Abstract
Time plays a central role in design research, influencing how people complete daily tasks, plan for the future, and interact with technology. Designers employ various methods, such as journey maps, diary studies, temporal probes, and storytelling, to articulate their conceptualizations of time. They use time to ground findings and envision future possibilities through tools like systems maps and the futures cone. This paper critically examines the use of time-based techniques in design research, highlighting their limitations and capabilities. It explores the intersection of time and trauma, acknowledging trauma's impact on an individual's perception and experience of time. The paper advocates for alternative framings of time, such as feminist temporality and Crip time, to better accommodate complex and nonlinear experiences like trauma. By doing so, it encourages designers to engage with messy temporal experiences to create more inclusive and appropriate design solutions.
Keywords
futures; temporality
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.1032
Citation
Wieczorek, C., and Forlano, L. (2024) Reimagining Temporality: Exploring the Intersection of Time and Trauma in Design Research, in Gray, C., Ciliotta Chehade, E., Hekkert, P., Forlano, L., Ciuccarelli, P., Lloyd, P. (eds.), DRS2024: Boston, 23–28 June, Boston, USA. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2024.1032
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Conference Track
Research Paper
Included in
Reimagining Temporality: Exploring the Intersection of Time and Trauma in Design Research
Time plays a central role in design research, influencing how people complete daily tasks, plan for the future, and interact with technology. Designers employ various methods, such as journey maps, diary studies, temporal probes, and storytelling, to articulate their conceptualizations of time. They use time to ground findings and envision future possibilities through tools like systems maps and the futures cone. This paper critically examines the use of time-based techniques in design research, highlighting their limitations and capabilities. It explores the intersection of time and trauma, acknowledging trauma's impact on an individual's perception and experience of time. The paper advocates for alternative framings of time, such as feminist temporality and Crip time, to better accommodate complex and nonlinear experiences like trauma. By doing so, it encourages designers to engage with messy temporal experiences to create more inclusive and appropriate design solutions.