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Expanding Participation to Design with More-Than-Human Concerns

Conference Paper · June 2020

DOI: 10.1145/3385010.3385016

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 Expanding Participation to Design with More-Than-Human
Concerns
Yoko Akama Ann Light Takahito Kamihira
RMIT University, Melbourne, Malmö University, Sweden/University Senshu University, Tokyo, Japan
Australia of Sussex, Brighton, UK [email protected]
[email protected] [email protected]

ABSTRACT humans means to become concerned about the fate of all living
Participatory Design’s focus on people comes from a social demo- beings, as the awareness of the vital interdependence of all life
cratic vision. However, as climate and existential crises press us to becomes more obvious. Even if we do not love bees for their own
consider wellbeing beyond humans alone, we ask what a pluriver- sake, pollinators are inextricable necessities for life on Earth to
sal design agenda might include and what could be articulated as function. Latour ([42] laments ‘Terrestrials in fact have the very
‘participatory’? Necessarily, this inquiry has limits, as participation delicate problem of discovering how many other beings they need
usually implies human voice, rights, representation and structures in order to subsist (p87). . . as true for a wolf as for a bacterium, for
of decision-making. This paper commits to these concerns while a business enterprise as for a forest, for a divinity as for a family’
asking ethical, political and onto-epistemological questions regard- (p95). Recognition of these interdependencies and how they chal-
ing how worlds and futures are shaped when more-than-human lenge hierarchies of human dominion over others is evident in many
entities – plants, animals, rocks, rivers and spirits – participate fields, including political ecology, environmental humanities, new
in our becoming? We offer a meeting of feminist techno-science materialism, the posthuman, and more-than-human geographies
with practices and philosophies from Japan and beyond to offer (e.g. [5][8] [24][26][80][81]). Such discourses re-think relations,
thought experiments in engaging with difference and plurality. And dismissing generations of essentialized hierarchy and extending
we give several examples of practice situated at ontological bound- grasp of the world’s ‘agencies, dependencies, entanglements, and
aries to offer some novel thoughts on ‘participation otherwise’, relations’ ([23]:17). Design’s reading of these discourses, notably via
always-participating-with-many and the futures this could usher Haraway, Barad, Tsing, Ingold and Escobar, reveals how dominant
in. ‘Modern’ ideology has worked to divide and erode deep relationali-
ties, producing unsustainable and unjust worlds ([17][22][24]).
CCS CONCEPTS Drawing on a broader frame of reference that includes feminist
STS, posthumanism, Shinto and Indigenous cosmology, this paper
• Human-centred computing → Interaction design; Interaction
explores common PD themes such as voice, representation, organiz-
design process and methods; Participatory design.
ing structure and decision-making. We consider what participation
might mean if the focus were on always-participating-with-many,
KEYWORDS
building on more-than-human theories that embrace primordial
More-than-human ontologies, posthumanism, feminist STS, Japan- relationality and interdependence. We look at the conceptual issues
ese Shinto, Indigenous cosmology involved in reconsidering the ‘who’ and ‘what’ of participation,
ACM Reference Format: before contemplating the ‘how’ of methodology that emerges with
Yoko Akama, Ann Light, and Takahito Kamihira. 2020. Expanding Partici- these alternative framings to provide examples of rethinking par-
pation to Design with More-Than-Human Concerns. In Proceedings of the ticipation as expanded ways of being.
16th Participatory Design Conference 2020 - Participation(s) Otherwise - Vol 1
(PDC ’20: Vol. 1), June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia. ACM, New York,
NY, USA, 11 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3385010.3385016
1.1 Contribution and Methodology
1 INTRODUCTION We argue that engaging pluriversally requires us to embody mul-
The history of Participatory Design (PD) is human oriented, born tiple worldviews and forge them into our thinking and practice.
in unease about the impact of automation on workers (e.g.[20]) Our paper questions the human-only ‘who’, ‘what’ and ‘how’ by
and growing into wider concerns about the relation between peo- threading PD’s usual concerns like voice, representation, structures
ple and technology (e.g.[69]). However, to worry about the fate of of organization and future-making decisions through examples of
participating-with-many. One context is Japan, which has main-
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or
classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed tained spiritual traditions in domestic life alongside successive
for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation Western influences from science, technology and industrialization,
on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the so it is not uncommon for many to think of cars and robots as being
author(s) must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or
republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission spiritual [26]. Another account, from Britain, uses imagination in
and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]. generative ways to open dialogue with PD and propose different
PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia onto-epistemologies as elements of a broad and plural inter-related
© 2020 Copyright held by the owner/author(s). Publication rights licensed to ACM.
ACM ISBN 978-1-4503-7700-3/20/06. . . $15.00 vision. They combine to present a radically inclusive vision of PD
https://doi.org/10.1145/3385010.3385016 theory and practice.

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PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia Yoko Akama et al.

