Beyond Make-do Innovation: Practices and Politics of Technological Improvisation in Brazil

In this session, anthropology Ph.D. candidate Liliana Gil will present her doctoral research on technological improvisation in Brazil. In her dissertation, she examines how improvisation has been thought of, performed, and valued across a range of sites of technological pro- duction, from innovation hubs and repair shops in São Paulo to elec- tronics factories in the Amazon. Based on immersive fieldwork, this work makes contributions to debates on inclusive innovation, sustain- able design, repair economies, and tech labor. Gil’s research has been supported by the American Council of Learned Societies, National Science Foundation, and the Wenner-Gren Foundation, and is forthcoming in American Anthropologist.