More-than-Human Moments via Movement-based Design and Cultural Insights

Abstract

The field of HCI is experiencing a more-than-human turn, expanding its focus on non-human entities, sustainable practices, and the integration of agentic technologies in daily life. This one-day workshop invites participants to co-create moments that facilitate encounters with more-than-human worlds using movement-based design methodologies and exploring cultural insights. Examples include Indigenous Australian games, the whistling vessels of the Incas in Peru, and fables of human-animal, plant, or object transmutation. These embodied experiences with the more-than-human emphasise play, make-believe, and multiple perspectives to foster awareness and empathy with nature that extend into everyday life. Grounded in the idea that our cognitive processes are deeply embedded in our physical interactions and experiences within our environments, movement-based design and cultural insights offer a unique lens to engage with the more-than-human world. This approach can enrich our understanding, research approaches, and relations with the more-than-human. The workshop’s outcomes will include a toolkit designed to engage audiences beyond academia in this exciting design space. Both the workshop and the toolkit will be documented in a future academic publication. These outputs aim to provide a platform to further develop the field of more-than-human design.