Exploring the Aesthetic and Humanistic Dimensions of Maker Culture

NY6 MINI THINK TANK
EXPLORING THE AESTHETIC & HUMANISTIC DIMENSIONS OF MAKER CULTURE

@UNION COLLEGE / Friday, June 5th, 2015
Organized by Atsushi Akera (RPI), Ellen Foster (RPI), and Christine Henseler (Union College). For the entire program, go here.

At the 2015 Union College Liberal Arts & Engineering Symposium, on June 5th and 6th, we convened a NY6 Think Tank session for exploring the humanistic and aesthetic dimensions of the contemporary maker spaces movement, and of maker culture as a whole. We were fortunate to have as our opening speaker Jentery Sayers, editor of Making Humanities Matter. His talk was on “Prototyping as Inquiry in the Arts and Humanities” and helped set the tone for the activities that followed.

Prof. Sayer's talk was followed by brief presentations by those who have been involved in creating maker spaces with the “issues” (and opportunities) surrounding the arts and humanities that have arisen in the design and development of their spaces. They included:

Jenn Karson and Doug Webster, University of Vermont
Margot Vigeant, Bucknell University
Ariel Nereson, Vassar College
John Rieffel, Union College
Ellen Foster, RPI

We then divided up into teams that were tasked not only to explore, but to create (i.e. make) solutions for the issue or issues they identified through a variety of structured activities ranging from concept generation to the aesthetic rendering of their ideas and documenting these ideas. As consistent with the concept of the NY6 Think Tank, our ultimate goal was to produce a public article, blog, performance piece, installation, game, and/or student exercises and learning modules that could help disseminate the ideas that we produced during this hands-on concept-building session. For this task, we provided a host of materials, from clay to chalk and wood sticks

These were the guiding questions we used for the initial concept generation:

"Maker Spaces Today"
·      What challenges do we face in maker spaces today?

·      When “making,” what unexpected interactions and surprising intersections emerge across disciplines and professions?

·      In what ways can the arts & humanities expand, amplify, and transform the maker movement?

·      What comes before or after the act of making? Where might the arts, humanities, and social sciences fit in in the “before” or “after”?

·      What is the Art of Making? What difficulties and challenges reside here that merit deeper exploration?

·      What is the relationship between diversity and creativity? How can social/humanistic knowledge be invoked to enhance this relationship?

·      What challenges do we face in maker spaces today?

·      When “making,” what unexpected interactions and surprising intersections emerge across disciplines and professions?

·      In what ways can the arts & humanities expand, amplify, and transform the maker movement?

·      What comes before or after the act of making? Where might the arts, humanities, and social sciences fit in in the “before” or “after”?

·      What is the Art of Making? What difficulties and challenges reside here that merit deeper exploration?

·      What is the relationship between diversity and creativity? How can social/humanistic knowledge be invoked to enhance this relationship?