(Nederlandse tekst, zie onder)
Today we climbed Bennachie Hill in thick 
fog. It was chilly, especially on the stony top, almost blown over by a serious Scottish wind. Together with 30- something other Phd students we are currently in the middle of a course on Design Anthropology. Most of the discussion centers around the question of what Design Anthropology actually is. Nobody’s quite sure. Some think it is (1) about the study, by antropologists, of ‘design’, as it is carried out for instance by industrial designers or landscape architects in their daily practice. Others think (2) it is the study, by antropologists, of the ‘design’ that is present in all human conduct, on the basis of the assumption that design simply is an elementary defining characteristic of what it means to be human. There seems to be a special focus on skill and the role of the body in that, which I like. (Reflecting on it now while making the English translation of this blog I do think that Herbert Simon, with his ‘Sciences of the Artificial’, was undertaking exactly the same project, but from a cognitivistic point of view, which specifically did not include the body, or situated practice, as a part of what ‘design in human conduct’ was about). Others, mainly design-researchers, think this new field defines (3) the application of principles from anthropology to studying ones own ‘design process’. Yet others think it is about (4) applying principles and methods from antropoolology (boy.. this word will definitely have to evolve to something simpler soon if designers need to use it on a daily basis. Let’s just make it Anpy - please note the ironic of me wanting to make things simpler instead of more complex) to doing user research: research people’s culture, rituals, ways of doing things, in order to make more ‘human centered’ design.
I think 2 and 3 might go together rather well. 1 is essentially the same set-up as 4 is, instead roles are shifted: in 4 designers pretend to be Anpy’s that study future users (a people), and in 1 the Anpy’s themselves study designers (a people). Anpy’s had big problems with intepretation 4, on account of it being in practice reduced to ‘quick-and-dirty ethnography misused by the marketing department’. (Those poor marketeers, they are truly the new millenium’s heretics. On the staple!)
On a side note is the discussion on ‘participatory design’. Just as an Anpy cannot stay ‘objective’ with respect to the people she’s studying (I realise now I’ve made Anpy into meaning both Anthropology and Anthropologist. Good. Even more simple - *grin*), a designer cannot stay objective in doing user research: you are in effect meddling with those people’s lives, so might they not also have a say in it? Shouldn’t it be not more a situation of collaboration between various parties, instead of one party designing for, or researching, the other? But how to be able to do research if you start collaborating, isn’t that sort of going over a line?
Anyway, as I said already in Dutch below: luckily there was an easy path up the hill and an easy one down, so despite all the confusion we didn’t actually get lost.
Vandaag zijn we de Bennechie heuvel op geklommen, in een dikke mist. Het was redelijk fris, vooral bovenop de stenen top, waar een straffe Schotse wind waaide. Samen met ongeveer 30 andere Phd-students uit allerlei landen ben ik hier voor een cursus ‘Design Anthropology’. Er is vooral veel discussie over wat Design Anthropology nu eigenlijk is. Niemand weet het zeker. Sommigen vinden dat het gaat over de studie, door Antropologen, van ‘het ontwerpproces’ zoals uitgevoerd door bijvoorbeeld industrieel ontwerpers of architecten in hun dagelijkse praktijk. Anderen vinden dat het gaat over de studie, door antropologen, van het ‘design’ aspect in de gebruiken en rituelen van mensen, in het algemeen, met speciale focus op improvisatie, skill, en de rol van het lichaam. Anderen, met name de aanwezige ontwerpers-onderzoekers, denken dat het gaat over het toepassen van principes uit de antropologie in het doen van onderzoek naar ‘je eigen ontwerpproces’. En even zovelen denken dat het gaat over het toepassen van die principes bij het doen van ‘gebruikersonderzoek’: onderzoek naar mensen die producten gebruiken of gebouwen bewonen die de ontwerper heeft ontworpen of aan het ontwerpen is. Daar doorheen loopt nog een discussie over ‘participatie’: in hoeverre die ‘gebruikers’ meedoen aan het ontwerpproces, of in hoeverre de onderzoeker ‘participeert’ in dat wat hij studeert, of meer algemeen in hoeverre iedereen eigenlijk in iedereens proces participeert en dat het allemaal dus best wel heel complex is.
Gelukkig was er een simpel pad naar boven, en een simpel pad naar beneden, dus we zijn ondanks alles niet echt de weg kwijt geraakt.
Popularity: 11% [?]
