panshiva (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} panshiva) wrote,@ 2006-11-21 10:55:00 |
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AAA Conference
I went to the American Anthropological Association Conference this weekend and had an awesome time. One of the high points included seeing Hsu Ta Lin, a colleague of mine from graduate school I haven't seen since we were on a panel at UC Berkeley in 1999. I also ran into folks from Dong Hua University in Hualien Taiwan who knew me when I was doing my fieldwork in 1996-97. My advisor Harry Wolcott was there and he introduced me to his great niece who is now an archaeology teacher at a local community college.
Other high points including attending a panel on Design Anthropology and Innovation put on by Elizabeth Brody from GM and Robert Trotter from Northern Arizona university. It seems "Design Anthropology" is starting to gain some serious traction, and I was happy to share my experience with several students from Northern Arizona University's program in applied Anthropology about this field I work in.
I had dinner with friends from the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness at the Gordon Biersch brew pup in San Jose, and had great conversations on Crowley and Thelema with a couple of soon to be graduate students. I also had an interesting discussion with Ian Edgar, a scholar of dreams and the imagination. We chatted about Ibn Arabi, and Henri Corbin's theories of the Imaginal as it relates to Sufism, and Hermetic Magick.
Saturday I went to a panel put on by Intel with another group of design anthropologists. I met one of my dad's patients who is an anthropologist at Fresno State. He wants me to come and give a guest lecture on Design Anthro to his students which I think would be a great way to contribute some of the stuff I am doing back to anthro as a whole. I'm definitely interested in increasing the communication between industry and anthropology departments around this emergent field, and any opportunity to speak or write about it is well worth it.
After the Intel workshop, I went out to dinner with a bunch of anthropologists and design researchers. I had a fun conversation with Julian Orr, famous anthropologist from Lucy Suchman's group at Xerox Parc, and had a great conversations with an Italian Design researcher now living in Portland. I also met a guy from Seattle who knows about Christopher Alexander’s Pattern Language. We talked about Alexander’s book “The Oregon Experiment” where Alexander uses his pattern language to design the University of Oregon campus.
I also bought over $400 dollars worth of books. Since moving down to the Bay Area 6 years ago and going to work in industry, I’ve drifted away from the theory in anthropology as I’ve become more focused on practice and results in my work. My company now is open to me sharing theory and methods, so I’m excited I will get an opportunity to bring this material into my work environment.
Altogether it was an awesome weekend of reconnections, new connections, and sharing around the discipline I'm so very fortunate and proud to be a part of.
I went to the American Anthropological Association Conference this weekend and had an awesome time. One of the high points included seeing Hsu Ta Lin, a colleague of mine from graduate school I haven't seen since we were on a panel at UC Berkeley in 1999. I also ran into folks from Dong Hua University in Hualien Taiwan who knew me when I was doing my fieldwork in 1996-97. My advisor Harry Wolcott was there and he introduced me to his great niece who is now an archaeology teacher at a local community college.
Other high points including attending a panel on Design Anthropology and Innovation put on by Elizabeth Brody from GM and Robert Trotter from Northern Arizona university. It seems "Design Anthropology" is starting to gain some serious traction, and I was happy to share my experience with several students from Northern Arizona University's program in applied Anthropology about this field I work in.
I had dinner with friends from the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness at the Gordon Biersch brew pup in San Jose, and had great conversations on Crowley and Thelema with a couple of soon to be graduate students. I also had an interesting discussion with Ian Edgar, a scholar of dreams and the imagination. We chatted about Ibn Arabi, and Henri Corbin's theories of the Imaginal as it relates to Sufism, and Hermetic Magick.
Saturday I went to a panel put on by Intel with another group of design anthropologists. I met one of my dad's patients who is an anthropologist at Fresno State. He wants me to come and give a guest lecture on Design Anthro to his students which I think would be a great way to contribute some of the stuff I am doing back to anthro as a whole. I'm definitely interested in increasing the communication between industry and anthropology departments around this emergent field, and any opportunity to speak or write about it is well worth it.
After the Intel workshop, I went out to dinner with a bunch of anthropologists and design researchers. I had a fun conversation with Julian Orr, famous anthropologist from Lucy Suchman's group at Xerox Parc, and had a great conversations with an Italian Design researcher now living in Portland. I also met a guy from Seattle who knows about Christopher Alexander’s Pattern Language. We talked about Alexander’s book “The Oregon Experiment” where Alexander uses his pattern language to design the University of Oregon campus.
I also bought over $400 dollars worth of books. Since moving down to the Bay Area 6 years ago and going to work in industry, I’ve drifted away from the theory in anthropology as I’ve become more focused on practice and results in my work. My company now is open to me sharing theory and methods, so I’m excited I will get an opportunity to bring this material into my work environment.
Altogether it was an awesome weekend of reconnections, new connections, and sharing around the discipline I'm so very fortunate and proud to be a part of.
