Collaborative Research: FW-HTF-RM: Expanding Rural Ceramics Craft and Computational Fabrication: A Synergy

该项目的目的是通过将悠久的工艺传统与新的计算制造技术相结合，为农村工匠创造新的就业机会，并开发受工艺传统启发的新的计算制造技术。手工艺企业保留了重要的文化传统，为地区经济做出了重大贡献，并为社区提供了认同感和使命感。在就业机会有限的农村地区，工匠及其企业发挥着重要作用，社区对当地工艺传统有着强烈的认同感和自豪感。计算制造结合了计算设计（使用计算机编程和算法来创建数字设计）和数字制造。到目前为止，计算制造主要是在学术研究和工业制造的背景下探索的。然而，随着制造机器的多样化，计算制造与中小批量制造工艺实践越来越兼容。该项目将向新的组成部分介绍计算制造，并扩大计算制造技术的发展，以代表不同的社区文化形式、价值观和需求。它将吸引数百名新墨西哥州和加利福尼亚州的农村工艺从业者，通过参与计算制造和独特的共同开发过程，为他们的业务和创造性实践提供新的机会。它还将通过一系列的推广活动，让来自农村、初中和高中的学生和教师参与计算、设计、制造和创业。研究团队将与新墨西哥州和加利福尼亚州的农村工匠合作，共同开发新的软件、建筑技术和商业策略，将计算设计、数字制造和传统工艺结合起来。该项目将专注于陶瓷，同时努力确保研究成果可推广到其他工艺领域。通过研讨会、访谈和共同设计驻地的方法，该项目有望通过以下方式发展变革性的研究贡献——涉及跨领域的实践、方法、技术和理论：1)开发受工艺传统启发的新形式的计算制造；(2)研究陶瓷工艺实践和传统、社区经济学、HCI理论和计算制造技术的新综合；(3)探索技术的协同设计和共同开发如何将文化、经济和技术问题整合起来；(4)运用价值链分析确定融合传统工艺和计算机制造的新型农村生产形式的经济和文化可行性；(5)加深对农村手工业面临的独特挑战和机遇的理解，以促进包括发展经济学、国际管理、地理学和社会学在内的一系列领域的研究，这些领域与农村和城市社区之间日益加剧的隔离和不平等有关。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The aim of this project is to synergistically create new career opportunities for rural craftspeople by blending long-standing craft traditions with new computational fabrication technologies, and to develop new computational fabrication techniques inspired by craft traditions. Craft businesses keep vital cultural traditions alive, contribute significantly to regional economies, and provide communities with a sense of identity and purpose. Craftspeople and their businesses play significant roles in rural areas, where employment options are limited, and communities have a strong sense of identity and pride that is rooted in local craft traditions. Computational fabrication combines computational design, (using computer programming and algorithms to create digital designs), with digital fabrication. Computational fabrication has, thus far, been explored primarily in contexts of academic research and industrial manufacturing. However, as the availability of fabrication machines diversifies, computational fabrication grows compatible with small to medium volume manufacturing craft practices. This project will introduce computational fabrication to new constituents and broaden the development of computational fabrication technologies to represent diverse community cultural forms, values, and needs. It will engage several hundred rural craft practitioners in NM and CA with new opportunities to grow their businesses and creative practices through engagement with computational fabrication and a unique co-development process. It will also engage diverse, rural, middle- and high-school students and teachers in computation, design, fabrication, and entrepreneurship through a series of outreach activities.The team of researchers will partner with rural craftspeople, in New Mexico and California, to co-develop new software, construction techniques, and business strategies that integrate computational design, digital fabrication, and traditional craft. The project will focus on ceramics, while working to ensure that research findings are generalizable to other craft domains. Through a methodology of workshops, interviews, and co-design residencies, the project is expected to develop transformational research contributions–involving practices, methodologies, techniques, and theory across fields–by (1) developing new forms of computational fabrication inspired by craft traditions; (2) investigating new syntheses of ceramic craft practices and traditions, community economics, HCI theory, and computational fabrication technologies; (3) exploring how the co-design and co-development of technology can integrate cultural, economic, and technological concerns; (4) applying Value Chain Analysis to ascertain the economic and cultural viability of new forms of rural production that blend traditional craft and computational fabrication; (5) developing deeper understandings of the unique challenges and opportunities facing rural craft businesses to contribute to studies across a range of fields–including developmental economics, international management, geography, and sociology–which are concerned with the increasing segregation of and inequalities between rural and urban communities.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.