[849] in peace2
Development by Design: MIT Colloquium 7/22/01
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Payal Parekh)
Fri Jun 22 09:43:28 2001
Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2001 09:41:35 -0400 (EDT)
From: Payal Parekh <parekh@pimms.mit.edu>
To: peace-list@mit.edu, save@mit.edu
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Workshop on Sustainable and Appropriate Technologies here at MIT;
"Development by Design" :
Workshop on Collaborative Open-Source Design of Appropriate Technologies
Sunday, July 22nd, 2001
9:00 AM - 7:00 PM
In conjunction with the Digital Nations Symposium (July 24-25, 2001)
MIT Media Lab, Cambridge, MA
Call for Position Papers: July 1st, 2001
Workshop organized by Graduate Students,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
In cooperation with ThinkCycle.org and Digital Nations
Workshop Website: http://www.thinkcycle.org/dyd/
Correspondence: dyd@media.mit.edu
Introduction
============
Although technological advances into the 21st century have brought many benefits to
industrialized society, a great majority of the world (nearly 2 billion people) still does
not have access to clean water, adequate nutrition, and affordable health care. The rural
population of the world's developing countries and many indigenous groups still lack basic
educational, political and human rights and freedoms. Many of the agricultural and
industrial practices of both the developed and developing world are environmentally
unsustainable and contribute to the erosion of our social fabric.
This workshop seeks to bring together a critical community of individuals and organizations
engaged in collaboratively solving design challenges for appropriate technologies posed by
our environment and the developing world. We wish to explore the lessons learned from
small-scale development initiatives based on simple and innovative design approaches and
how they can be scaled-up to benefit communities everywhere.
Topics of Interest (including but not limited to)
==================
* Design Challenges in Rural or Urban Poor and Indigenous Communities
* Technology Design based on Indigenous/Local Knowledge, Resources and Practices
* Sustainable Design Practices and Participatory Approaches
* Novel Materials and Processes for Appropriate Technologies
* Case Studies from Design of Technology and Development Interventions
* Design Ethnography and Social Assessment
* Open-Source Collaborative Design Tools for Appropriate Technologies
* Models for Distributed Intellectual Property in Collaborative Design
* Developing Interdisciplinary Curriculum for Teaching Sustainable Technology Design
* Models for Distribution and Delivery of Appropriate Technologies in Developing Countries
* Approaches for Cooperative Design Initiatives between Academia, NGOs, Government and
Corporate Sectors.
Based on the position papers submitted, an appropriate program and working groups for the
day-long workshop will be established.
Participation Guidelines
========================
We invite diverse perspectives from individuals in universities, companies, government and
non-governmental organizations, as well as independent innovators. We encourage
participation of an interdisciplinary mix of researchers and practitioners in rural
development, engineering design, human-computer interaction, industrial design,
environmental sciences, anthropology and sociology.
Participants are asked to submit short position papers that describe their prior experience
and ongoing work in design of novel technologies or practices for communities in developing
countries. Position papers can be submitted online at the workshop website in MS Word,
Postscript, PDF or HTML format. The papers should be no longer than 3-5 pages including
abstract, organizational background, references, and description of the problem domain,
design approaches and/or evaluations of novel interventions. Alternatively, papers may
describe novel policies, methodologies or design practices and processes towards open
source collaborative design in this context. Please include what you consider the key
challenges (technological, environmental, social or political) for design and deployment in
these settings.
All position papers will be made available to participants before the workshop. Revised
papers will be included in an informal proceedings distributed at the workshop, as well as
published online. The workshop program will consist of panel sessions and working groups
around topics of interest. In addition, a summary and key outcomes will be presented at the
Digital Nations symposium at MIT (July 24-25). Selected participants will be asked to
submit extended papers for a new online peer-reviewed journal to be published in fall 2001.
We expect to have 40-50 participants, however the workshop program would
be expanded if
there were greater interest. There is no workshop fee. Selected participants (with minimal
funding support) may qualify to receive travel reimbursement. If needed, housing many be
provided by some graduate students. Please indicate any financial constraints in the online
submission form or contact us at dyd@media.mit.edu,.
[ Workshop Online Submission Form available June 18, 2001 ]
Please join the Online Discussion Forum at the website for updates on the workshop and to
share your opinions with participants.
