Rosenverse

This video is only accessible to Gold members. Log in or register for a free Gold Trial Account to watch.

Log in Register

Most conference talks are accessible to Gold members, while community videos are generally available to all logged-in members.

AfroFuturism and UX Research

Gold
Monday, March 27, 2023 • Advancing Research 2023
Share the love for this talk
AfroFuturism and UX Research
Speakers: Florence Okoye
Link:

Summary

What might a communal, speculative, Black-centred action research method look like? Reclaiming the discarded, the half-forgotten, the oppressed and marginalised is a key technique in AfroFuturism, whether for creating provocative fiction, exploring alternative technologies or developing radical means to thrive within white supremacist systems. How might this perspective be incorporated into user research? What impact could it have on our artefacts and ways of working? This talk will take precedents from projects that range from introducing masquerade performativity to structure research activities, to early stage research into how service design might intersect with narrative to co-design local policy rooted in anti-racist practice. Join us as we explore both how AfroFuturism can be used as design research methodology and what it can offer user research on a broader scale.

Key Insights

  • Afrofuturism functions beyond aesthetics as a research framework that centers Black experiences to combat white supremacy throughout the design process.

  • Research as praxis involves embedding methods in specific cultural and political contexts, emphasizing accountability in design outputs.

  • Black cultural practices like masquerades and storytelling can be reframed as effective design research techniques with community impact.

  • Afrofuturism problematizes modern notions of objectivity and discipline by breaking down colonial borders, whether disciplinary or national.

  • Design-based implementation research aligns closely with African epistemologies, making methods accessible and participatory.

  • Involving young Black people in policy design using Afrofuturist storytelling and comics creates inclusive spaces to surface diverse racial experiences.

  • Facilitation techniques inspired by call-and-response foster communal contact and mutual respect, essential when dealing with complex racialized experiences.

  • Centering race as a core dimension of research questions opens up more honest investigation and inclusion of marginalized voices.

  • Specificity of cultural lineage and positionality improves openness and cross-diasporic dialogue in research contexts.

  • Afrofuturistic methods help dismantle the artificial divisions between research and participants through collaborative, creative practices.

Notable Quotes

"I desperately needed a specifically Black centered ethos of design to avoid being a pair of hands contributing to imperialistic white supremacist capitalist patriarchy."

"The masquerade is like the design process, a secret alchemy drawing on public elements to create new social organizing."

"Afrofuturism breaks down and distorts the heretical notions of objectivity and disciplines haunted by coloniality."

"Design-based research methods rooted in African epistemologies are accessible and help include participants as co-creators."

"Storytelling became the root of the workshops because it helped everyone relate and respect each other’s experiences."

"By centering racialized experiences in research, we're not just addressing diversity, but fundamental realities shaping modernity."

"The trickster role in African storytelling reveals observersities in systems and shows new ways things should be done."

"Owning your specificity and positionality makes you more open to diasporic experiences and deeper conversations."

"Afrofuturistic research techniques aren’t just cultural displays, but social design methods with explicit intent and thought behind them."

"Racialization is a dynamic complex technology arising in all societies; centering othering is key to social research."

Ask the Rosenbot
Charles Lee
Building a New Home for the Atlassian Design System
2020 • Enterprise Community
Jackie Ho
Lead Effectively While Preserving Team Autonomy with Growth Boards
2024 • Enterprise Experience 2020
Gold
Heidi Trost
When AI Becomes the User’s Point Person—and Point of Failure
2025 • Rosenfeld Community
Amy Jiménez Márquez
The Atypical UX Manager Path
2020 • Enterprise Community
Dr. Jamika D. Burge
Bridge Building across Research Disciplines
2021 • Advancing Research Community
Michael Land
Establishing Design Operations in Government
2021 • DesignOps Community
David Sternberg
Uncovering the hidden forces shaping user behavior
2025 • Rosenfeld Community
Kristin Skinner
Five Years of DesignOps
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Sylvie Abookire
A Civic Designer's Guide to Mindful Conflict Navigation
2022 • Civic Design 2022
Gold
Stephen Pollard
Closing Keynote: Getting giants to dance - what can we learn from designing large and complex public infrastructure?
2017 • DesignOps Summit 2017
Gold
Alexandra Schmidt
Enterprise UX Playbook
2022 • Enterprise Community
Kate Kalcevich
Designing inclusively with AI
2024 • Designing with AI 2024
Gold
Christian Bason
Expand—Rethinking Design for Public Challenges
2022 • Civic Design Community
Jen Cardello
Learning Velocity—The Insights Speedometer
2021 • Advancing Research Community
JD Buckley
COMMUNICATE: Discussion
2018 • Enterprise Experience 2018
Gold
Natalie Dunbar
DesignOps and Content Strategy: Envisioning the Future Together
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold

More Videos

Taylor Jennings

"Cutting down on the analysis time was huge for us, speeding up speed to insight significantly."

Taylor Jennings Joe Nelson Alex Knoll

Repository Retrospective: Learnings from Introducing a Central Place for UX Research

March 9, 2022

Nicole Aleong

"Destiny is the belief that a certain future outcome is predetermined regardless of the path."

Nicole Aleong

Future Orientations to Everyday Life: Futures Anthropology as a Methodology

March 26, 2024

Jeff Gothelf

"Disruptive innovation doesn’t happen overnight; you have to practice, fail, learn, and have patience."

Jeff Gothelf

Innovation Studios: the Engines of Enterprise Experimentation

May 14, 2015

Saara Kamppari-Miller

"By designing products through the lens of edge cases like disabilities first, they often become better products for everyone."

Saara Kamppari-Miller

DesignOps for Inclusive Design and Accessibility

May 26, 2022

Tess Dixon

"You can’t make your team happy, no one can ever make anyone else happy ever, ever."

Tess Dixon

C'mon Get Happy

September 29, 2021

Liam Thurston

"All your team wants to do is win at career Bingo or career Snakes and Ladders, hopefully more ladders."

Liam Thurston

Why Your Design Team Is Quitting, And How To Fix It

June 10, 2022

Ian Swinson

"People care about titles way too much. I had a guy whose business card said star-bellied sneak—love that."

Ian Swinson

Designing and Driving UX Careers

June 8, 2016

Leisa Reichelt

"If you make rules, put numbers in them, and say them confidently, sometimes people actually do them."

Leisa Reichelt

Opening Keynote: Operating in Context

November 7, 2018

Rachael Greene

"It depends was the most common answer to how do you know what you’re doing is working."

Rachael Greene Alison Davis

Building a Design Ops Practice that Really Works (Most of the Time)

October 2, 2025