Exploring digital life-worlds: the postphenomenology of writing

Postphenomenology employs a variety of phenomenological and empirically grounded methods to capture the everyday, lived experiences of different technologies including disciplined observation of humans employing specific technologies, “interviewing objects” and “thing writing”.

Postphenomenological analysis often begins by first reconstructing “posthuman anecdotes”, that is, descriptions of human-technology-world interactions as they are lived, then subjecting these “reassembled resemblings” to a set of postphenomenological analytic tools to help untangle how humans and different technologies in use are mutually shaping and co-constituting each other. Analytics include studying breakdowns (e.g., the “broken hammer” strategy), attending to the invitational quality of things, and discerning the spectrum of human-technology-world relations.

Incorporating the approaches described above with Max van Manen’s work on the phenomenology of practice (2016, 2023), this UCL Knowledge Lab workshop will provide multiple opportunities to experience postphenomenological concepts and research practices firsthand. Participants will also have the opportunity to experience:

1. attuning to the lived meaning of specific technologies through using different writing instruments,
2. writing a postphenomenological description of their experience, and
3. in small groups, trying one or more analytic techniques (e.g., uncovering human-technology-world relations, phenomenological variation), towards an apprehension of generative AIs and writing

Please note this is an in-person event.

Related links

• UCL Knowledge Lab
• Culture, Communication and Media