|
blivet radio
The Radio weblog of Hal Rager
 |
Thursday, April 4, 2002 |
[via Got Caliche?] I'm not just plugging my career field here (ok, I am a little), there are ways that anthropology is positively valuable for you application developers out there."It is an historic moment in the world of science -- a breakthrough in the scientific "glass ceiling." Only a handful of women throughout history have ever won the Nobel Prize, and rarely has a woman been honored with a major scientific award. On April 25, 2002, that will change, when, for the very first time, three out of eight Benjamin Franklin Medals and Bower Awards will be presented to women scientists at the 178th Franklin Institute Awards, for their revolutionary achievements. (...) Widely regarded as the "American Nobel Prizes," the Franklin Institute Awards are one of the oldest and most prestigious comprehensive science and engineering awards programs in the world,. (...)
Lucy Suchman, Ph.D., the recipient of the 2002 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Computer and Cognitive Science and a Professor in the Department of Sociology at the Centre for Science Studies at Lancaster University, UK, is being honored for her fundamental contributions to ethnographic analysis, conversational analysis and Participatory Design techniques for the development of interactive computer systems. Her techniques for system development have created a paradigm shift in the way interactive systems are designed. While most of us simply wonder why it has to be so difficult to set the clock on a VCR, or figure out how to use a complex copy machine, Dr. Suchman has actually made it the focus of her work, and the results have had a profound impact on the way corporations design new machines and software.
An anthropologist, Dr. Suchman's research targets the relationship between the culture of a workplace and the way that culture affects the design of new technology, with areas of interest including artificial intelligence, human- computer interaction and information and communications system design. She found a major disconnect between the engineers who design the machines and the people who use them: the engineers know the machines so well, they can't understand why people who are unfamiliar with them might have difficulty. So while working for Xerox, Dr. Suchman went into the field and observed how people use software and machines. Consequently, many large corporations are hiring anthropologists to do the same thing." I don't personally know any to ask them about their work, but that probably doesn't really matter. Still, I have wondered if I could do that sort of thing, It sounds pretty interesting.
8:51:01 PM 
|
|
|
|
