Workshop Title

Action To Improve Diversity and Inclusivity at NIME

Description

NIME has a diversity problem, and remains largely white, male, American-European, able-bodied and English-speaking1. We believe that groups with important insights and experiences are being underrepresented within NIME as authors (such as non-male people, those who do not speak English as a first language, those with disabilities, and those of other races and ethnicities, just to name a few), and that this underrepresentation means that important ideas and viewpoints that come from a wider range of lived experiences are missing.

Initial efforts to draw attention to diversity within NIME were in response to a lack of gender diversity, such as analyses of NIME’s women authors [1][2], a 2018 workshop on gender diversity in the community2, the establishment of the WiNIME directory3 and a 2014 panel discussion that resulted in an article [3]. The NIME diversity statement4 and the Pamela Z Award were established in 20185 in an effort to foster a larger conversation around broader diversity in this community. However, far more work still needs to be done: In 2020 strong critique emerged of NIME’s lack of political agenda[4], as well as NIME’s current epistemological crises[5], and we acknowledge that our conversation about diversity cannot be centred on a limited number of special interest groups, but must instead extend more widely.

“Diversity” is a complex term. At its simplest diversity describes differences within a group (usually across lines of identity such as race, gender, sexuality, and so on). However, simply acknowledging diversity does not address the structures of power that contribute to a lack of diversity in the first place[6], and here we acknowledge that simply pointing out differences does not go far enough.

We propose extending this existing community work by viewing a lack of diversity through an intersectional lens. Intersectionality, coined by Crenshaw in 1989[7], refers to the interconnectedness of all discrimination and the common roots in structural inequality (and, most importantly, that focusing on a single axis of discrimination undermines anti-discrimination more widely). With this workshop, we aim to be a point of departure for community discussion, not to address diversity within NIME in one strata (such as gender), but instead to examine the wider structures within the community that include some and exclude others, and to develop strategies to address them. In 2021 we have already begun a trial English-as-second-language assistance program and are developing financial scholarships, ideas drawn from the 2020 NIME diversity survey and subsequent discussions in collaboration with the NIME Ethical and Environmental workgroups, but this is just a start. We see this workshop as a an opportunity for “transforming silence into language and action”[8]; strategy is, as Ahmed states, “not only thought in action but thought sharpened by action.”[9]

Workshop activities

We will begin this workshop by introducing the diversity officers. We will also share the results from our NIME 2020 diversity survey, and share initiatives that are currently underway.

Next, musician and activist Kim Macari will give a presentation on topics relevant to this area in order to orient attendees around intersectional diversity thinking, such as the myth of meritocracy, signalling vs normalisation, effective methods for talking about diversity and inclusion, and building healthy teams.

Then, we will invite workshop attendees to participate in 3 rounds of active discussion in breakout rooms of 4-5 people, using Discord. The goal is to focus on action, brainstorming ways of addressing various issues facing the NIME community and strategising methods of implementation. Teams are encouraged to take notes in Padlet, as groups will share their ideas afterwards.

Topics of discussion may include, but are not limited to:

• Inclusivity of NIME research on disability

• Decolonizing NIME research

• Feminist design approaches in NIME research

• Quotas for NIME participation

• Work across borders, and fostering international collaboration

• Mentorship programmes for research within NIME.

• Financial impediments to NIME participation: freelancers, artists, communities that are not as privileged

• Geographical impediments to NIME participation: remote participation, accessibility, and attendance sponsorships

• Collecting/publishing/open data on NIME attendees

• How to encourage/collaborate with local communities/hack-spaces etc

We will end with a call to action (request for volunteers).

Workshop timetable

Short Description

Addressing and fostering diversity within NIME is a complex endeavour, as diversity itself is a multifaceted concept. In this workshop we aim to discuss the existing diversity issues in NIME with members of the community, concerning access, gender, ethnical, financial, institutional, and epistemological disparities. We will also discuss the initiatives that are being put forward by the diversity officers and will call for action and volunteers.

Organizers

Dr. Laurel S. Pardue, Ableton AG

Laurel is a software engineer for Ableton Live and diversity officer for NIME. She has held Postdoctoral Fellowships at Queen’s University Belfast, Aalborg University Copenhagen, and Queen Mary University of London where she also obtained her PhD having previously obtained multiple degrees from the Massachussets Institute of Technology. Dr. Pardue specialises in embedded programming, sensor interactions, and real-time audio programming. With a firm grounding in musical practice, she was the lead engineer on the recently released electronic Tabla Touch with Keda Music and Kuljit Bhamra; Gamelan Elektrika, a gamelan interface that debuted with Kronos Quartet at NY’s Lincoln Center; and a hybrid-electro-accoustic violin that placed 3rd at the 2020 International Guthman Musical Instrument Competition. Dr. Pardue has toured Europe as violinist in multiple projects including appearances on BBC Radios 2-6 as well as serving as a UN Peacekeeper in Liberia.