The paper acknowledges traditional politics, but it makes the 2 BACKGROUND: THE MORE-THAN-HUMAN
case that, in response to climate change, anthropocentricity and IN PD
species mass extinction, radical rethinking is needed in practice, as
As Light ([49]:29) notes, ‘the very concept of participation presup-
well recognizing pluriversal worlds [22] and the theory of more-
poses there is something going on beyond you to which you can
than-human spheres (see [23] for a good round-up). The political
be invited. Exploding the center produces a counter-concept of
and ethical has historically been a crux of investigation for PD in
already-being-with’. PD has long involved people without a voice
designing technologies, systems and structures. PD navigated using
and/or the power to express themselves. A compelling keynote
concepts of power, access, labour, rights, inclusion, representation
by Patricia Marti at PDC 2006 argued for ways to include people
and voice, with particular interest in marginal or ‘resource-weak’
with dementia and other barriers to full consensual engagement.
humans in democratic decision-making (e.g [20][64]). Designing
Since then, youth, autism and other states impacting ‘full’ partic-
otherwise does not abandon PD’s commitments to support peo-
ipation have come under scrutiny from, for example, Druin [19],
ple in their struggles, but we offer here another, complementary,
Spiel [71]and Keay-Bright [39], noting proxies and carers may be
view of relations with which to develop practice. If being and in-
engaged, and questioning how all people can be included according
terconnection is respected and honoured in all humans and more-
to the ethics of PD [64].
than-humans, then care must extend across further relationships. A
In other work, PD researchers with a broad view of planetary
widening and deepening of ‘self’ to include the more-than-human
cohabitation have explored concepts of deep relationality, finding
can also be ‘felt and conceived as protection of ourselves’ ([60]:35).
a fit between PD ambitions to include all stakeholders and theo-
It reveals the trade-offs that are being made in prioritizing tradi-
ries of interdependence of life. Heitlinger and colleagues [31] have
tional human-centred perspectives and helps us question how to
interrogated the ethical, legal and methodological concerns that
manage such decisions in future.
shape policies and practices in sustainable smart cities, urban in-
Our contribution here is methodological too. Creative non-fiction
formatics and IoT designs, critiquing participation that narrowly
writing allows us to give accounts of participating-with-many. Con-
focuses on designing urban spaces for, and inhabited only by, hu-
temporary non-fiction makes writers visible, releases academic
mans. Stahl and Lindström [72] conduct participatory events with
language from the overtly instrumental, and imbues theory with
residents in the Kingdom of Crystal (Sweden), where the soil has
embodied subjectivity as a ‘politics of location’ ([13][14][27][78]).
been polluted by heavy metals from past glass-making industries.
Sections of this paper are written in ‘first person’ to show how con-
Trauma of this land is attended to by plants that remediate the toxi-
cerns are connected intimately to each author. Our experimentation
city, sharpening our own awareness of how more-than-humans are
follows advocacy to use methods of reporting that are appropriate
participating in maintaining and repairing damages that humans
to content [48]. This is an autoethnographic research method of
cannot ‘undo’ alone. Morrison [58] writes with Narratta, a narwhal
sharing our experiences: demonstrating ‘how we come to know,
that speaks, feels and observes cultural landscapes and concerns for
name, and interpret personal and cultural experience’ ([1]:1). It
the Arctic. Such explorations respond to Haraway’s Staying with the
involves trying to translate the untranslatable and interpret cul-
Trouble [30], addressing challenges of living and communicating
tural phenomena in language / English to share personal, nuanced
with/in multiplicities of species to find connection and ‘make kin
and emotional experiences that we hope resonate with intimacy
in lines of inventive connection as a practice of learning to live and
and vibrancy. Resisting the replicability required in empirical re-
die well with each other in the thick present’ (p297). Other prece-
search, the paper offers theoretical provocation by demonstrating
dents that consider how more-than-humans shape participation
a different ‘how’ for thinking and being.
are focused on artefacts and technologies. Concepts like ‘thinging’,
All in all, this is not a straightforward paper but we hope it is
‘non-human actants’ and ‘object-oriented politics’ ([9][20][36][43])
intriguing to read. It introduces theory from philosophers, anthro-
have shaped PD discourse in critical ways, following theory that
pologists, folklorists and feminist techno-scientists to offer ways to
rejects separating the human from socio-material entanglements.
consider always-participating-with-many by: 1) decentring human
This ethical vigilance ranges from a refusal to render objects as
perspectives to consider life across species; 2) adopting simulta-
inert, needing humans to give them agency and animacy [34], to
neous multiple worldviews; 3) embracing ‘non-living’ forms with
interrogating ways technology (and design) are shaping lives, fu-
ontologies; and 4) relating the more-than-human to the becoming
tures and ecologies. We note that more-than-human participation –
of everything. The first might be seen as a traditional inclusive
systems, knowledges, practices – is often featured in reference to
framing to challenge us to hear many voices. The second to fourth
human-centred concerns: we care because these more-than-human
give a rationale for upending universalist categorizing (hierarchies,
things are made by us and affect us. So what does it mean to fore-
typologies and centres of focus) to be replaced with entanglement
ground the more-than-human without centring the human as the
and co-emergence. In this, we observe a paradox that requires us
reason for attention and concern?
to link pluralism, or the acknowledgment of multiple ontologies,
with an interrelatedness that speaks to the oneness of all. Our con-
tribution, then, is to link radical rethinking with the impetus of
designing. 2.1 Broadening Frameworks
Other fields have attempted to grapple with these questions. Schol-
ars in more-than-human participatory research detail projects that
involve animals, insects, plants and elements as research partners
[6]. Pitt reflects on how ‘planty knowledge’ challenges participatory

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Expanding Participation to Design with More-Than-Human Concerns PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia

