Rosenverse
Beyond Methods and Diversity: The Roots of Inclusion

This video is only accessible to Gold members. Log in or register for a free Gold Trial Account to watch.

Log in Register

Most conference talks are accessible to Gold members, while community videos are generally available to all logged-in members.

Beyond Methods and Diversity: The Roots of Inclusion

Gold
Tuesday, March 26, 2024 • Advancing Research 2024
Share the love for this talk
Beyond Methods and Diversity: The Roots of Inclusion
Speakers: Victor Udoewa
Link:

Summary

Most efforts at advancing research to be more inclusive focus on methods or methodologies or participation. Though helpful, those efforts have unfortunately not been sufficient for inclusion and we continue to be constrained by stronger forces which go to the root of what research means and the definition of inclusion. To be fully unconstrained and reach true inclusion we must learn to let go. Do we have the ability to do that? Let's talk about that. Join us for a half-hour of becoming undone, joyfully.

Key Insights

  • Diversity in research teams does not inherently guarantee inclusivity or counter systemic oppression.

  • Awareness of power and identity positionality often leads to feeling stuck without clear action steps.

  • Our ways of being deeply shape our epistemologies and methodologies in research.

  • Colonial Western ways of being emphasize objectification and individualism, limiting emancipatory knowledge production.

  • Indigenous knowledge systems, like those of the iBio people, view knowledge as relational and emergent from relationships.

  • Songs and oral traditions can serve as valid research methodologies tied to indigenous ways of knowing.

  • Systems of value influence which knowledge is considered legitimate or beneficial, often marginalizing community knowledge.

  • Immigrant communities bring preserved ways of being that produce measurable health and social benefits.

  • Positive deviance in communities reveals untapped local wisdom that can guide effective interventions.

  • Radical participatory research requires researchers to relinquish control and let communities define methods based on their own ways of being.

Notable Quotes

"If diversity alone made research inclusive, then police could never be anti-black because they include black officers."

"Whiteness isn’t about color; people of all colors can reinforce white supremacy."

"Awareness leads to feeling stuck because we don’t know what to do or don’t feel empowered to act."

"Our ways of being are roots that grow into ways of knowing, doing, and methods, all nourished by systems of value."

"In Western modernity, if something is not an object, it is not real research or real knowledge."

"For the iBio people, knowledge is relational, not objectified, emerging from relationships like songs."

"Songs become methodologies—the way you identify who is at the door is through the song they sing."

"Colonial ways of being, knowing, and valuing will never produce emancipatory methodologies."

"Community-rooted wisdom like the Mexican 'guana' practice reduces postpartum depression without traditional research."

"Will you learn to let go? Better yet, will you let go?"

Ask the Rosenbot
Bria Alexander
State of DesignOps Panel
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Sean Fitzell
Craft of User Research: Building Out Jobs to be Done Maps
2021 • Advancing Research 2021
Gold
Jack Moffett
UX Metrics That Matter and The Future of our Design at Scale Conference: A Community Conversation
2022 • Enterprise Community
Bria Alexander
Opening Remarks
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Jacqui Frey
Flow and Superfluidity for Design Orgs
2018 • DesignOps Summit 2018
Gold
Roberta Dombrowski
Making Research a Team Sport
2022 • Advancing Research 2022
Gold
Joerg Beringer
Scaling User Research with AI: Continuous Discovery of User Needs in Minutes
2025 • Designing with AI 2025
Gold
Julie Baher
Culture Change—My Journey
2015 • Enterprise UX 2015
Gold
Peter Van Dijck
Coffee with Lou #4: Taking a Peek Under the Rosenbot's Hood
2024 • Rosenfeld Community
Rachel Radway
The Many Paths Of Design Operations
2022 • DesignOps Summit 2022
Gold
Sam Proulx
SUS: A System Unusable for Twenty Percent of the Population
2021 • Design at Scale 2021
Gold
Aaron Stienstra
Leveraging Civic Design to Advance Equity and Rebuild Trust in the US Federal Government
2021 • Civic Design 2021
Gold
Jaskiran Kang
Why Community is Key to Professionalizing Design
2022 • Civic Design Community
Sabrina Mach
How to Design Your Design Operating Model
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Yalenka Mariën
Designing for Digital Inclusion in the Belgian Government
2021 • Civic Design 2021
Gold
Kit Unger
Theme 2: Introduction
2021 • Design at Scale 2021
Gold

More Videos

Ted Neward

"Being nice and empathetic at the executive level is critical to get results and maintain trust."

Ted Neward

Theme 4: Enterprise Organizational Journey

June 4, 2019

JD Buckley

"Fight to communicate your passion in a way that is digestible for other people."

JD Buckley Margot Dear Jim Kalbach Janaki Kumar

COMMUNICATE: Discussion

June 14, 2018

Karen McGrane

"What is AI gonna do for us? Are we afraid the robots will take our jobs? AI is a tool, not a replacement."

Karen McGrane Jeff Eaton

AI for Information Architects: Are the robots coming for our jobs?

November 21, 2024

Louis Rosenfeld

"Some early community recordings sound rough, but the overall error rate for the AI transcription is pretty low."

Louis Rosenfeld

The Rosenbot and the Rosenverse: An AMA with Lou Rosenfeld

June 5, 2024

Taylor Jennings

"Having a place for people to self-serve insights is really big, so they don’t ask us to repeat research."

Taylor Jennings Joe Nelson Alex Knoll

Repository Retrospective: Learnings from Introducing a Central Place for UX Research

March 9, 2022

Robin Beers

"If you have a terrible boss, you can do an ethnography of your own organization disguised as friendly connection."

Robin Beers Sonja Bobrowska Mujtaba Hameed Josh Morales

How to create actionable insight in the face of politics and silos [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series]

October 12, 2023

Sarah Fathallah

"Many organizations treat researchers like glorified assembly line workers churning out disposable insights."

Sarah Fathallah Alba Villamil

Beyond insights: Rethinking the role of researchers as stewards of organizational wisdom

March 13, 2025

Dan Hill

"In Oslo, recently released prisoners maintain the bike sharing fleet, helping reintegrate them into society."

Dan Hill

Strategic design, slowdown, and the infrastructures of everyday life

April 21, 2022

Wendy Johansson

"The challenge with design education is building a cohort that grows from literacy to mastery while empowering cross-functional creativity."

Wendy Johansson Surya Vanka

Design at Scale: Behind the Scenes

April 29, 2021