Event! Trans*Formations with Emma Heany on June 25th, 2025
Category: Outreach
Any posts regarding Outreach like calls or events.
ACCESSTECH @ CHI’25
As we are preparing to head out to Japan for the CHI 2025 Conference, we’re happy to share our nine (!!!) contributions to the Full Paper and alt.chi Programme that we are going to present there. Come find us at the conference or read the papers soon thereafter!
Full Papers
Robin Angelini, Katta Spiel, Maartje De Meulder
SPECULATING DEAF TECH: REIMAGINING DEAF TECHNOLOGIES CENTERING DEAF PEOPLE
What does it really mean to employ a deaf-centered design approach and which previously untapped knowledges open up in using it? We embarked on a journey to understand the participation of deaf people from diverse communities to bring in novel perspectives into HCI research that is the premise for technologies centering deaf people.
This paper also received a best paper award!
Oliver Suchanek, Katta Spiel, Robin Angelini, Janis Meissner
We develop the concept of methodological solidarity in such a way that it describes an ideal that is deliberately unattainable in many respects: project partners can only approach it. Coming close to the ideal requires all participants to reflect on actively initiated processes and their effect on systemic power relations as well as their respective involvement in them.
Dilisha Patel, Ekat Osipova, Katta Spiel, Giulia Barbareschi
A CRITICAL REVIEW OF SEXUALITY, TECHNOLOGY AND DISABILITY
In line with the broader goals of promoting inclusivity, diversity, and equity in technology design and application, we conducted a literature review using feminist content analysis to examine the intersecting domains of sexuality, technology and disability. We provide an outline of existing research on sexuality, technology and disability, and identify the unmarked norms governing research.
Janis Meissner
How can research methods be tailored around give-and-take-relationships with participants? I draw on my collaboration with the Blaydon Shed to discuss the example of co-designing a booklet to serve both as research material for me and brochure for my participants. Along this case study, I discuss gendered and activist tensions in this space, and highlight the political nuance of conduction such research.
Kay Kender, Katta Spiel
SOCIAL MEDIA AS MARGINALISATION MACHINES: THE TRANS DESIRE FOR SOLIDARITY SPACES
We explore desirable and meaningful social media possibilities from a trans perspective, identifying scale, commercialisation and automation as core issues with mainstream social media, alongside algorithmic and other forms of violence. Considering embodied experiences of shifting economised spaces, we propose a shift towards interest-centric, community-oriented places that prioritise interactions based on solidarity over those based on identity.
alt.chi
Ekat Osipova, Kay Kender, Katta Spiel
SEXY AND WE KNOW IT: EXPLORING SEXISTEMOLOGIES FOR HCI
We propose sex as a method to critically engage with technologies and social narratives. After introducing compulsory sexuality and sex exceptionalism, we discuss two case studies that used sex as a method.
Kay Kender, Ekat Osipova
EVIL AUTISTIC MASTER PLAN FOR ACADEMIA: HCI EDITION
We rage against the eugenic logics of the structures we work in, and share our evil plans to overthrow them. We hand out some neat zine fragments from the living document.
Molly O’Reilly-Kime, Yifan Feng, Francesca Cipelli, Ekat Osipova, Kay Kender, Madeleine Steeds, Sarah Clinch, Elisa Rubegni, Jennifer Rode
FINDING OUR JOY: QUEER PERSPECTIVES ON HCI RESEARCH
We join our colleagues in reflecting how we conduct queer HCI with a joyful approach, discuss the challenges we face in doing so, and provide a few handy guidelines for the curious researcher.
Kay Kender, Ekat Osipova
FOUND FOOTAGE FROM THE NUCLEAR PROTECTION NATIONAL PARKS
We immerse ourselves, with some measure of slapstick, in the world of the Nuclear Protection National Parks Austria, to discuss Found Footage as an accessible approach to co-speculation.
Paper Alert: Experiencing Deaf Tech
Robin Angelini, Katta Spiel and Maartje De Meulder just published a paper on Deaf Technology! Curious what it’s all about? We’ve got a quick overview for you in these slides!
👉 Their research dives into how current tech often requires deaf users to adapt, rather than being designed with their needs in mind. 💡
👉 What if technology was specifically created with deaf perspectives as a priority? This paper explores that idea through a case study called Deaf Watch — a concept imagined by deaf participants to better serve their everyday experiences.
Plus, Robin explains the paper’s main points in International Sign (IS).
Open doors with ‘die Maus’
Last week, we had special visitors: ‚die Maus‘ came for a visit along many small and ‘big’ children.
