Passion project
Intersectionality
A group initiative started by me and four other students at our university, Hyper Island. The purpose of this is to start educating about comprehensive and nuanced understandings of intersectional perspectives.
We are working within an intersectional framework and trying to account for the dynamic and complex ways that race/ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, religion, citizenship, ability, and age shape individual identities and social life. Starting as an internal group within Hyper, we have continued our work and served as a consultant in how the school can counteract racism and discrimination in all the complex ways it might come in
Outcome
1. We have opened up a space for analysis, dialogue and reflections among students and staff.
2. Brought in external expertise that did a thorough examination of the whole school bottom up and contributed with strategic improvement areas.
3. Hyper has now an upper management team solely working with these questions.
4. Student as well as teachers applications for the school now have a less biased process in which they assess them through and bring them in.
5. Through brainstorming workshops & research we created 3 new tools for the infamous Hyper Island tools box. The tools can be used for a team work, designing & self-reflection.
6. Currently we’re working on creating a new course goal that aims to make a structural change in the school curriculumWe
Outcomes
Diversity & inclusion tools
The Circle of Trust
A tool that can be used both individually and for groups. You can rate your circle of trust – think of your ‘inner circle’; work, school, or another group – to see how diverse the group of people you trust is. This tool helps to uncover unconscious, affinity bias.
Demands Continuums
A tool that helps a designer assess the demands a product/design puts on the user. This tool can be used by anyone creating a product, design, or service and wants to critically assess its demand on users.
The Sketch Game
A drawing exercise that shows us how we can have different perspectives on various subjects and/or objects – demonstrating cultural diversities. It can help us unlock some of our unconscious assumptions and biases. The task is fairly simple to execute and doesn’t require more than 6 A4 pages/or post-its and a pen for each participant, or a Miro/Mural or virtual whiteboard.
