Anthropology
Studies human beings in their culture: how they live, what they believe, how they organize themselves and what they do with objects.
What it studies
How to understand people whose lives are not ours. It brings ethnography and a focus on material culture to design.
Principles
Being there
You learn by living alongside and observing, not just by asking.
From the inside
Understand things as the people who live them see them.
Objects tell stories
What people use reveals how they live.
Applications in design
Use it like this
Observe people in their context before designing for them.
Avoid
Calling a one-hour interview ethnography.
Don’t fall for it
Your culture is a culture too: question what you take as normal.
Theories and concepts
Design anthropology
Joins anthropological research and design to intervene and co-create, not just observe.
Methods and tools
- MethodEthnographySpending time in people’s world to understand their daily life and culture from the inside.
- MethodContextual inquiryObserving and asking people questions while they do their work, in their own setting.
- MethodGenerative toolsMaterials for people to make something, such as a collage, and express what is hard to put into words.
Connections
Used in
Authors and works
- 1922
Bronisław Malinowski
Established long-term fieldwork as the method of anthropology.
- 1987
Lucy Suchman
Brought the anthropological lens to the study of how we use machines.
Sources
Original sources
- Malinowski, B. (1922). Argonauts of the Western Pacific. Routledge.
- Suchman, L. A. (1987). Plans and situated actions: The problem of human-machine communication. Cambridge University Press.
Last reviewed: