To add my modest biographical note, I "met" Don late 1988/early 1989
(can't recall exactly when).
I had decided to do my MA about interactivity and interaction...
well, I can tell you that in France, at that time, I couldn't really
find a tutor. I finally got one (for the dissertation part), who was
very bright, terribly demanding, and set up the tone quite quickly :
"I'll see you one hour every second week... and you'll have to submit
written elements in between". Plus a list of fields and references I
had to check. God ! None of these fields or books had anything to do
with what I was familiar with. No pictures, papers that endlessly
referenced other papers. Thank God that I had some scientific
background to survive. But distinguishing the subtleties between
semantics, semiotics, cognitive ergonomics, knowledge construction
etc. was sometime discouraging. So many papers about the way air
traffic controllers handle information, Hanoi tower experiments,
papers from Xerox Parc's, Luria's and Ochanine'sOchanine publications
(fascinating)...
...and I found "The psychology of everyday things", still smelling
printer's ink, in one of the scientific bookshops that were still
common in Quartier Latin (I am almost going to cry when I recall
these incredible spaces, cramped with books in stacks, in the most
exotic languages, with the most exotic topics... quantum physics,
topology, versification in Sanskrit, biology of clams..., where the
owners could trace anything in the Babel of worldwide publishing).
I still have the book in my shelf. I didn't agree with a certain
number of things (I should read it again, to see how I have changed),
but it did help me in bridging the gap between the world of cognition
and ergonomics and daily life...
I got my degree, thanks to the conviction of my tutor. My
dissertation is weak, looking at it today. There are only two things
that I am happy about, as they have emerged since as fields of
studies. I wrote five or six pages discussing the need to explore
ethnology (concepts as well as methods) when looking at the general
public dealing with interactive devices that are imposed in our
environment. And the other was that we probably needed new means of
representations to qualify interaction (before testing), and that
movies and dance (the different types of representations that
directors or choreographers use when they are preparing their
project) could be a promising route.
No one was really convinced, the jury told me that I should do
research (but couldn't tell me where)
;-)
Jean
Le 10 juin 11 à 03:59, Ken Friedman a écrit :
Eduardo Corte-Real wrote, “… it is very important to understand why
the “design community people” weren’t interacting with Don Norman
and his century setters’ terrific pals. What were they doing at the
time? Were they doing essentially different things? And if they did,
were they doing it because they were essentially designers? And why and
when they came along after?”
With some rueful amusement, I can tell you what the “design community
people” were doing at the time, and why they weren’t interested.
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