research [62]. Bastian ([6]:19) remarks on Western anthropocen- 2.3 Otherness, Alterity and Spirituality
trism that restricts how participation is imagined and ‘to whom Pluriversality requires us to work with multiple worldviews and link
. . . commitments might be made’. Epistemological limits are re- them in our personal thinking and design research practices. Such
vealed in her reflections: ‘efforts to think through the ethics of ecological inclusivity is distinct from the politics of otherness and
community-based research with water . . .provoked as much si- alterity as understood in critical theory and rights-based approaches
lence as discussion. That is, the participatory framing pushed us so to justice.1 Marxist and feminist writers have used The Other [15]
far away from familiar “forms of interaction” that we found we had to denote a form of marginalization. The Other refers, by definition,
almost no conceptual frameworks to draw on’ ([6]:31). These works to relations with a perceived primary (and is, therefore, in a state
reveal challenges in responding to more-than-human research part- of alterity to that primary: cis, white, male). In this way, The Other
ners, such as the one-sidedness of transformations in reporting and helps analyze and challenge structural politics.
fundamental ontology. Viewing the encounters as participatory is The idea of otherness we use is the ontological tangle that allows
problematic, but a bigger problem is lack of frames of reference. for many beings to co-exist, not all of which are made of living
Questions of symbio-politics and the hierarchies of animacy arise matter. There are scholars in anthropology, cultural theory, creative
too in multispecies ethnography, which follows genes, cells and writing and more who have written about ghosts, magic, monsters
a multitude of organisms that shape, and are shaped, by political, and the supernormal as a deliberate tactic to bring these into view
economic and cultural forces. Morton [59] claims that humans are and question what knowledge sanctions and what it can omit, to
always less than the sum of our parts; living well means living with deliberately trouble disciplinary certainties (see [11][40]). Encoun-
biome. Lim [51] compellingly asks how to live with HIV symptoms ters are noteworthy because they can catalyze understandings that
of infection as ‘stories’ told by the virus, listened to by bodies. Ask- are beyond existing paradigms or imagination and jolt us out of
ing whose and what stories are told (and listened to) heightens an complacency in a move towards altering perceptions [57]. For ex-
acuteness for what participation means. In reading where others ample, Popplow and Duque use the playful, rhetorical device of
have gone, we recognize that we need different ways of encounter- ‘Ghosts, idiots and Others ______ . . .. to address tricky hinterlands
ing if we are to enable an inclusive process that acknowledges the of our engagements that all too often remain unspoken in design
breadth of possible relations. academic writing’ ([63]:4).
There are also encounters that go much further, beyond the
comfort of Aristotelian reasoning, to employ ‘logics’ from different
2.2 Not More, but Different Relations
worldviews. An example is cancer-causing death magic, with de-
‘Human exceptionalism’ refers to treating non-human beings as structive power and entities that confront our realities and existence
‘other’. Were we merely to address this by taking a broader sweep [73]. Bringing these relations to bear takes us well outside Mod-
of living things as participants in our work, this would go some ern rationalist design thinking. Walker [79] argues that spirituality
way to understanding power structures and how imbalances have was systemically eroded in northern Europe, through Modernity,
arisen. However, there are more radical ways of considering futures, in favour of scientific investigation, empiricism and technologi-
which speak, not to more stakeholders, but to different relations in cal development. He connects spiritual erosion with accelerated
the world. consumption, damaging our planet and relations. There is work
Escobar ([22]:101) asks if it is possible to develop a deeper notion to accommodate religious practice in design (e.g. [83]), but little
of relationality ‘in which the relational basis of existence radically allowing a more spiritual dimension to inform it. Here, we distin-
pervades the entire order of things’. Like Haraway, he points to an guish between religion and spirituality, building on Buie’s techno-
ontology in which nothing pre-exists the relatings; ‘we inter-are spirituality scholarship [12]. She defines religion as ‘a complex
with everything on the planet’ (ibid). Here, we use pluriversal to rec- cultural and social framework . . .that facilitates the organized prac-
ognize a variety of socio-cultural worldviews and differing realities, tice of a faith tradition’ (p7), distinct from spirituality: ‘a person’s
and most importantly, to embrace what might appear as contra- relationship with the sacred or transcendent, with their ultimate
dictory ontologies or implausible realities. We show links between values, with what purpose and meaning that relationship enables
relationality and participation as both a way of grasping a unify- them to create in their life’ (p7).
ing relational principle and understanding the local, contextual, Yet, even this definition falls short of our use of spirituality here,
entanglements of the many. which has an expansive embrace beyond serving human needs
Most ways of thinking where relationality sits at the heart of the alone. Many worldviews regard the sacred and transcendent as
ontology exist in small pockets marginalized by dominant, global- spiritual entities. These sacred entities might be trees, animals,
ized, Modern and neoliberal actions. We look at how this is already rocks, mountains, and/or rivers. In many cultures around the world,
happening and how else it could take place. In arguing for pluriver- more-than-human entities are revered for their wisdom, teachings
sal participation beyond just entertaining a different practical un- and transcendence. Acknowledging the sentience of more-than-
derstanding of how life can be lived, we propose an intellectually human entities of many kinds means resisting their assignment as
generous tangle of worldings in which many ways of being and
knowing co-exist. This will be easier for readers with ‘Western’ 1 Ecological thinking has been criticized for failing to acknowledge structural issues
notions of ‘living’ (limited to entities with cell division) to follow if such as gender and race. However, it is addressed in showing that patriarchy and
they note 1) we discuss ontologies that draw differing lines between colonialism derive from anti/a-ecological thought ([28, 84]). Yet, this analysis can
overlook human experience of discrimination on grounds of gender, sexuality, ethnicity
what is ‘living’ and ‘inert’; and 2) we consider what it means to and more (and, extending this to animals, the speciesism that results in the acceptability
move between these multiple ontologies. of factory farming.)

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PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia Yoko Akama et al.

narratives of socio-psychological production or political indices, or (p299), remarking how many people are able to shift between differ-
as performing a pragmatic social function for human value [35]. ent dimensions of reality: ‘. . .at one moment, a person may stand
When more-than-human beings are embraced as they are, having in Te Ao Māori, where river ancestors are real and copresent, at
a ‘worldly existence’ [35], rather than subsumed in human values, another, they may speak and think as a physicist, or an historian,
participation can go beyond egalitarian, tolerant and liberal visions or a highly trained lawyer, with no evident sense of contradiction’
towards questions of co-ontology, where being and becoming are (p.301). Salmond observes this as ‘ontological braiding’ and frames
already always-with-many. the Tribunal as a space ‘in which resonances as well as contradic-
tions between different ontological styles are being recognized and
2.4 The politics of multiple ontologies new forms of order explored’. However, she cautions not ‘to force
a convergence of horizons’ (p.303).
Dominant forms of design are about doing, uncritically following
We are inspired and guided by her account, by the different
Modern theoretical commitments. New conceptual work is needed
ontologies being embodied by individuals, and the power of Ao,
to change accepted practices and here we can look to a range of the-
accommodating worlds and movements between them. While we
orists. For instance, Haraway [29] draws from philosopher White-
cannot know Ao as ontology, we attempt a small step towards
head to argue that ‘Beings do not pre-exist their relatings’ (p6).
one interpretation of ‘ontological braiding’ to explore what that
Morton [59] says we need ‘To think in [a] new-old way, to restruc-
might mean for us. From here on, we are going to move between
ture logic... to violate the logical “Law” of Noncontradiction’ (p73).
ontologies and propose that readers attempt to hold two (or more)
Both suggest we consider relations differently and multiply.
ontologies simultaneously in mind, as a means of fellow-travelling
in our subversion of dominant design paradigms.
2.5 Co-ontology and ‘Ontological Braiding’
We want to start this section by acknowledging learning in cultures 3 PLURAL WAYS OF BEING AND
where living with multiple ontologies has been a matter of neces- ORGANISING
sity and survival. Indigenous nations and their peoples have been
In this section, we present Japanese practices that live between
fighting for water, land and the cultural space to self-determine
worlds, followed by accounts from the two Japanese authors. The
their futures since contact.
A landmark Tribunal dealt with the first waterway to be legally text will move between a curational style situating the experiential
recognized as having rights as a living being – the Whanganui River sections and first-person narratives.
in Aotearoa (New Zealand). We quote Salmond [65], a professor Japan’s everyday spirituality relates to Pre-imperial, ancient
with a life-long engagement with Māori peoples and worlds, using Shinto (Koshinto), remarked by Kasulis, a scholar of Asian philos-
her words to prevent misrepresentation of a case with which we ophy [37], as ‘a manner of feeling about the world and of feeling
have no direct relationship. She talks of ‘the simultaneous relevance one’s way through the world’ (p3). Koshinto is inter-relatedness
of alternative realities, not merely different perspectives on the same with rocks, mountains, trees, animals, lands, waters, winds and peo-
things’ (p290), including ontologies of rivers and peoples. Alter- ple, imbued with spirituality. Some scholars have related Koshinto
to animism [66], a view that the natural world is made of a com-
native realities meet in this legal case, where settler conceptions
munity of spirits of which humans are just one part. This animistic
of water as a material resource that can be owned and consumed
collide with Te Ao Māori (Māori world), which sees people, land, characteristic is common to belief systems practiced in many cul-
waterways and ancestors are inextricably bound together as one tures today (see [74]). Japan shares these sensitivities, being an
kin. Salmond quotes an Elder who spoke at the tribunal: archipelago of islands that have maintained relationships with and
Our river is stagnant and dying. The great river flows from the respect for manifold forms of beings and non-beings. Certain ritu-
gathering of mountains to the sea. I am the river, the river is me. If als and landmarks (such as shrines and cairns) have continued to
I am the river and the river is me – then emphatically, I am dying engage with more-than-human worlds (ses [2][55]). This ontology
(p.294). has co-existed with a highly technologized way of life, inviting an
We learn how several ‘worlds’ come into view in this case: Te Ao exploration of braiding what appear, on the surface, to be incom-
Māori or “the Māori world”. . . is a phrase often invoked by Maori mensurable states of being and becoming.
speakers, where “ao” is a dimension of reality, often translated as
“world” (but without the implication of a bounded, singular whole 3.1 Places for Sacrosanct Encounters
that underpins that term in English). In contemporary parlance, Koshinto spirituality is about inter-relatedness of plural worlds.
Te Ao Māori is often paired as a dyad with Te Ao Pakeha (roughly, This means nothing exists in-and-of-itself, but always as part of
European or Western ways of being) just as Te Ao Hou (the new a whole that is continuously ebbing and flowing. Many places in
world, contemporary life) is paired with Te Ao Tawhito (the ancient Japan, such as Mt Fuji are considered sacred, with awe-inspiring
world, ancestral ways). Te Ao Māori and Te Ao Pakeha, in particular, power (kami), and so are demarcated with a gate (torii) or rope
which evoke complementary but different realities locked in ongo- (shimenawa). The feeling of kami might be likened to experiencing
ing exchanges, generate divergent and contested accounts of the natural wonders: a spectacular sunrise or the Grand Canyon. Awe
world that require constant and careful negotiation (p.291). is an overwhelming and humbling experience, a merging of self and
Salmond further expands that ‘since the early contact period in other, forging the ‘relationship with a power or force, an element of
New Zealand, Māori have engaged with a range of Western onto- life that it is not only greater than the self but is ontologically dif-
logical styles, often very successfully, and sometimes exclusively’ ferent’ ([21]:124). Kasulis [37] explains that particular sacred places

