ow do we understand ourselves as part of Re:?
I’m still making sense of where and how I fit in at Re. I first attended in Oslo. I was a PhD student at the time and a graduate fellow of the Intel Science and Technology Center for Social Computing. On the one hand, I was a member of a very tech-centered group; on the other hand, I was learning about what humanistic approaches to technology (widely construed) were all about. This split between two scholarly worlds defines my professional experience. It is both frustrating and satisfying.
How has Re:Enlightenment shaped our work?
Having developed an approach to work that draws on humanistic HCI, social informatics, psychology, phenomenology, and infrastructure studies, I frequently find myself arguing against technological determinism and the widespread reduction of the human to the ‘user.’ This puts me in an uncomfortable position relative to the language of the Re:OS. It’s probably more of a rhetorical issue than anything, but where much attention in the computing fields is beginning to focus on humanistic
concerns (e.g., ethics, history, aesthetics – and these are issues that technologies are remarkably ill-equipped to address), I think I see the move towards the language of computing as counterproductive.
Re has been instrumental in shaping my interest in historical and theoretical approaches to HCI. This is particularly true of my interest in archives and theories of the archive. (I have two articles under review right now and three(?) conference presentations that are directly related to this. Geof and I also have a forthcoming book chapter that is related.)
The work contained in This is Enlightenment has also been very important for my ongoing work on the data doppelganger, algorithmic identities, and the ontology of the self in relation to ubiquitous computing. (Works in progress, including a monograph and a large NSF proposal.)
My involvement in Re has also solidified my commitment to diversity. The pronounced lack of diversity at Re is a liability. It was instrumental in my decision to work as a faculty mentor in the Center of Excellence for Women & Tech and the GROUPS
program at IU. (Relatedly, I remain unconvinced that European Enlightenment deserves more focus than other Enlightenments.)
How has our work shaped and reshaped what Pete De Bolla has called the organism of Re?
I am not in a position to answer this question. I hope that my contributions to Re have been meaningful for others, but I can’t say with any certainty whether that’s the case.