Abstract
This workshop will engage participants in an exercise that conceives experimental design practices that involve communication with other-than-human species. The process encourages a shift away from human-centred control, creating conditions that allow other species to manifest their own behaviours. This is important since the dominant global material culture of design does not acknowledge the presence and interaction of other species with things designed, erasing biodiversity as human habits repeat anthropocentric and destructive ecological patterns. Building on the work of J. J. Gibson’s concept of affordances, and other work that conform the emerging field that today is understood as posthumanism, the workshop will speculate upon possibilities of cohabitation with ‘umbrella’ or keystone species of different locations. Duration: 3 hours. Maximum number of participants: 10.
Keywords
affordances, multispecies, design-driven research, ecosemiotics, biodiversity
DOI
https://doi.org/10.21606/nordes.2025.73
Citation
Avila, M., Mäekivi, N.,and Andersson, E.(2025) Designing for multispecies affordances: A poetics of control, in Brandt, E., Markussen, T., Berglund, E., Julier, G., Linde, P. (eds.), Nordes 2025: Relational Design, 6-8 August, Oslo, Norway. https://doi.org/10.21606/nordes.2025.73
Creative Commons License
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Conference Track
Workshops
Included in
Designing for multispecies affordances: A poetics of control
This workshop will engage participants in an exercise that conceives experimental design practices that involve communication with other-than-human species. The process encourages a shift away from human-centred control, creating conditions that allow other species to manifest their own behaviours. This is important since the dominant global material culture of design does not acknowledge the presence and interaction of other species with things designed, erasing biodiversity as human habits repeat anthropocentric and destructive ecological patterns. Building on the work of J. J. Gibson’s concept of affordances, and other work that conform the emerging field that today is understood as posthumanism, the workshop will speculate upon possibilities of cohabitation with ‘umbrella’ or keystone species of different locations. Duration: 3 hours. Maximum number of participants: 10.