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Bat-man and the modern smart neighborhood: Exploring more-than-human participatory design and perception shifting
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School of Arts, Design and Architecture |
Master's thesis
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en
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84
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Abstract
Biodiversity is declining worldwide, and acutely so in cities. As urgency increases around the loss of biodiversity and the need for carbon capture, urban green spaces can be remedies for this unexpectedly well. Smart neighborhoods in places such as Helsinki have the opportunity to play a crucial role in biodiversity conservation. With this as motivation, the objectives of this research were (1) to explore if and how more-than-human participatory design could change perceptions around urban open spaces, contributing to approaches that address the sustainability crisis, and (2) to contribute to evaluative research of more-than-human participatory design of which there is currently a large gap. To meet these objectives, background research was carried out and a more-than-human participatory workshop was designed, conducted, and evaluated, focusing on participants’ perceptions of urban spaces after imagining life as a northern bat seeking a home in an urban smart neighborhood. Additionally, pre- and post-workshop surveys were undertaken, and subject matter expert interviews were conducted to supplement the academic research.
This primary research indicated that immersive, role-playing, more-than-human participatory workshops can, and did, shift participant perceptions of urban space. A sense of urgency during the workshop to locate a bat roosting site, combined with the attained knowledge of bats’ needs, helped to shift participant perceptions towards a positive symbiosis between bats, humans, and urban spaces. Shifts also occurred through a raised awareness of the ways in which smart neighborhoods are not currently designed to be environmentally forward beyond the human perspective. Additionally, the research identified a number of tools and techniques used in this more-than-human participatory design method that were effective in helping to shift participant perceptions of urban space, thus contributing to the lack of evaluative literature in more-than-human participatory design. These tools and techniques included pre-workshop surveys that primed participants for the knowledge shared in the workshop, props—such as bat wings to wear and echolocation sounds to listen to—that helped participants to get into the bat mindset, and choices of tasks and self- documentation which gave participants freedom to follow their own interests in problem solving.
Furthermore, although there was a limited participant size, the workshops demonstrated that experiencing a bat’s mindset and needs holds the potential to help design more habitable neighborhoods for both bats and humans, but also to help create the motivation to do so. While there are limits to what humans can imagine, the act of “trying” to know what it’s like to be an animal—understanding what they need, and how we are connected to them—appeared to be sufficient not only to shift perceptions of urban spaces, but also to cultivate the motivation to create, or support, more inclusive and ecologically minded urban design.
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Supervisor
Gaziulusoy, İdilThesis advisor
Veselova, EmilijaBotero Cabrera, Andrea