to circumvent surveillance–through the lens of agonism, a political theory that emphasizes contention and dissensus as foundational to democracy. Through my analysis I aim to provide design criticism with a new approach for thinking about the relationship between forms of political expression, computation as a medium, and the processes and products of design.
Recent/Upcoming Travel and Events
June 18-29, Kitchen Lab, Walker Art Center Open Field
Minneapolis, MN
Teaching
I am not teaching any courses at Georgia Tech over the summer. In the fall I will be teaching a Project Studio (LCC 6650) on Public Design and Civic Media. The days and times are yet to be settled. Here is a brief description of course.
LCC 6650: Project Studio on Public Design and Civic Media
This project studio will investigate the design and use of civic media. Special emphasis will be placed on the idea of “collectivity” and how forms of participation inform and are supported by digital media in the domains of food systems and citizen science. Activities will include reading across the disciplines of design, human-computer interaction, and science and technology studies, analysis of existing products and services, ethnographic research, and the design and production of digital media systems. Students from any major are welcome to enroll.
