Ethnography considered useful: situating criticality

Increasingly the fields of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) and art are intersecting. Interactive artworks are being evaluated by HCI methods and artworks are being created that employ and repurpose technology for interactive environments. In this paper we steer a path between empirical and critical-theoretical traditions, and discuss HCI research and art works that also span this divide. We address concerns about 'new' ethnography raised by Crabtree et al. (2009) in "Ethnography Considered Harmful", a critical essay that positions ethnographic and critical-theoretical views at odds with each other. We propose a mediated view for understanding interactions within open-ended interactive artworks that values both perspectives as we navigate boundaries between art practice and HCI.

[1]  Paul Dourish,et al.  Reflective HCI: towards a critical technical practice , 2004, CHI EA '04.

[2]  L. Suchman.  Human-Machine Reconfigurations: Plans and situated actions (2nd edition). , 2007 .

[3]  Lucy Suchman,et al.  Human-Machine Reconfigurations: Plans and Situated Actions , 2006 .

[4]  C. Heath,et al.  Crafting participation: designing ecologies, configuring experience , 2002 .

[5]  William W. Gaver.  Cultural commentators: Non-native interpretations as resources for polyphonic assessment , 2007, Int. J. Hum. Comput. Stud..

[6]  Nathaniel Stern.  The implicit body : Understanding interactive art through embodiment and embodiment through interactive art , 2009 .

[7]  Paul Dourish,et al.  Where the action is , 2001 .

[8]  Mary Flanagan,et al.  Critical Play: Radical Game Design , 2009 .

[9]  Steve Benford,et al.  Moving with the Times: IT Research and the Boundaries of CSCW , 2005, Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW).

[10]  Ann Morrison,et al.  Bodily Explorations in Space: Social Experience of a Multimodal Art Installation , 2009, INTERACT.

[11]  Tom Rodden,et al.  Ethnography considered harmful , 2009, CHI.

[12]  E. Petersson.  Non-formal Learning through Ludic Engagement within Interactive Environments , 2006 .

[13]  Eva Hornecker,et al.  Learning from interactive museum installations about interaction design for public settings , 2006, OZCHI.

[14]  Steve Benford,et al.  From interaction to trajectories: designing coherent journeys through user experiences , 2009, CHI.

[15]  Yvonne Rogers,et al.  From entry to access: how shareability comes about , 2007, DPPI.

[16]  Peter C. Wright,et al.  Designing culturally situated technologies for the home , 2003, CHI Extended Abstracts.

[17]  Hugh F. Durrant-Whyte,et al.  Shared spaces: Media art, computing, and robotics , 2008, CIE.

[18]  Kristina Höök,et al.  Sense and sensibility: evaluation and interactive art , 2003, CHI '03.

[19]  Paul Dourish,et al.  What we talk about when we talk about context , 2004, Personal and Ubiquitous Computing.

[20]  Margot Brereton,et al.  The lens of ludic engagement: evaluating participation in interactive art installations , 2007, ACM Multimedia.

[21]  J. R. S. Fincham.  Moving with the times , 1992, Nature.

[22]  Phoebe Sengers,et al.  Reflective design , 2005, Critical Computing.

[23]  Ann Morrison.  Situated play in open-ended interactive art environments , 2010 .

[24]  Libby Hemphill,et al.  Human-machine reconfigurations: Plans and situated actions, 2nd ed , 2007, J. Assoc. Inf. Sci. Technol..