As design researchers who desire to work with locals—and new residents to this community—we began asking ourselves: “how should we engage with a place full of ambitions, histories, relations, wounds, and actions?” Recognizing the often exclusionary and extractive interaction between academic institutions and the communities they engage, we seek a healthy relationship with the human and more-than-human residents of this area in the Sonoran Desert. Importantly, we believe truly building “healthy relationships” means that we must refrain from presuming that residents will share our perspectives and interests.
Therefore, guided by a feminist ethics of care, we have started an initiative to greet the community via the giving of gifts. As design researchers, what do we have to offer? For one thing, we can share our rich experiences with materiality, creative expression, and socio-ecological dynamics. Additionally, we also hold positions in a university brimming with diverse knowledge and resources—a setting to which we can offer access.
This initiative aims to leverage these ingredients to create gifts for locals around pressing matters that pertain to plants and water in the region. The approach for creating these gifts will unfold through four activities: 1) immersive excursions in the Sonoran Desert; 2) interviewing local researchers and Tempe community organizers; 3); mapping socio-technical and ecological systems in Tempe 4); making gifts for Tempeans. These activities require attention to the complexities of the topic, which we will engage in a process of gift-making that involves the review of historical data in conjunction with generative design activities. By drawing together our personal expertise and our positions as part of Arizona State, our gifts aim to support growing relations among community residents and institutions.
The Gifts for Tempe project is supported in part by the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts at Arizona State University