Juan P. Martinez Avila, The University of Nottingham
Juan is a Computer Science PhD candidate at the Mixed Reality Laboratory in the University of Nottingham. He is a diversity officer for NIME. His work addresses how guitars can be augmented to support performance preparation. His research interests include ethnographic studies, value-based design, soma design and e-textiles. Juan’s research has been published at NIME, CHI and Audio Mostly, and it has received a honourable mention award at CHI 2019. As a diversity officer Juan is interested in exploring ways of promoting the work of people from the Global South at NIME, as well as facilitating their access to the conference.

https://zavilaz.wordpress.com/

Dr. Anna Xambó, De Montfort University

Anna Xambó is a Senior Lecturer in Music and Audio Technology at De Montfort University (Leicester, UK), a member of the Music, Technology and Innovation - Institute of Sonic Creativity (MTI²), and WiNIME officer. Her research and practice focus on sound and music computing systems looking at novel approaches to collaborative, participatory, and live coding experiences. Her solo and group performances have been presented internationally in Denmark, Germany, Norway, Spain, Sweden, UK and USA. She is PI of the EPSRC HDI Network Plus funded project "MIRLCAuto: A Virtual Agent for Music Information Retrieval in Live Coding" and has taken leading roles in organisations with a special interest in improving the representation of women in music technology: Women in Music Tech (2016-2017, Georgia Tech); WoNoMute (2018-2019, NTNU/UiO); and WiNIME (2019-present, NIME).

http://annaxambo.me

Isabela Corintha, University of Aveiro

Isabela is a PhD candidate in Multimedia in Education at the Department of Communication and Arts, University of Aveiro. Her research focuses on embodied and enactive music cognition approaches to digital musical instrument design. Isabela’s current interests includes the exploration of machine learning models, interactive musical improvisation and music education within the perspective of enactive approach to mind. Isabela’s work has been published at NIME and in the Springer book: Advances in Design, Music and Arts. Diversity and social inclusion have been embedded and integrated to her work since early 2000s when she began her career in the field of electronic music.

Doga Buse Cavdir, Stanford University

Doga Cavdir is a PhD candidate at Stanford’s Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics. Her research integrates body movement and expression into designing new musical instruments for cross-disciplinary inclusivity, accessibility, and affordability. Doga’s research and artistic practices focus on utilizing embodied interactive system to offer shared performance spaces to people with diverse skill set and abilities. She continues to contribute to inclusion and diversity practices within and outside of Stanford University. She has been participating in the WiMIR mentoring program and she has been most recently organizing the peer mentoring program, Peer Mentoring in Music, and the Physical Interaction Design Group (PIG) at Stanford. Her artistic work has been featured by Bay Area art centers such as Center for New Music and Temescal Arts Center.

Dr S M Astrid Bin, Ableton AG

Astrid Bin is an artist, technologist and writer. Currently she is a music technology researcher at Ableton AG in Berlin, where her research investigates the human, cultural and technological aspects of designing environments for musical creation and exploration. She specialises in design, interfaces, cultural trends, and embedded real-time applications. She is also a founding developer of Bela.io.

Additional Speakers

Kim Macari is an Artist-Activist immersed in the world of improvised music. Fundamentally she believes in the arts as a powerful tool of empowerment, creative expression and social change. As an artist, she performs in a number of improvised settings on trumpet and spoken word and creates graphic scores, often using ekphrasis and data sonification.

Macari also occupies a number of key positions within the arts world - Programmer for Vortex Jazz Club (ranked in Top 10 jazz venues in the world 2020), Chair of pan-national support body Jazz Promotion Network and is on the Music Team at Arts Council England. She often appears as a cultural commentator at a range of events and publications on topics including gender politics in the arts, diversity and inclusion, cultural identity and the implications of political decision making on the arts.

https://jazzconnective.eu/articles/21/where-are-all-the-good-questions-about-women-in-jazz/

Preferred Length of Workshop

Half-day (4 hours)

Technical and Space Requirements

We will aim for a blended mode, where participants may join the workshop physically at the conference as well as remotely. A set of materials will be provided prior to the workshop using an asynchronous learning approach. We will use Discord (or NIME2021 recommended alternative) to create a server and run multiple voice channels for each of our discussion activities in breakout rooms and plenaries, and chat rooms for participants to have threaded conversations. During the breakout discussions we will also use Padlet for participants to post notes and comments.

As discussions groups will be kept small to best encourage individual engagement (which we already tested in our trial online workshop in January 2021), discussion sessions can be run periodically throughout the day for different audiences across different time zones.

Refined Questions:

How is NIME and the NIME research context exclusionary to people with disabilities, from VI, to neurodivergence and more? What can we do to improve our inclusivity? [action & research]

What would local NIME chapters look like and how can we make them work? What would/could be the benefit? [action, decolonization]

Usually NIME is an in-person conference and most people travel. However, this excludes those without access to the financial resources to attend. What can we do to make a remote conference experience as rewarding and beneficial as being there in person? [we are aware that this also has ethical implications]

How could NIME be more relevant, engaging, and rewarding for those outside the academic tech. community, for instance, artists, performers, and makers? [diversity of practices]

What is NIME’s responsibility to foster cultural exchange and how to make that occur, especially in the context of the conference itself? [ How to encourage/collaborate with local communities/hack-spaces/ and cultural exchange etc. during NIME and NIME linked events? ] [decolonization, diversity of practices]

Why is gender parity a persistent problem at NIME? Why have past efforts not worked? What new actions/strategies can we take to improve? [research/reflection]

How could mentorship address issues of underrepresentation?

Who does the diversity work? How do we reward meaningful diversity work within the community and share the work between everyone?

The vast majority of the people who present at, attend, and perform at NIME are white. What are the reasons for this? What needs to change?

How can we improve and continue the sheparding scheme (English or NIME Academic-as-a-second-language)?

How can we make a sustainable scholarship program and how do we best use it to reach our goals of improved representation?

For those people attending NIME without a supervisor to guide them through “how to get the most from NIME”, how could we implement a NIME buddy system for the conference (and conferences going forward)?

[Optional] How do we track improvements (or non-improvements) of inclusivity and diversity within NIME? How do we measure success? [Do indexes work? How do we best collect information?]

[Optional] How do we define diversity and inclusion within NIME?

[Optional] What do you want to discuss?

Links to Supporting Media

• NIME Diversity wiki: https://transientstatic.gitbook.io/teamdiversity/