Reading Response #7
to Artful Design • Chapter 7: "Social Design"

Marise Van Zyl.
November 8, 2021
Music 256A / CS476a, Stanford University

Reading Response 7: Anti-Social Social Design

I didn't get very far in the chapter, when I stumbled upon a concept that totally threw me for a (human-in-the) loop.
P.357 talks about 'Rings of Familiarity in Social Design'. The page is essentially just a graphic showing the continuum from the self all the way out to total strangers and how we relate outwards to these different levels of familiarity. What struck me most is that, contrary to what seems logical, familiarity doesn't necessarily decrease as you move outwards in these different layers. In fact, the thing that caught my eye, was the word "self". Right at the center of our own universes, here we are. The self. And yet, how familiar are we with that person? Would I be able to design for my self (space between words intended)?

This might go against the whole purpose of the chapter, but it is what stuck. What if we designed for ourselves as social beings. For us to interact with ourselves. Could we use technology to engage with our authentic, truthful selves? Can it help us engage with the self? What if we were anonymous and were socially interacting with the self as another being altogether? What if, for once, we could step away from our selves and interact with them as strangers? As aquintances? As friends?.

I keep coming back to the 'Empathy' part in Kunwoo's 'The Fisherman'
Those few minutes moved me in ways I can't explain. I felt protective over the little person in the rain. I wanted to both hold an umbrella over someone else's head, and have someone cover me from my own rain. What if both those characters were me though? What if we could encounter our selves in an anonymous social setting. We don't know it's us, but it somehow is. How would we treat it? Would we recognize it? Would we show it kindness, patience, empathy? Would we reject it as unfamiliar?

This week I might have completely missed the mark of "social" design by talking all about the self. But how can we be familiar with other before being familiar with ourselves? Engaging with other social creatures might have to start by engaging with the original social creature - the self.