Under the theme ‘Technology for an inclusive future’, we set up four interactive stations as part of #TürenAufMitDerMaus2024, where young and old could playfully
- explore 3D printing,
- immerse themselves in Austrian sign language,
- learn about how circuits and LEDs work, and
- reflect on what solidarity actually means.
Many thanks to our curious visitors, who participated wonderfully and with great interest at each station.
We look forward to seeing you again next year!
More information about the event can be found on the ‘Türen auf mit der Maus’ Website.
You can also find further impressions on our new Instagram channel.
Dazzling contributions at MuC24
ACCESSTECH had a strong presence at this year’s „Mensch und Computer“ (MuC) in Karlsruhe, Germany. Founded in 2001, the MuC conference is the largest conference series on human-computer interaction in Europe.
Almost the entire ACCESSTECH team was on site to present our work and goals in various workshops, paper presentations and panel discussions to an interested audience of experts.
Our first contribution from Kay and Janis was to co-organise and run the workshop Can’t Touch This? Is This Touch? It’s So Fluffy I’m Gonna Die! — Material and Tangible Research Methods in HCI‘. Together, they created a zine with the catchy name ‘Touchy Feely’, which was duplicated in an overnight action and published directly at the conference the next day. We announced the workshops here on this website in April.
On the second day, Katta gave a prominent keynote speech in the workshop ‘Bedürfnisse sind unterschiedlich und verändern sich, Methoden auch? Umdenken bei Forschungsmethoden’ and used their own practical examples to show how research with the mindset of “being consciously non-helpful” can lead to a fundamental understanding and radical implementation of access and participation.
On the third day, our core values of participation and solidarity were again highlighted in the paper presentation entitled ‘Von Partizipation zu Solidarität: Eine Fallstudie zur Zugänglichkeit von Makerspaces aus Gehörloser und Hörender Perspektive’ by Oliver and Katta.
Oliver then took part in a panel discussion on the topic of ‘The State of (In)Accessibility in Academia’ and used their own experiences to argue that the removal of barriers is a continuous process and can only be successful if it is actively driven forward by all parties involved (with and without disabilities).
With these comprehensive contributions and a dazzling appearance (see photo below), we have evidently succeeded in giving visibility and publicity to our concerns among a (partly somewhat traditional) audience.
All in all, it was a very successful conference which, in addition to the professional aspects, also offered an excellent supporting programme with a festival atmosphere and cultural evening events in an impressive setting. We would like to thank everyone involved in the organisation and implementation and congratulate them on a fabulous MuC24!
First ACCESSTECH paper out: “Cyber toy stories: The broken promises and broken parts of interactive sex toys”
Videos show content in International Sign (left) and Austrian Sign Language (right).
Teledildonics are remote-controllable sex toys that transmit touch in real-time via vibrational patterns between two (or more) users. Inspired by sci-fi narratives, they aim at enabling sex at physical distance. The ability to combine teledildonics with virtual reality pornography further promises endless possibilities for sexual interactions.
To investigate how this idea is realized in practice, we took a deep dive into one Dutch teledildonics company, KIIROO.
The results
KIIROO portrays an imminent technologized utopia by promising that their products will revolutionize sexual relationships and improve the health and safety of their customers. However, while they present their claims as established facts, they do so without necessarily providing the required proof to back these up.
Further, despite claiming that their products are for everyone KIIROO’s presentations and design of their teledildonics rienforce cis-hetero-normative concepts of sex, intimacy, and relationships. Thereby a range of groups (such as queer and disabled people) are marginalized, ignored and effectively excluded.
Contrary to the company’s promises, we show how such enactments potentially result in a dystopia characterized by security nightmares around intimacies and dire consequences for mental and physical health, safety, and consensual sexual interactions.
The point
Design and marketing of a product cannot be separated. If we actually want to foster inclusivity, we also need to change the cyber toy stories we tell about intimate technologies.
You can find the full paper at the journal homepage.
Lunchtime Lecture Monday, 13.05.2024 (12:00!): Ruadhán James Flynn
We sponsor a lunchtime lecture at the HCI Group and are happy to let you know we invited Ruadhán James Flynn to tell us about “Whose Standpoint Matters? Imagining Disability Justice”. Please find all information directly at the website of the HCI Group or in the video (in ÖGS).
ÖGGF Gender Lecture
Videos show content in International Sign (left) and Austrian Sign Language (right).
On Tuesday, March 19th 2024 at 6pm, Katta Spiel will give an online talk on “Tech-Utopias between Cyborgs and Care – What Access has to do with Solidarity and Feminism”. It will be given in German and interpreted to Austrian Sign Language. The talk is part of the ÖGGF Lecture Series on Current Positions in Gender Studies. ÖGGF stands for Gender Studies Association Austria. They request you register at office{at}oeggf.at.
