What does it mean to fix things? And how might starting from repair, instead of design, innovation, invention, etc. – change how we think about technology, art, and creative human action in the world?

This talk will draw on recent and older work in philosophy, sociology and technology studies to make the case for repair as a crucial but widely misunderstood (and undervalued) dimension in our relationships with the non-human world. It will also report on a wide-ranging program of ethnographic research with fixing communities from around the country and around the world – from mobile phone repair workers in Namibia and Bangladesh, to amateur repair movements in Europe and the U.S., to new media artists and robotic surgeons in New York City. It will explore what makes repair work hard and often invisible, and the social, cultural, and environmental promises of a more repair-friendly world.

Dr. Steven J. Jackson is a professor and researcher in the Cornell University Department of Information Science. He teaches and conducts research in the areas of human-computer interaction, technology policy, and global development, with special interest in problems of time, maintenance and repair, and the nature and range of human-object relations (as expressed with and through technology). His academic work has included field studies with groups seeking to deploy new computational infrastructures in fields ranging from physics to fine art furniture production; how new social computing practices may violate and remake existing cultural norms around privacy, ownership, and creativity; and how emerging infrastructures may complicate our basic cultural practices around the production, sharing, and contestation of knowledge. Above all however he cares about technology in its human dimensions, and argues that the value and interest of technology (if any) lies ultimately in its capacity to extend, augment, and realize core human relationships and possibilities (love, sorrow, care, etc.) with and through the material worlds around us.

This event is held in conjunction with The Future of Fixing, on view at Benchspace Gallery & Workshop September 2, 2016 – January 7, 2017.

The Future of Fixing was originally created by From-Now-On and adapted and curated by Marilyn Zapf of The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design under a Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. This project was supported by the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

The Art of Repair || Guest Lecture by Dr. Steven J. Jackson, Nov. 14, 2016 6:30 p.m. at The Center for Craft, Creativity & Design