Gabriella Garcia
My thesis speculates toward a syllabus for technologists who want to design at the sex+tech intersection and build technology that is safe for sex workers as informed by sex workers and their experience in the digital sphere.
Description
In proposing a syllabus, I am setting the technology school as the locus for a radical participatory design movement rooted in a place of learning that recognizes the complicated, co-constitutive relationship between sex, society, and interactive technology. My motivation comes from a place of accountability as a creative technologist who wishes to design toward harm reduction, to signal-boost the voices of the Other-Wise, and confront uncomfortable topics in hopes of expanding the perspective of those creating in the realm of the “recently possible.” Sex/work stigma is a computer ethics design question in that those who labor in sex trades (and by proxy those who explore sexuality in the digital space) have been useful for communications technology developers only as far as they invest as early adopters or pose as a problem to be solved, without consideration of the incredible breadth of knowledge each has to offer—as observers, laborers, artists, educators, entrepreneurs, targets, activists, and partners. Curriculum proposals include Data Feminism techniques, recommendations for FinTech companies in a post-Covid world after individuals turned to online sex work for income while isolated, and potential for mutually-beneficial allyship between developer schools and formerly incarcerated sex workers.
(I don't know how to make video documentation for a research paper, so I included my midterm thesis presentation instead)
Classes
Thesis Part 2: Production
Presentation Video
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kLmxWkWAhwlKl04IDmSLaJ6r-Klmeh8k/view?usp=sharing