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Expanding Participation to Design with More-Than-Human Concerns PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia

are demarcated with a torii and shimenawa to act like a ‘bookmark’ hundreds of years. They are also a place for community future-
to remind us, in our busy, modern lives, of our connection to awe, planning and decision-making. Yoriai [55] is an unhurried system
intimacy and belonging with the world. The word kami loosely of collective decision-making by villagers to manage taxes, accounts,
refers to spirits, gods, deities, souls – anything that is revered – expenses and punishment. Up until the Edo period, yoriai were often
including the sun, a tempest or something mundane, like a well or held at shrines and temples, which were also built to accommodate
a cooking pot [66]. The word referring to any animate or inanimate places to eat and sleep because discussions, especially on matters of
being speaks to diversity of forms that kami takes. Kasulis warns significance and complexity, would require days and weeks to estab-
not to think that kami merely visit or inhabit the form (like a rock), lish mutual understanding across diverse experiences and accounts.
based on a view that starts from separating the form and kami to These places of decision-making are not ‘neutral’ civic spaces. A
construct an external relationship. Instead the form is already kami. Japanese historian Oootsuka (pers. comms. July 2019) explains how
Japan’s devastating earthquake and tsunami on March 2011, re- making decisions in the presence of village guardians and deities
ferred to as 3.11, destroyed as much as 80% of coastal towns in cannot be ignored as insignificant because acts of commitment
Tohoku, northeast Japan. In surveying the damage, civil engineers are built upon ancient practices of making collective, sacred vows,
Takeda and colleagues [75] plotted 215 shrines in the area to dis- called ikki keijo (‘of one intention alliance’). This ritual, stemming
cover that 75% of those that survived contoured the edge of the from the Middle Ages, requires a group of people to draw up a doc-
tsunami’s reach. The researchers were made curious by another ument with their signatures to be burnt [33]. The ashes were mixed
feature. The most common deity celebrated amongst the surviving with a vial of divine water, passed from one member to another for
shrines is Susano-o no mikoto, associated with sea- and water-related a ritual sip, called ichimi shinsui (‘one taste of gods’ water’). ‘All
disasters. In Kojiki, Japan’s oldest written chronicle from the 8th who had tasted the gods’ water were considered equal under this
century, Susano-o defeated yamata no orochi, a legendary eight- ritualistic conception of an ikki public. . . some surviving contracts
headed and tailed serpent-dragon that is said to be based upon the for ikki alliances arranged the signatures of the participants in a
river Hi-i river that runs through Izumo (now called Shimane, a circle that signified the equality of all members’ ([33]:115). While
place where many myths of Japan were born). From such legends, the physical rituals of ikki keijo have eroded over the centuries,
Susano-o is widely respected as a deity with powers over waters, Ootsuka believes that Yoriai decision-making perpetuated a bind-
associated with calming floods and preventing droughts and water- ing allyship and obligation, witnessed by revered higher orders.
related diseases. From this, Takeda deduced that communities had The rituals, repeated over centuries, forged weighty bonds among a
erected shrines on these higher grounds, hundreds of years ago, group that also included more-than-human beings, enhancing the
to act as a repository of cultural memory to warn descendants of impact of the slow pace and care taken to arrive at such decisions
recurring tsunami in the local area. by the villagers.
While 3.11 stands out in recent history for catalyzing a nuclear Such organisational structures and acts of decision-making are
disaster, major cataclysms have repeated over thousands of years. based on interrelationships among people and more-than-humans.
Japan is an archipelago made up of more than 6,000 islands, formed This connectedness is an intimate kind of relation ‘in which each re-
on a volcanic fault line called the Ring of Fire that surrounds the Pa- lated item is part of the other’ ([37]:13). Sacred places like shrines act
cific Ocean. This region is known for tectonic plate shifts, typhoons as visible, enduring, markers of interconnected worlds and, by ex-
and hurricanes; natural disasters have been part of its geological tension, life’s rhythms and cycles. The yoriai gatherings took place
and cultural history. Seismically-caused sea waves are so frequent in such shrines, committing people to a binding, sacred obligation
that the Japanese word tsunami has been adopted in common Eng- and raised attentiveness to always being interrelated: a continuous
lish. There are many folklores and oral histories about such natural and never-ending relationship that extends beyond one’s lifetime.
disasters, like a giant catfish (O-namazu), revered as a deity associ- Agriculture, births, deaths, tsunami, earthquakes and people are
ated with floods, heavy rain or earthquakes, appearing with vigour all part of an inter-connected whole. These shrines are still there,
on Edo-period (1615-1868) woodcuts (see [52]). Such folklores are rooted on lands that have been shaped by disasters, visited by resi-
also materialized as cairns and shrines throughout Japan. dents who are living with the awe-inspiring powers of that place.
To live with disasters is, to use Haraway’s [30] words, ‘to live and Such buildings, rocks and stories around them maintain a connec-
die well with each other in the thick present’ (p297). In Shinto, death tion that is visible and enduring, between how things were known,
is just another stage of transformation – part of a natural cycle. can be known and can be given significance.
Shrines are not mere buildings. Rocks are not just an inanimate
fusion of minerals. They are not separate from the waves, winds,
rain and earth that taught local communities how to live with the
world’s rhythms. They are sentient beings with a living presence 3.3 Thinking Otherwise
that is (and has always been) interrelated with cycles of creation This next section is by Yoko, written to evoke the power and mean-
and destruction. This is co-ontology, where being and becoming ing of more-than-humans in the everyday.
are always-participating-with-many. I hear a cracked whisper on the radio about a resident of Otsuchi,
Itaru Sasaki, who calls his lost cousin from a disconnected phone box.
‘. . . my thoughts could not be relayed over a regular phone line, I
3.2 Decision-Making with More-Than-Human wanted them to be carried on the wind. . . . So I named it the wind
We can see sacred places, such as shrines, as an embodiment of telephone (kaze no denwa). The idea of keeping up a relationship with
community history, teaching, knowledge and practices that spans the dead is not such a strange one in Japan. The line between our

