We are delighted to announce Professor Helen Manchester from the University of Bristol, UK, as one of the keynote speakers for the Design for the Just World Symposium 2024, taking place on 19th and 20th November 2024. This highly anticipated event, a collaboration between the QUT Design Lab and the Centre for Justice, will bring together thought leaders and innovators to explore the intersection of design and social justice.
Professor Manchester’s keynote, titled “Taking care of ageing futures: Reflections on a situated, relational, and care-full praxis of co-design with older adults,” promises to challenge conventional approaches in the field of gerontechnology. If Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is truly committed to ‘taking care of the future,’ she argues, it is crucial to disrupt institutionalised logics that often overlook the voices and lived experiences of diverse older adults.
Helen’s work, drawn from the Connecting Through Culture As We Age project, explores co-designing digital cultural experiences with minoritised older adults to foster social connection and wellbeing in later life. By adopting a feminist-inspired, care-focused approach, Professor Manchester’s research emphasises the importance of situated knowledge and relational dynamics, exploring power structures and everyday practices across four co-design sites: older adults’ homes and neighbourhoods, a community hub, a makerspace, and a design studio.
About Professor Helen Manchester
Professor Manchester is a leader in the field of Participatory Sociodigital Futures at the University of Bristol. She recently completed the UKRI-funded project Connecting Through Culture As We Age and serves as Co-Investigator on the ESRC Centre for Sociodigital Futures, a five-year program that brings together interdisciplinary expertise to explore fair and sustainable sociodigital futures.
Her research is deeply rooted in feminist and post-human approaches, focusing on ageing, digital technologies, and participatory methods. She has a wealth of experience working with minoritised communities and often collaborates with artists, technologists, civil society organisations, and policymakers. Professor Manchester is widely published in the fields of ageing and technologies, particularly around participatory methods and co-designing with marginalised groups.
This keynote will be an incredible opportunity to engage with transformative ideas on design and ageing—don’t miss it!
More to come – watch this space!
We’ll be announcing more speakers and program details soon. Stay tuned for updates, as this will be an event you won’t want to miss!