Nesli Hazal Oktay doktoritöö kaitsmine

12. septembril kaitseb Eesti Kunstiakadeemia kunsti ja disaini eriala doktorant Nesli Hazal Oktay doktoritööd „Far-away bodies: Co-creating design(s) in and for remote intimacy“ (“Koosolemine distantsilt: läheduse kogemine ühisloomelise disaini abil”).

Avalik kaitsmine toimub algusega kell 12.00 EKAs, Põhja pst 7, ruumis A101.
Kaitsmist kantakse üle EKA TVs.
Kaitsmine toimub inglise keeles.

Doktoritöö juhendajad: dr Kristi Kuusk (Eesti Kunstiakadeemia), prof Danielle Wilde (Umeå University, University of Southern Denmark)
Eelretsensendid: dr Verena Fuchsberger-Staufer (University of Salzburg), dr Vasiliki Tsaknaki (IT University of Copenhagen)
Oponent: Dr. Verena Fuchsberger-Staufer (University of Salzburg)

Doktoritööga saab tutvuda EKA digivaramus.

Intimacy is an embodied experience rooted in everyday life activities including bodily interactions. For some, intimacy is experienced and built across distances when intimate partners find themselves physically apart for various periods. In such scenarios, people turn to technology, using devices to connect with their loved ones intimately. When using technology, a boundary exists between loved ones in the digital and physical worlds. Despite this boundary, intimacy can be maintained and nourished when bodies are apart.

This dissertation delves into the role of interaction design in fostering non-sexual intimacy across distances through an embodied approach. By designing for intimate, yet distant, bodies, it offers the research programme co-creating design(s) in and for remote intimacy. Derived from the main research question – How can a close-to-body experience be designed to support intimacy between people across distances? – this research programme explores the design of a remote, close-to-body experience for individuals who are emotionally close but physically apart. The designed experience aims to invite far-away loved ones to reflect on, disrupt, and reinvent their habitual ways of building and experiencing intimacy across distances. Within this programmatic framework, the dissertation offers three key contributions to interaction designers and design researchers: methodological, designerly, and theoretical. Methodologically, it proposes new approaches for co-designing remote intimacy. Designerly, it presents commitments to consider when designing in the realm of remote intimacy. Theoretically, it provides situated knowledge that highlights the multifaceted nature of remote intimacy, emphasising its individual, collective, bodily, virtual, and material dimensions.

In conclusion, this dissertation challenges conventional methods and advocates for embodied design practices and approaches, opening new design spaces for supporting intimacy across distances. It invites interaction designers and design researchers to rethink and reimagine how humans experience and build intimacy in an increasingly digital world.

Kaitsmiskomisjon: dr Jaana Päeva, dr Anu Allas, Ruth-Helene Melioranski, prof Indrek Ibrus, dr Liina Unt, dr Claudia Nunez-Pacheco