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PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia Yoko Akama et al.

world and their world is thin. . .’ [[54]]. Otsuchi has one of the highest different sea. These islands also have practices worthy of wonder
numbers of missing people in the 3.11 tsunami. and exclamation, but because their dominant culture played a large
Now thousands of people show up, randomly from all over, to part in determining what would be normalized as mundane, sci-
speak on Sasaki’s kaze no denwa, installed on a hill that receives entific, and logical across the world, it is more difficult for many
the sea breeze from the Pacific Ocean. These calls are deeply moving, Western thinkers to see this.
yet familiar. Children call their grandparents, parents, siblings with
reports of their daily lives and ask how they are.
These echo everyday rituals. At the small Buddhist altar at our 4.1 Sensibilities of Living and Being
home, I greet my father and sister, who have passed away, with daily Ann does not have a Shinto heritage. Neither the historical religions
offerings of rice, water and incense, together with updates of our lives of her culture nor her family’s atheism prepared her for growing
and to give gratitude for their love and protection. into a world among so many other living and dying beings. Kasulis
Kamihira-sensei sends me a Japanese newspaper article. My eye [37] makes the distinction that Judeo-Christian religions and Islam
is caught by a black and white photo of a memorial in a Japanese commemorate historical events, such as those associated with their
newspaper. A roughly-hewn stone cairn, carved in old calligraphy founder, rather than simply a relation to the world, as Shinto and
warns that no houses should be built below this point on a hill [[32]]. many Indigenous knowledges do. Lent [45] points to the growth
Shadows cast by nearby branches cut crisp, dark lines across the of monotheism as introducing the notion of a one true way in the
lettering, adding gravity to its warning. The headline says ‘Cairn West and the conceptual end of plurality. Morton [59] suggests that
Wisdom Saves.’ The depth of meaning is haiku-like, saying so much Mesopotamian farming practices 12,000 years ago introduced a con-
in so few words about human and more-than-human wisdoms. The cept of civilization that values a wonder-destroying logic. All in all,
article reports how the town survived the tsunami that devastated Ann’s reading and her inheritance are not comfortable companions
coastal towns in the northeast of Japan in 2011, by heeding the cairn’s if celebrating more-than-human worlds is her ambition.
ancient warning. Although the tsunami reached to 70m from where I still recall my surprise at an evening spent celebrating the par-
this cairn stands, all the town’s buildings and almost all its residents ticipatory design of a community garden without any reference to
survived, safe on higher ground. They lost one family who were visiting the wonder of things growing in it. Perhaps that things germinated
another town. Kamihira-sensei says it’s a compelling story of more- and grew was too obvious. But living things are not the same as made
than-human communication and collaboration. things. When something lives or dies; grows or wilts, it is not an act
I think about what Kamihira-sensei means. I imagine standing of human wrangling or persuasion.
in front of this stone and I am overcome with heaviness. The words I have always wondered at this feature of life around me, spent
are carved in human words and hands, but the ‘voice’ feels more- time observing it, wanted to work with it to think about what counts
than-human, evoking a witnessing by our ancestors, mountains and as making, and indeed, have run projects that involve growing to
oceans. These ‘voices’ vibrate through the materiality of the stone reflect on our place(s) in the world [[46]]. It feels important for how
and carving with a presence that is immense as time itself. These to think, after all, that these elements of life (and death) march to
more-than-humans are here. They have always been here alongside, their own beat. Not ultimately controlled by patriarchy or empire, not
coexisting, and they will continue to be here. To me, this ‘cairn wisdom’ directly deterred by capitalism, individual living things grow or they
combines teachings of many things, not just about the survival of don’t grow. And, despite alchemy, science, fertilizers, altered genetics,
towns, but wisdom about coexisting with rhythms of beings that are enhanced feeds and The Singularity, there is still no way to ensure
far larger than human scale and lifespans. that things come into being and no way to keep living things alive
A quote by a geologist Bjornerud [[10]] pops into my head: ‘Early indefinitely. Amazing. So I am sitting in a workshop in the UK with
in an introductory geology course, one begins to understand that rocks five groups of people invited to think differently by me – and one
are not nouns but verbs. . . bear[ing] witness to events that unfolded group is working together on innovations inspired by animism.
over long stretches of time.’ (p8). There is no mainstream animism in Britain. We don’t even have
Kamihira-sensei tells me that in Shinto, rocks grow. Sazareishi relics of a faith that imbues everything with its own spirit, though they
are awe-inspiring rocks often marked with a shimenawa as sacred existed. We merely have relic rituals celebrating plants and animals
and sentient beings. In the southern islands of Miyako and Hachijo, that are woven into the festivals of religions that displaced these beliefs.
local residents revere giant boulders thrown up from the seabed in (In the wilds of the countryside, people dress maidens and wells with
a tsunami [[70]]. The boulders are a breeding ground for migratory flowers.) But people talk about these absences, discussing that our
birds, a collaboration between earth and waves, and a symbol for awe experience is closer to animism than science allows and acknowledging
and wonder. that we accept spirit in the animals we know, but not the broader
Rocks are not nouns but verbs. They are living. world.
I walk through a meadow with a colleague, talking animatedly
about what inhabits life around us. We are interrupted by a sudden
4 OTHERWISE EXPERIMENTS mound alive with small butterflies and the scent of thyme radiating
Our second story attempts to braid worlds to change how people from low purple flowers. Bees crowd in. We stand there. Then I consider
engage with the world they are used to. We explore a participatory the fewer insects at home. The moment of connection is broken. There
practice designed to bring individuals into new relations, as ongo- is something about the immediacy of interconnection that doesn’t
ing work in how to structure human relations differently [50]. We know itself; when my mind jumps elsewhere it is easy to move on and
offer it beside the first story, but speaking from other islands in a pick up our conversation.

