Sarah Pink: Professor of Design and Emerging Technologies: ethnographies on human futures

Sarah Pink is a design anthropologist, researcher, consultant and thought leader, whose work focuses on scholarship and intervention in the fields of technology design, digital technologies in everyday life and design for wellbeing. She is currently Director of the interdisciplinary Emerging Technology Research Lab at Monash University. Sarah’s work engages with contemporary issues and challenges through a dialogue between academic scholarship, applied practice and intervention. She has been International Guest Professor at Halmstad University, Sweden since 2014 and Guest Professor at Loughborough University, UK since 2012. Her research has been funded by national research councils in Australia, UK, Sweden and Spain, and the EU, and through partnerships with organisations including Volvo Cars, Samsung, Unilever, Suncorp. She has designed and undertaken research in UK, Australia, Spain, Brazil, Sweden and Indonesia, and has collaborated across design, engineering and arts and documentary practice. Sarah is also an international leader in innovative digital, visual and sensory research, intervention and dissemination methodologies.

In today’s episode Sarah speaks of her past, current and potential future projects which look into human - technology relation from a more interdisciplinary perspective than human-computer interaction. We ask Sarah about her way to combine academic scholarship and applied work which can make an impact not only in organizations but in the society in a broader sense. She shares her insights on how anthropologists can engage in pushing research and development to a different level and to use design anthropological theories to think of human futures to which technologies have a positive contribution. She also speaks to the concept of trust and its relevance to multidisciplinary collaboration. Lastly, she shares a few words to those considering to join the conference as participants.

Mentioned in Podcast:

Emerging Technologies Lab, Monash University: https://www.monash.edu/mada/research/labs/emerging-technologies-lab

Anthropology + Technology Conference, Bristol 2019: http://www.mundyandanson.co.uk/blog/anthropology-plus-technology-conference-bristol-2019/

MA Visual Anthropology program, University of Manchester: https://www.manchester.ac.uk/study/masters/courses/list/10029/ma-visual-anthropology/

Future anthropologies network (FAN): https://www.easaonline.org/networks/fan/

Digital Energies Future project by Australian Research Council: https://energyconsumersaustralia.com.au/wp-content/uploads/Digital-energy-futures-a-research-agenda-Yolande-Strengers.pdf

Co-designing future smart urban mobility services - A Human Approach (AHA): https://www.vinnova.se/en/p/co-designing-future-smart-urban-mobility-services---a-human-approach-aha/

Sarah’s work:

https://monash.academia.edu/SarahPink

Social media and other links:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-pink-aa9b14ba/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/pinkydigital?lang=en