Call for Projects: Anthropology & Design Exhibition 2021

The students of the Department of Anthropology at The New School for Social Research and the Design & Technology program at Parsons School of Design are pleased to issue a call for projects for The New School’s Anthropology & Design Exhibition (ADX) 2021.

ADX invites students from varied disciplinary backgrounds to explore and experiment with anthropological and design research methods that open up new epistemological and creative possibilities, and illuminate our lived experiences and imaginations. The exhibition consists of a virtual reality showcase and a series of virtual moderated panels with artists and presenters.

The bond between anthropology and design is not new. Anthropologists have studied the various processes and effects of design interventions (Suchman 1987; Dourish 2006), and adopted designers’ methods and modes of dissemination (Gunn, Otto & Smith 2013), while designers have deployed anthropological methods and frameworks for critique and human-centered insights (Weizman 2007). This rich and entangled history of design and anthropology has generated new ways of knowing and doing that have widened the scope of both social scientific research and creative practice.

Facing intersecting global crises of public health, climate emergency, financial disparity, political turbulence, and technocracy, the need for collaboration between anthropologists and designers to make conscientious interventions is urgent. ADX 2021 makes a space for anthropologists and designers to interface, share work, and collaborate outside of disciplinary silos.

The committee is interested in a wide range of research-informed projects across disciplines that engage with anthropological questions, and ethnographic methods through design, broadly conceived. Works-in-progress may be presented at this exhibition, if you’d like to showcase your methods, process and iterations. Participants should be able to contextualize their project within the broad scope of anthropology and design. Such projects could include, but are not restricted to:

• Explorations of new formats of methodology and epistemology in anthropology and design
• Research-based design projects
• Experimental ethnography
• Experiments with visualization, sonification, or visceralization; multi-sensory projects.
• Investigating historical intersections of anthropology & design

Sample topics of interest may include: networks and systems, data and platforms, social media, data visualization, digital humanities, civic design, and others.

We welcome a variety of formats and media for submission, which may be: 3D models, academic papers, AI simulations, audio projects, data visualizations, interactive UI, product designs, video projects, visual essays, or others. Please specify in your proposal what form you plan for your project to take.

>> Submit your project via this Google Form