Reference: Michael, M. (2012). “What are we busy doing?” Engaging the idiot. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 37(5), 528-554. https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243911428624
Abstract: Engagement events—whether interviews, installations, or participatory encounters—can entail a range of happenings which, in one way or another, “overspill” the empirical, analytic, or political framing of those engagement events. This article looks at how we might attend to these overspills—for instance, forms of “misbehavior” on the part of lay participants—not only to provide accounts of them but also to explore ways of deploying them creatively. In particular, Stengers’ figure of the “idiot” is proposed as a device for deploying those overspills to interrogate “what we are busy doing” as social science researchers in engagement events. This interrogation is furthered by considering the proactive idiocy of “Speculative Design’s” version of the public engagement with science which seems directly to engender “overspilling.” Providing examples of speculative design prototypes and practices, the article develops an ideal typical contrast between social scientific and designerly perspectives on public engagement. It is suggested that speculative design can serve as a resource for supplementing “science and technology studies” (STS) conceptualizations of, and practices toward, public, engagement, and science.
My Notes:
This paper makes a couple of thought-provoking contributions. One in relation to 'misbehaviours' that tend to go unnoticed in events such as participatory workshops, which Mike Michael tentatively classifies as:
- absence (failing to turn up);
- incapacity (e.g., being too tired, or drunk, or ill);
- refusal (e.g., being present but remaining silent);
- disruption (heckling at, or aggressively challenging);
- distraction (focusing on something ostensibly irrelevant);
- irony (actually doing something different)
The second argument is that 'speculative design' offers a complementary way of engaging with people. summarised in Table I below, and by the title of this post, a direct quote (p. 541):
"Speculative design’s efforts are ‘'idiotic’'... an idiotic prompt to reflection on, and a slowing of, what STS practitioners are busy doing"
Extra note: The journal "Science, Technology, & Human Values" has interesting content of relevance to designers. And it includes papers authored by design researchers, so it seems like a suitable outlet in addition to the more typical 'design research journals'...
