I am interested in what you are doing. I may be approaching something similar
and yet completely different. Can you be more descriptive? Not sure if intent
is similar, methodology is similar, process is similar, but at least it would
make interesting discussion. What I am doing has nothing to do with hypertext
software.
Jan

Jan Coker
C3-10 Underdale Campus
University of South Australia
+61 8 8302 6919
"There is no way to peace, peace is the way"
Gandhi


-----Original Message-----
From: Al Selvin [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Sunday, 5 October 2003 1:24 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Designing artifacts for use in mediation and reconciliation

A few weeks ago I submitted the query below to the list. There were no
responses, so I thought I'd try again (since I'd still greatly appreciate
any pointers), but this time making more explicit why I think this area is
of interested to doctoral research in design.

For the last ten years or so I've been engaged in the development and
application of a facilitative methodology that centers around visual
hypertext software (compendiuminstitute.org). Using this approach requires
practitioners to construct and manipulate multidimensional representations
of a problem domain on the fly, often in front of, and with the
participation of, groups of people. There are several levels of design work
going on in such engagements. Since the technique itself can be both
constrained/prescriptive as well as free-form, the practitioner must make
minute-to-minute design decisions about what to 'make' with the tool, how
to change it, what will 'work' from a design perspective. Another level
concerns the design choices and actions of the participants themselves -
how they direct the practitioner to create or make changes to the
representation, or make them themselves. A third is the work the
practitioner and/or participants do with the representation on their own
(i.e. not in the group setting). A fourth, different sort of level concerns
design choices about the software itself, how it can be evolved so as to
better serve the purposes of the other levels.

During this time I have read pretty widely in the computer-supported
collaborative work (CSCW), hypertext/hypermedia, human factors, group
support systems (GSS), participatory design, knowledge management, and
facilitation literatures. I've learned much from these sources, but also
have felt something missing -- something that seemed central to the
understanding of just what was occuring in the work I described above,
certainly in my own experience of it. What I might call "software-centered"
literature tends to treat the subject of practitioner ethics and aesthetics
sketchily, if at all, preferring to talk about "users", a frame which, to
me, leaves quite a bit out. Some facilitation literature does talk about
practitioner ethics and, to a limited degree, aesthetics, but tends to shy
away from direct engagement with the "design" aspect of the work -- the
artifacts that the practitioner/facilitator make (this is true particularly
when such artifacts are produced with the aid of advanced technology, as if
the two realms -- facilitation and technology -- are somehow inherently in
opposition). Or, if they do treat these aspects, it tends to be in a
mechanistic manner -- follow these exact procedures and you will produce
good decisions, etc. Usually the conception of the pracititioner in such
writing is highly constrained, and certainly not treated as a "creative",
"design" actor, one who must make ethical and aesthetic choices, and
improvise, in the course of their work. "Design" in most of these areas of
the litertature is something that users or participants might do, but not
the province of the practitioners themselves.

In the past year I've begun to find some writing that begins to hit the
"spot" I'm interested in -- the intersection of an engaged, expert,
creative practitioner with groups of people, that treats the interaction of
practitioner, tools(s), artifact(s), and participants as itself the subject
of inquiry. I allude to a couple of these below, and there are others, such
as the Research Into Practice conference I first read about here (
http://www.herts.ac.uk/artdes/research/res2prac/). What attracted me to the
phd-design list in the first place were hints of such related interests in
the postings I read here, so I'm hoping that members can suggest additional
readings that can help me along this path.

It's fine to reply off-list. I will collect and post the replies.

Thanks,

Al

______________________________________
Al Selvin
Director, External Portals and e-Learning
CMS-Wholesale
Information Technology
Verizon
White Plains, NY USA 10604
914.644.2156
[log in to unmask]

and

Knowledge Media Institute
Open University
Milton Keynes, UK MK7 6AA
[log in to unmask]



>To:    [log in to unmask]
>cc:
>
>Subject:    Literature query
>
>Hello all,
>
>I've recently read a few pieces that have helped me frame some research
>questions I want to pursue further.
>
>These are: "The Promise of Mediation: Responding to Conflict Through
>Empowerment and Recognition" (R. Bush, J. Folger, Jossey-Bass 1994) and "A
>Poetics of Reconciliation: The Aesthetic Mediation of Conflict (C. Cohen,
>http://www.brandeis.edu/ethics/coexistence_initiative/research_and_scholarship
/reconciliation.pdf

>). Also in this vein is "Story in Art and Mediation: Art, Race and
>Dialogue"  (A. Lovelace, http://www.inmotionmagazine.com/al/alths1.html).
>
>Each covers, from different perspectives, aesthetic and ethical issues
>faced by practitioners of conflict resolution techniques. They go into
>depth on the choices that pracititioners and facilitators must make in
such
>difficult work. Each is grounded in direct experience of such practice,
but
>begins to address a variety of (to me) compelling theoretical issues.
>
>I would appreciate recommendations for more such literature. I'm
especially
>interested in papers that address these types of issues on the part of
>practitioners of techniques that require a high degree of mastery, and/or
>that involve the practitioner themselves creating artworks, design
>artifacts, or other aesthetic interventions that are used in their
>facilitative processes.
>
>I am fairly familiar with the literature on group support systems and
>'conventional' meeting facilitation approaches, so please don't supply
such
>citations unless they directly address the issues above.
>
>Thanks very much,
>
>Al
>
>===========================
>Al Selvin
>Information Technology
>Verizon
>White Plains, NY USA 10604
>914.644.2156
>[log in to unmask]
>
>and as of 1 October:
>
>Knowledge Media Institute
>Open University
>Milton Keynes, UK MK7 6AA