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Technical breakdown: breaching experiment-workshops in university lectures

Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This article explores the methodological design of breaching experiments, originally introduced in ethnomethodology as pedagogical tools for examining the maintenance of social order. Building on this tradition, I introduce a typology of breaching experiments and the idea of breaching experiment-workshops: collaborative, negotiated interventions that uncover how technical devices, and sociotechnical expectations mediate university lectures. Drawing on observations with two lecturers and subsequent efforts to design interventions in their teaching practices, I show how breaching experiment-workshops can surface the entangled roles of technology, disciplinary norms, and student expectations even when the breaches remain hypothetical. I argue that breaching experiment-workshops offer a valuable method for design researchers investigating human-technology relations by extending breaching into participatory, context-sensitive, and reflective co-design practices.
Source: CoDesign
Author: Timothy Miller
Language: English
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4414515747
FWCI: 2.599
Cites: 16
Cited by: 3
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