Category: Outreach

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

FROM PARTICIPATION TO SOLIDARITY: A CASE STUDY ON ACCESS OF MAKER SPACES FROM DEAF AND HEARING PERSPECTIVES

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

CONFIGURING PARTICIPATORY RESEARCH AS GIVE AND TAKE RELATIONSHIPS: METHODOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS ON CO-DESIGNING BOOKLETS WITH A MEN SHED

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.

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).

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.