my name is olav bertelsen, i am working at the computer science department
of aarhus university, denmark, and doing my ph.d. at the information and
media science department.
i have studied the foundations for human-computer interaction; because
theories in this field obviously determines the world that people come to
live in, and because these theories in a identifiable manner mediates
design work.
in the area of human-computer interaction activity theory is the best
theoretical basis i have seen; when it comes to the broader contexts of
computer systems development, and computer support for cooperative work i
am more sceptic: i have a feeling that AT can become too deterministic.
my ph.d.-project is about design artefacts (i.e. artefacts like programming
tools, theories about work, systems development metods etc.) determines the
design proces and the final product.
the surrounding for my project is the centre for experimental system
development at aarhus university (the "devise-centre").
the centre has developed a suite of tools for partisipatory design, and the
evaluation of these tools in an industrial setting is planned to be the
emperical basis for my project.
i have learned a lot from reading a litle Feyerabend; Marx is still the
corner stone (but i have never seen a house with only one corner); some
texts by Wartovsky i read reacently made me feel good; Galperin proved to
be very operational for a paper i co-autored this spring.
the most important thing i have learned about theories that you can't see
without them, and you can't see if you care too much about them.
/olav
olav bertelsen, comp sci dept, aarhus university, denmark
olavb@daimi.aau.dk, http://www.daimi.aau.dk/~olavb
phone +45 89 42 31 88, direct +45 89 42 32 81