Datafication and Embodied Intelligence
Brandy Parker, Senior Design Director, Health Portfolio Lead, IDEO and Indigo Weller, Senior Consultant, Stripe Partners
Overview
Today, data analysis, digital technology and design objects are used for measuring, understanding, augmenting, surveilling, and controlling the body. As a consequence, data-driven technologies are continuously asking us to renegotiate our conceptions of and practices with bodies.
This salon discusses current technology designs, and practices around them, to capture and augment bodily modes of intelligence. How should we bridge representations based on data, on one hand, and lived experiences, on the other, when it comes to something so intimate as the body and its sensed phenomenology? What is – and what should be – the role of ethnography and design thinking in the current reformulation of lived, measured, and represented bodies?
References for Participants
Crawford, K., Lingel, J., & Karppi, T. (2015). Our Metrics, Ourselves: A Hundred Years of Self-Tracking from the Weight Scale to the Wrist Wearable Device. European Journal of Cultural Studies, 18(4-5), 479-496. 10.1177/1367549415584857. Download article.
Ruckenstein, Minna and Natasha Dow Schüll. The Datafication of Health. Annual Review of Anthropology, vol. 46:261-278, October 2017. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-anthro-102116-041244
About the Hosts
Brandy Parker, Senior Design Director, Health Portfolio Lead, IDEO
Brandy Parker is a senior design director at IDEO. With a background in ethnography, psychology, and nutrition, she brings a unique whole-person perspective to both medicine and the design world. She works at the intersection of her passions for human-centered design, research, and health care.
Indigo Weller, Senior Consultant, Stripe Partners
Indigo Weller is a consultant and narrative researcher with a background in patient advocacy and medical education. Prior to joining Stripe Partners, he served as a development editor for patients writing illness memoirs and legacy projects. He is a facilitator for the European Reminiscence Network, an international dementia arts initiative, and holds degrees in Bioethics, Narrative Medicine, and Creative Writing.
What Is a Salon?
In Salons, we gather in smaller groups to build collective intelligence about pressing or emerging topics. Hosts set the stage with key points and provocations, then participants drive the discussion, sharing diverse expertise and experiences. We come away with deeper understanding, new strategies and tactics for our work, and a wonderful network of thought partners.