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In work using parallel worlds to drive a sense of how things could in the outcomes, but there is imagination and the act of being in-
be ‘other’, I choose a world that features these sensitivities to include volved makes space for different pathways. The talking, making and
in the exercises I ask of participants. negotiating together can be transformative.
Because the workshop format uses counterfactual worlds, based on As workshop leader, I am transformed. I recall butterflies and the
a changed history that needs bringing into the present, I use an episode scent of thyme, the possibilities and challenges of community gar-
from Sweden that involved Sámi nations. Of course, I worry that this dening and the achievement of shoots that sprout. And I wonder: is
risks a form of cultural appropriation. Acknowledging the possibility some vulnerability needed to know the more-than-human, as it is to
does not mitigate it, but it allows us to discuss it afterwards as part of be fully alive?
our reflections. We are twisting history and history is political. This
is the revised history I use (Laestadius was the Swedish Sámi who
influenced religion in Sweden towards a strict Protestantism, demon- 5 DISCUSSION: PLURIVERSAL INTEGRITIES
strating some of the complexity involved in considering Indigenous Escobar [22] quotes the Zapatistas in asking for a world where
ontologies): many worlds fit. Describing different ontologies and how we have
“Lars Laestadius (1800 – 1861), the Swedish Sámi who founded the experienced them and, in the last section, worked with them, we
Laestadian pietist revival movement, has a mid-life conversion to the draw attention to the pluriversal worlds we are touched by and
faith of his ancestors, which heavily influences religious developments can conceive of, personally, as researchers, collaborators and ter-
in Sweden. Though varying considerably from region to region within restrials. All these worlds fit together somehow. Acknowledging
Sápmi, traditional Sámi beliefs consist of three intertwining elements: plurality (and the pluriversal) is merely naming and welcoming
animism, shamanism and polytheism. Animism perceives all things— the pre-existing relationality of life. Here, in the discussion, we
animals, plants, rocks, rivers, weather systems, human handiwork attempt to offer further structuring so that these thoughts and
and perhaps even words—as animated and alive. While Lutheranism experiences can contribute to PD scholarship and reach beyond
persisted in some parts, it became increasingly tinged with pantheism idiosyncratic storytelling in ways that are not too reductive, but
and animism until, by the general turn to a new spiritualism in 1960s, abstracted enough to be transferable.
Sweden led the world in everyday practices and beliefs elsewhere found To do this, we have looked around instead of looking ahead
in Japan’s pre-imperialist Shinto and in Indigenous faith systems. for wisdom and guidance [76], addressing sources that may not
Over recent years, this animism has become more closely identified have been accepted to date in scholarly fields. Tsing [76] laments,
with the environmental movement.” ‘theories of heterogeneity are still in their infancy’ (p5), to which
Inevitably there is a challenge to contemplating a different belief we add that there are theories of heterogeneity but not in the places
system. It is a greater challenge than entertaining a different material where mainstream scholars tend to look. As we evidence, there
or economic circumstance (other scenarios include: plastics are not are stories that entangle beings in folklore and newspaper articles,
invented; the Brazilian rubber monopoly continues). I am watching reflecting worlds that are ‘obvious to ordinary participants and
the third group to tackle this brief. The first two have interesting observers’ (ibid). From this we can see that there are many kinds of
outcomes: everyday theories (with a lower-case t) imbuing sustained practices
1) a governance structure where officials must commune with lakes and philosophies that help us understand how always-participating-
and hills for days before making any decisions; with-many is ongoing.
2) a ritual presentation of seeds for carbon capture and algae to un- We know the world(s) we inhabit needs a process to navigate
block the flows of the world, collected from a trip outside the workshop and transition between the thought systems informing different
building and described as a symbolic restocking of life. life-views. This is not merely inclusive politics; it also acknowledges
A common theme has been the exercise of power in and against this how destructive the dominant growth-oriented and human-centric
world. How does this sweet-natured yet vulnerable state (condition or approach has been. Particularly, a deeper understanding of rela-
nation?) exist when there are expansionist tendencies round it, such tionality is needed in PD for our collective future-making. To make
as the Russian and British empires? But this third group has cracked the point, we have given the example of how deep relationality
that problem. Not only do they work with flows in this world, but exists in modern Japan and how participation (using familiar ex-
they can send arcs of energy to dance through the skies, showing a amples like decision and future-making) has been shaped by it. In
power that they deploy only to entertain each other at festivals, but the description of yoriai, we show how such structures of thought
which signals to other political systems what they have achieved. In can profoundly inform becoming through the sociotechnical ar-
this world, no empire will ever marginalize their ways of knowing. rangements of decision-making, and, in turn, be informed by these
These three outcomes are based on the Sámi scenario and the mak- infrastructures. In a second example, considering deep relationality
ing of cultural artefacts for the contemporary world inspired by it. without the relevant cultural structures (Britain), we invent them
Each time it is run, the process captures the imagination of the par- through design.
ticipants and they are able to play with ecological ideas of harmony, This is disruptive thinking. Worlds have futures but we are re-
restoration and other intimacies across species. This, of all the briefs, minded that designing with and for those futures is ethically tangled
has proved to be powerful in its opportunity for stimulating thinking and scaled. Colonialism and neoliberalism have spatialized futures.
about ‘being’. It draws on hopes and clichés: film narratives, dreams Planning ahead is further complicated by the flow of ideas constitut-
and other renderings of a gentler world; it speaks to a yearning for ing a radical rethink of humans’ relations with living beings, (seen
a different set of relations that are outside the direct experience of in Haraway, Tsing, Morton, etc), by moves towards decolonising
the participants. Perhaps there is little originality or ‘authenticity’ ([28][67][77]) and acknowledgment of the many ways coexisting

