Semester: M.1.1
Project: first Master project (group)
This project built on the Social Progress Index (SPI), which measures a region’s success based on needs, wellbeing, and opportunity, rather than economic output [14]. My group and I were intrigued by how certain indicators for success, like freedom of religion and LGBTQ+ acceptance, can sometimes be in tension. This raised the question: does a lower score in one area always mean less progress?
Therefore, my group and I designed Entangled Conversations to stimulate conversations about social progress from a situated perspective. It is meant to foster understanding of each other’s perspectives. Sharing personal stories can be very intimate and intimidating. To relieve self-consciousness during storytelling, embodiment plays a large role. Players can feel and interact with each other through the rope, and this helps them get out of their heads and into their bodies. When a player relates to another player’s story, they hook themselves to the rope next to the storyteller. This creates an interesting interaction, as it physically brings players closer together.
My development
During this project, I developed the most in the expertise areas User & Society (U&S), Creativity & Aesthetics (C&A), and Business & Entrepreneurship (B&E). In regard to C&A, I learned that if you start from material explorations, you can discover aspects and qualities of concepts that would not be revealed when you are just thinking about them. In the beginning of the project, we mostly held meetings and talked for hours. As the project progressed, embodiment started to play a bigger role, and we got out of our heads and into our bodies [15]. This helped us discover, for example, that feeling each other through materials helps foster a sense of connectedness. My understanding of the concept of situatedness also grew. If I want to understand where people are coming from, I need to recognize that their experiences, values, and needs are shaped by their social, cultural, and physical contexts [16]. This is highly relevant for me as a designer, because I want to design for a sense of belonging and community, and these concepts differ depending on where, who, and by whom they are experienced. Lastly, my understanding of B&E grew, because we had the chance to validate our concept with De Toekomst van Brabant at the provincial government building of Brabant [17].
Dana Starmans 