Day 04. Activating Inclusive Futures
Speculating from the thick present:
participatory methods for designing feminist futures
Thursday June 25, 1:15pm EDT
⚡ Lightning Talk, 15 minute session
Covid-19 has made it even more apparent that the experience of global catastrophe is compounded by social inequalities such as gender, class and race. The weight of domestic violence, care work, domestic labour, and poverty, is disproportionally experienced by women and has been felt even more acutely during the pandemic. This talk considers how we move towards a world where this is not the case. It argues that the possibility of social equality by design is constrained by dominant narratives of the future. Visions of the future among the general population, particularly in the West, have been heavily influenced by the techno-utopias of Silicon Valley and/or the dystopian scenarios that circulate on TV and in cinemas. These future visions have changed little since the 1950s.
As memories of the future, they influence, and constrain, the collective imagination, designers included. I argue that if we want to create a socially-progressive future then we need to use methods that utilise different understandings of time. I propose a speculative approach that is inspired by queer feminist theorisations of the ‘thick present’. The ‘thick present’ is a concept that recognises how the present is simultaneously made up of pasts and futures. The past and future are alive in the present not only as personal experience and as social reality, but materially in bodies and environments. Drawing on my experience running feminist futures workshops, I share some of the techniques I have used to get participants thinking about and designing alternative futures.
Sarah Elsie Baker
Senior Lecturer (Master of Design) and Research Coordinator, Media Design School, Auckland
Sarah is a Senior Lecturer and Research Coordinator at Media Design School in Auckland. Her research interests are focused on design and social inequality, especially in relation to user experience, ethics, and critical design. She also has specific expertise in design ethnography, particularly multi-sensory and participatory methods. Sarah teaches postgraduate design courses on design futures, design research, and design and economies. Her most recent research project is focused on developing methods to co-create feminist futures. Prior to working at Media Design School, Sarah lectured in Design Culture + Context at Victoria University of Wellington. Before she moved to New Zealand, she lectured in media and cultural studies at Middlesex University and the University of East London in the UK. She also worked in arts marketing and was involved in a number of major exhibitions at the Hayward Gallery, London.