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PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia Yoko Akama et al.

has been ignored (e.g. [2][35][44]). If we connect these practical representation, structures of organisation and future-making in
and ideological changes with the concept of pluriversal worlds of participating with the more-than-human. This is not to dismiss the
multiple ontologies, then the idea of solution crumbles beyond dis- value of a more functional approach to design, but to offer a realm
sensus [9] and adversarial concerns [16]. There are troubles to stay of alternatives to be embraced as part of acknowledging plurality.
with [30] instead of definable problems, as we work out what it In fact, for design researchers, who are already adept at anticipat-
means to live and die well in ‘the ruin that has become our collective ing mess, errors and disruption, encounters of ‘perplexing alterity’
home’ ([76]:3). There are more-than-human approaches that replace [57] need not raise suspicion, but be seen as a generative approach.
reliance on the practices of human-centred problem-solving. For those schooled only in scientific detachment and unused to
thinking outside traditional processes, we point out that the act of
including ethics of others is itself an ethical choice.
5.1 Aligning PD Ethics
We commenced this paper by interrogating PD’s ethical starting 5.2 The Ethics of Aligning with Many Worlds
point – that of protecting the underdog and looking for inclusion Yet, in considering plurality of ethics and ways of knowing, we
even when voices could not be heard directly. Yet, we questioned have, like so many scholars, also spoken about situations in which
the human-only ‘who, what and how’ of these practices. In stories
we have no direct or reciprocal relations. This has its own ethical
of co-existence with the rhythms and tempests of nature, we can
commitments. It is a precarious act (requiring some courage) to
hear many ‘voices’ being represented in material and non-material engage with Indigenous cosmopolitics and onto-epistemologies.
forms. Some are more visible, such as the words carved by ancestors We know that Indigenous peoples have suffered abuse through
on the stone cairn or folklore passed down over centuries. Some appropriation of their knowledge and experience, so those who are
are less visible, such as rocks that grow in dialogue with waves, non-Indigenous must exercise extreme caution not to take Indige-
land, animals and weather. Some are intimate, whispered on a dis- nous thought as merely a source of ideas to draw on. Wiradjuri
connected telephone to the spirits of loved ones. Some are felt at design scholar Sheehan ([68]:68) explains, Indigenous Knowledge
an immense scale of time and space. It is important to note that (IK) ‘is a layered understanding that includes divergent streams of
the related structures of organising are not for humans alone to knowledge related within natural systems. IK generally is ontologi-
control. Local folklores – such as the O-namazu, the giant catfish, cal because inquiry is situated within an intelligent and intelligible
or legend of Susano-o defeating eight-headed serpent dragon – are
world of natural systems, replete with relational patterns for being
shared to revere the power of more-than-human forces, to learn to
in the world’. Here, it is possible to respect without knowing fully.
live alongside them, to be shaped by inhabiting with the various So we must not fear engagement – otherwise there will be little hope
forces of this world. The shrines, cairns, tsunami and boulders can for reconciliation or chance to be guided by Indigenous wisdom. In-
be seen as ‘bookmarks’ [37] ‘designed’ to remind us (humans with stead, we encourage curiosity, reflexivity, learning from and explor-
short lifespans and impatience for progress) of this primordial co- ing with Indigenous peoples – it cannot only be their task to make
habitation, premised on enduring intra-dependence [4]. To engage others aware. This includes stepping into contested spaces where
in PD with these thoughts in mind expands ontological categories Indigenous and non-Indigenous subjects engage – what Nakata
and orientations to the work of structuring and reporting on struc- [61] calls the ‘cultural interface’ of ‘multiple and interconnected
ture. Is it meaningful to talk about sentiency of infrastructuring, for discourses, social practices and knowledge technologies that condi-
instance, or is this too much ontological queering? Asking about
tion how we all come to . . .understand our changing realities in the
alternatives is especially important in contexts that have long lived
everyday, and how and what knowledge we operationalise in our
with co-ontologies of always-participating-with-many. daily lives’ (p9). Following Nakata, we suggest a reflexive, ethical
Similarly, in the story by Ann, there are more-than-human voices vigilance to provide a nuanced explanation, starting with questions
and representations. These exist in the movement of butterflies, the of what knowledge is encountered, how it has been interpreted,
sound of bees and scent of thyme and meadows. These voices need what claims are made by this, where this knowledge is placed and
a shift in gear – a slower pace and lower posture – to appreciate. in relation to what, and how this might circulate. The focus woven
It is no coincidence that the only group to collect materials in through our accounts, of voice, representation and structures of
the open air was working on the Laestadian scenario. One does decision- and future-making, is already championed by Indigenous
not need to be Shinto or have an animist faith to appreciate this peoples as a matter of sovereignty and self-determination, and there
kind of awe and wonder. The potency of these more-than-human is much to learn (see [3][7][53]). Non-Indigenous people must take
stories is their familiarity and they are resilient and hopeful for this
responsibility to educate themselves as fellows trying to develop the
reason. It speaks to cultures with eroded reverence for life, which
capacity to understand multiple ontologies, including broadening
are hastening biodiversity loss and destabilizing the weather. In ideas of sentience and relationality.
this impoverished cultural landscape, Ann’s story reminds us that
it is only one thought away to place faith in creative imagination,
to choose collective organising for future decision-making and to
5.3 Methodologies of
believe that communing with lakes and mountains has legitimacy. Always-Participating-With-Many
Namely, when extolling pluriverses, ecological inclusivity and This paper is conceptual, yet it offers radical strategies for the
always-participating-with-many, the usual ethical concerns in PD practice of always-participating-with-many. Instead of aspiring to
can be productive fulcra, without collapsing them under anthro- replicability, the contribution is to demonstrate how a different how
pocentric agendas. We can support the underdog and use voice, can come into being; how to catalyse to think and do differently;

