UNSATISFYING
(Source: vimeo.com)
Let’s celebrate the new neighborhood with the real Harlem Shake (via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mdeu5aGwwWI)
(Source: youtube.com)
Thanks to DiversAbility for having me speak.
A short talk on self-directed access and framing accessibiity as interdependence:
I’m Christopher. I’m going to talk about the workplace. I’m sorry that’s not the fun topic you were hoping for. For deaf and hard of hearing, this is NEVER a fun topic. Too many of us are un- or underemployed. Stuck on SSDI. And even when we do find work, we’re hit with the intricacies of office communications that seemed designed to leave us out. This is a failure of traditional accessibility that focus on task communications and not social communications. In the workplace, a deaf worker MIGHT have interpretation to verbal communications around meetings and training, but she is not going to have that same level of access in the break room or in the hallway. The social conversations, however, are essential. It’s in these that we find the seeds of innovation. When Steve Jobs took over at Pixar, he moved the bathrooms to a central location, so that Pixar employees came into contact with each other and make small talk. Famously innovative environments like the WWII code breaking labs at Betchley Park in England or the groundbreaking design studio of Charles and Ray Eames brought together people of different backgrounds to capitalize on daily interactions. For the individual, social conversation is an important factor in job advancement by helping workers tap into secondary information about office dynamics: is the boss angry? is there a new position opening up? is the plant facing a slow down? These kinds of conversations that happen outside of primary task-related conversations and they are essential to mastering the workplace. Workers need this kind of information to be in control of their careers.That chatter also has a social purpose that decreases isolation and increases job satisfaction. Have you ever had a job that the work is just okay but you love your coworkers? That’s coming from the social communications. So how do we cross these barriers that keep deaf and hard of hearing from fully participating in their work lives? I think we need to rethink how we frame accessibility. Traditional accessibility is often passive. It depends on sponsorship and top-down leadership. It pits deaf and hard of hearing against their co-workers, their bosses, and their translators. It puts them together in a competitive relationship for scarce resources. What if we found a way to talk about accessibility that is self directed, empowering, and interdependent? I’d like to read a quote from from a conversation that Judith Butler had with Sunny Taylor, the disability rights advocate. I think it’s a great way to think of accessibility that is interconnected. Butler comments that “Nobody goes for a walk without having something that supports that walk, something outside of ourselves.” That “something outside of ourselves” can be anything from the ADA or an ally that we’ve developed such as person in the office that connects us to social conversation. The barriers to communication are continually challenged by different cultures, different languages, different genders, and different abilities trying to find new ways to collaborate. Accessibility that depends entirely on policy and top-down planning, does nothing to support bridging those barriers in collaboration: a collaboration that is diverse, that is empowering for the individual, that reaches out to fellow collaborators and doesn’t isolate. Taking the stand that we are responsible for building bridges and finding allies and new ways to fundamentally attack barriers to participation is my vision for a different kind of empowered, self-directed access. I know that some might think I’m trying to put all of accessibility on those of us that are differently abled: that is far from my intent. I believe that we need strong policies like ADA and workplace protections, but I also believe we need to support workers, of all abilities, in building bridges, finding allies, and taking ownership of participation. Perhaps that’s an overly activist take on our future, but if we aren’t our own best advocates, who will be?
"Embodiment is a feature of interaction, not technology. [E]mbodiment is a question of how the technology is used."
— Paul Dourish, Where the Action Is
(Source: craftingaccess, via craftingaccess)
Thesis Pitch Version 2.5
I’m an MFA candidate in Transdisciplinary Design where we take the tools and methods of design into new contexts. I’m also Deaf. Through a condition at birth, I lost my hearing as I’ve aged. Because of this slow transition, I have extensive experience in mixed communications settings.
From this perspective, my thesis focuses on access to incidental communication in the office place. By incidental, I mean social communication that is unplanned and thus outside the traditional accessibility framework – gossip and grapevine and quick task-based conversations. The inability to access this kind of communication in the workplace can affect job satisfaction and economic mobility through alienation and by limiting access to conversations about employee opportunities. I see this as a third space of accessibility between not accessible and planned access.
I will be building on the strategies and tools that deaf/hh already employ in mixed communication workplaces: from group chat and speech-to-text technologies to white boards and paper as well as the identification of hearing collaborators. Deaf/hh in the office place are hackers of technology and organizational dynamics, inventing new ways to communicate through existing and emerging means. How might I enhance and support these informal methods without losing their flexibility?
(Source: craftingaccess, via craftingaccess)