Infographics of the thesis

I tried to make a screen friendly version of the poster. Would probably need to make this more graphics based. Now it’s just a whole lot of blah blah blah…

Presentation Poster

I made a presentation poster. I don’t really like the layout but the content is OK. It’s so stiff. Very traditional. I will do it again if I have time.

PDF version: presentationposter

Infographics

Summary of the results of the study.

Awareness of racial bias acted as a filter through which influencing factors passed. The result was disposal of concepts with racial stereotypes and hindering interference with the creative process. This led to the resolution to postpone critique and to tolerate some racial stereotypes in the design.

The Bitmap illustrations on sale

 

I have placed the bitmap illustrations on sale on Dreamstime. You find them from my DT-portfolio.

As you may notice from the statistics total sales have been modest. Hoping to make more illustrations in the future to boost the business. Probably still concentrating on Africa, university and Bible.

The vector silhouettes on sale

The plain vector silhouettes are now on sale at dreamstime.com:

https://www.dreamstime.com/african-child-house-help-image95131882?utm_medium=email&utm_source=email_newsletter&utm_campaign=

I decided to sell them as a bundle so this one will be a real good deal for the user!

If you purchase the silhouettes would be awesome to see/hear how you found it useful. 🙂

 

New ideas

Im already dreaming of a new project. I would like to study how graphic novels can be used to reflect on experiencing race. I would like to make an auto ethnographic graphic novel about my experiences as a Scandinavian in West Africa. Wish I had gotten this idea months ago so I could have done it as my masters. Oh well, maybe it’s better this way as now I can do it better. 🙂

Re-framing the study

 I was looking at the study from a new light after reading “Doing Research in Design (Crouch and Pearce, 2012). I wanted to refine what is it that this study is really about. I thought this study would seek to find out the effect of past experiences and outside influences on racial biases in design but actually now it seems I have really managed to draft a study that answers the question of how autoethnographic method can help to reduce racial stereotypes in the design outcome through enabling avareness of one’s racial biases and the role of past experiences on them.

In other word should I make the autoethnography the actual subject of my study?

This is the draft of the new abstract.

I’m not sure if this should be a topic for a conference paper looking at the data from a different point of view or wether I should re-write the actual thesis.

—-

The study seeks to find out whether the awareness of one’s racial biases, through the use of autoethnographic methods, can help to reduce the unintended recycling of racial stereotypes.

Series of illustrations of West African characters were produced as a case study. The design process was recorded in field notes accompanied by memories of events in the past that had led to the designer’s present perceptions. The field notes were reconstructed as an evocative autoethnographic narrative. Through this process the designer was able to identify and reject some of the most racially biased concepts and to claim responsibility over the decisions she made.

Using Fiske’s Stereotype Content Model as the basis of the analysis the identified stereotypes were found to be paternalistic and envious in nature. The influences identified were the designer’s personal encounters and the Finnish and Western popular visual culture. Connections to the stereotypes of the colonial era, slavery and abolitionism were noted.

It was found out that though paying attention to one’s racial biases during the design process could be beneficial in order to avoid racial stereotypes, given too much attention it could hinder the creative process.

Keywords:

Racial bias, ethnic bias, design process, out-group, autoethnography, stereotype.

 

Autoethnography -Process, Product, and Possibility for Critical Social Research

My supervisor suggested I read Autoethnography -Process, Product, and Possibility for Critical Social Research Written by Sherick A. Hughes and Julie L. Pennington. I have finally received it.

I will be posting some of my “underlings” (Since it’s a library book and I can’t really underline the actual book).

Feedback on the extended abstract

I sent the extended abstract to a review and got really strong criticism. Nevertheless very helpful feedback that I must take actions upon, and fast!

They wrote:

“Would the trajectory you propose really affect anyone? To what degree is
this intervention likely to impact racism or the sorts of images made or
used, or is it primarily for the designer’s personal development?”

Ahh.. This is what I was afraid of. The work is only valuable as personal development project, enough to gain degree (maybe) but not meeting any need in the (academic) world. This makes me feel so low. I guess I was thinking these images could be like discussion arousing statements and that way they could impact this short of images made and used. Guess not then…

In a nutshell they wanted  more academic references to

• representation in image banks.
• the auto-ethnographic process.
• inclusive design in commercial art practices.
• contemporary literature on ‘implicit bias’ as it relates to image production
  in contemporary media.
• importance of image bank illustrations to African image producers.

They also kindly suggested literature:

• the Image of the Black in Western Art series, published by Harvard UP (I would like to have access to the series but not possible due to cost)
• The Red Fez, by Fritz Kramer ( I could order this one for general interest but I wonder how exactly this relates to my study.)
• http://www.jacobbrancasi.com/work/#/new-images-of-healthcare/ (Very relevant.)

Both reviewers recommended another venue for this paper. So I won’t waste my time trying to present my paper at their technology and future goal oriented conference. I do have another venue in mind anyway but am getting exhausted with trying to finish the thesis and an online course. The deadline of that paper is pretty close.

 

Study on representation in image banks

Jacob Brancasi’s Masters thesis about representation of elderly patients in stock photography.

http://www.jacobbrancasi.com/work/#/new-images-of-healthcare/

This work has really nicely involved the portrayed group in the project. This is something I lack. I guess If I would really want to make a difference I should apply his approach. I think I should try to do a follow up study some day with this approach.