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and how to present highly contextual descriptions that reinforce more customary PD foothold, we offer method in the second story:
these insights. We have given several examples of cases where we an attempt to infuse relations with a different sensibility. This may
are always-participating-with-many: a tsunami, places of Japanese address the ‘why’ of PD with more-than-human worlds for those
decision-making, a workshop about futures, summer meadows. who do not see altered orientations as an end in themselves. But
There are diverse ways and we can learn from all of them, just as this is not to substitute our suggestions with simple design solu-
decades of study of human participation is supported by hundreds tions. To paraphrase the craftivism movement, ‘if we want a world
of documented cases. that is beautiful, kind and fair, shouldn’t our activism be beautiful,
First, if we are to adopt these radical strategies, we need to move kind and fair?’ (http://craftivist-collective.com). Such workshops
our minds and hearts, as well as our practices, allowing for what are activism in this vein, embodying gentle alternatives.
Light [47] calls ‘the imaginative process of moving towards’ (p86)
to inform design. This might be an individual response, though dia-
logue (such as the one that fuelled this paper) can help to articulate 6 BEING DIFFERENT TO DO DIFFERENTLY
the implications of these encounters. The point of diversity is to In this paper, we have played with form and pushed ideas of what
hear from unanticipated sources, open up the space for different constitutes participation to a point that may not be comfortable for
ways of knowing and allow things to enter. As with other forms readers. This is an ongoing attempt to open up discussion and con-
of PD research, if we knew where we were going before looking tribute fresh energy to PD. We have offered some ways of always-
beyond ourselves, we would not need the participation of others. participating-with-many as processes by which (PD) scholars and
But, we do not know all the answers and we learn by bringing practitioners might enrich their understanding of working with the
others together and listening. So, this is a fundamental way that more-than-human, without detailing how that more-than-human
our discipline can respond positively. might manifest or what the experience might be. That remains open
Second, we can learn from places and positions that recognize for others to determine.
more-than-human sentience. We have drawn on Japan because We need to change systems, lifestyles and imagination to aban-
two authors have a binding connection and lived experiences from don siloed, anthropocentric, Modern thinking and avert the worst
that place. Speaking from our situatedness (places and people) is a devastation in the offing. Design, in its extreme functionality and
valued methodology in PD, building on feminist and anthropology service to big industry, is both the handmaiden of devastation and
theory. a possible means of changing this fate. Our practice needs to propel
As a third strategy, we can braid, juxtapose and interweave us out of current modes of thought, but to resist functionalism when
multiple worldviews, eroding separations between beings and non- it threatens to close down a welcome for plural ways of knowing, in
beings in favour of greater entanglement between them. While thinking, in material practice. Participatory designers are reflective,
inspired by it, this is not the same as ‘ontological braiding’ as intro- concerned with fellow beings, inclusion and ethics. Our practice is
duced by Salmond [65], where Te Ao Māori accommodates many well-placed to lead change within Design disciplines, as has hap-
ontologies, for we start with wholly different ways of knowing pened before [41]. It can spur re-evaluation. Redesigning design,
and being. Yet our attempt must resist collapsing plural ways of here, means welcoming alternative approaches and recognizing het-
being and becoming under a universal ontological equivalence - we erogeneous practices that have always been designing-with-many
caution readers not to interpret our explorations in this way. We ([2][67][68]).
are all involved in impossible but necessary translations in aiming We note that Escobar discovers design just as his own logic
to link up worlds and share them. We recognise this challenge in propels us, when thinking about many ontologies and ways of being,
submitting our work to an ACM publication with a dominant way to speak of ecologies so complex and evolving that any intervention
of knowing (see Light’s critique [48]). It is necessary to resist the can only be contingent. It can only be an intra-action [5] not a
compression that academic traditions impose on knowledge and decisive move. In other words, we are not talking about simple
accept contradiction. PD researchers may see this as a fact of living processes, but this reflects a tension in design’s traditional role as
or as an epistemological device, depending on their starting point. mediator between world-as-is and intentional change. There has
The fourth strategy we suggest is to use the power in writing to never been a world-as-is: it has always been a changing, plural tangle
present alternatives in alternative ways. We are inspired by non- of interactions and exchanges, not to be fully grasped. Explicitly
fiction writing and auto-ethnography, using narrative form to link encouraging people to apprehend life in this way has the dual merits
abstract, unfamiliar theories and personal experiences and share of slowing down design (thereby increasing chances of futures
these engagements without collapsing them under generalisations. for all) and ushering in greater appreciation of what we humans
Last among strategies for embracing always-participating-with- participate in.
many, we suggest that all of us start living more explicitly with For us, this paper is a way to honour PD’s particular agenda
more-than-humans and embody these practices by: 1) being with by questioning dominant frames and singular worldviews, looking
plants, other animals, trees, mountains and rocks to attune our pace at precedents that do not stem from democratic motivations as
with different rhythms and flows; 2) keeping multiple worlds alive the field understands them, but nonetheless occupy a similarly
within ourselves so that these philosophies and cosmopolitics can ethically-charged place. Instead, these more-than-human concerns
inform dialogue without being flattened out; 3) designing with and offer a way to think past the limits of current design trajectories
learning among people with deeply relational worldviews. while engaging with the spiritual dimensions that are absent from
The strategies above demonstrate what participation means design’s usual commitments. This seems to fill out so much that is
when multiple ontologies are embraced. For readers wanting a missing. And, while this responds to PDC’20’s conference theme of

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PDC ’20: Vol. 1, June 15–20, 2020, Manizales, Colombia Yoko Akama et al.

‘participation otherwise’, we also see our paper aligned with calls to Natural World. Theology and Science, 4 (3): 229–246. https://doi.org/10.1080/
trouble PD’s dominant borders and assumed ‘Western’-centricity. 14746700600952993
[27] Anna Gibbs. 2015. Writing as Method: Attunement, Resonance, Rhythm. In
We hope the thinking across worlds that we have described as Affective Methodologies: developing cultural research strategies for the study of
inspiration for us will also be inspirational for others. affect. Britta Timm Knudsen & Carsten Stage. (eds.). Palgrave Macmillan.
[28] Ghassan Hage, 2017. Is Racism an Environmental Threat?Polity Press.
[29] Donna J. Haraway. 2003. The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, And
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Significant Otherness. Prickly Paradigm Press.
[30] Donna J. Haraway. 2016. Staying with the trouble: Making kin in the Chthu-
Yoko would like to thank Linda Daley, Lucinda Strahan and invalu- lucene.Durham and London: Duke University Press.
able support and input from the Expanded Writers Group. Ann [31] Sara Heitlinger, Marcus Foth, Rachel Clarke, Carl Disalvo, Ann Light, and Laura
would like to thank Phil Jones, Caroline Bassett, Per-Anders Hill- Forlano. 2018. Avoiding Ecocidal Smart Cities: Participatory Design for More-
than-Human Futures. Proc. PDC 2018: 2-4.
gren and Kristina Lindström for inspiration in developing the On [32] Shigeru Higashino, 2011. 石碑の教え守る. Kohaku Shimpo Newspaper. 10 th
Some Other World workshop. April 2011 http://memory.ever.jp/tsunami/tsunami-taio_307.html
[33] Eiko Ikegami. 2005. Bonds of Civility: Aesthetic Networks and the Political
Origins of Japanese Culture. Cambridge University Press, New York.
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