Audience Tools

Nassim Parvin

CV Associate Professor, Associate Dean for Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Access & Sovereignty (IDEAS)
Mary Gates Hall 370 ◆ Website

Specializations

  • Design Ethics and Politics
  • Feminist Science and Technology Studies
  • Design Justice

Research Areas

Courses

  • INFO 352 - Race, Gender, And Information

Biography

Nassim Parvin is an Associate Professor at the University of Washington (UW) Information School where she also serves as the Associate Dean for Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Access & Sovereignty (IDEAS). Dr. Parvin's research explores the ethical and political dimensions of design and technology, especially as related to questions of democracy and justice. Rooted in pragmatist ethics and feminist theory, she critically engages emerging digital technologies—such as smart cities or artificial intelligence—in their wide-ranging and transformative effect on the future of collective and social interactions.

Dr. Parvin’s interdisciplinary research integrates theoretically-driven humanistic scholarship and design-based inquiry. That is, she both writes traditional scholarly papers and makes digital artifacts that illustrate how humanistic values may be cultivated to produce radically different artifacts and infrastructures. Her scholarship appears across disciplinary venues in design (such as Design Issues), Human-Computer Interaction (such as ACM CSCW), Science and Technology Studies (such as Science, Technology, and Human Values), as well as philosophy (such as Hypatia: Journal of Feminist Philosophy). Her designs have been deployed at non-profit organizations such as the Mayo Clinic and exhibited in venues such as the Smithsonian Museum, receiving multiple awards and recognitions.

Dr. Parvin is an editor of Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience, an award-winning journal in the expanding interdisciplinary field of STS and serves on the editorial board of Design Issues. Her teaching has also received multiple recognitions inclusive of the campus-wide 2017 GATECH CETL/BP Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award. In her role as the Associate Dean of IDEAS, she is committed to creating a model of excellence for how institutions might foster accessible, equitable, and joyful environments that advance social justice through pluralistic scholarship and ensure that all students, staff, and faculty thrive and succeed.

Dr. Parvin received her PhD in Design from Carnegie Mellon University. She holds an MS in Information Design and Technology from Georgia Tech and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Tehran, Iran.

Education

  • Ph D, Design, Carnegie Mellon University, 2011
  • MS, Digital Media, Georgia Institute of Technology, 2003
  • BS, Electrical Engineering, Tehran University, 1998

Awards

  • Best Paper Award - ACM Designing Interactive Systems (DIS), 2024
  • Infrastructure Award, awarded to the editorial collective of Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience - Society for Social Studies of Science (4S), 2020
  • Faculty Research Award - Ivan Allen College (IAC) Digital Integrative Liberal Arts Center (DILAC), 2017
  • Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award - Georgia Tech, 2017
  • Teacher of the Year Award - Ivan Allen College, 2016

Publications and Contributions

  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Feminist Philosophical Toys: Playful Companions and Live Theorization (2024)
    Hypatia, pp. 1-27 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Rebecca Rouse
  • Conference Paper
    Sensing Bodies: Engaging Postcolonial Histories through More-than-Human Interactions (2024)
    Proceedings of the Eighteenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction Authors: Sylvia Janicki, Alexandra Teixeira Riggs, Noura Howell, Anne Sullivan, Nassim Parvin
  • Report
    Just Design: Pasts, Presents, and Future Trajectories of Technology (2023)
    Just Tech. Social Science Research Council (SSRC) Field Review, pp. 1-16 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Magazine/Trade Publication
    Citational justice and the politics of knowledge production (2022)
    ACM Interactions, 29(5), pp. 78-82 Authors: Syed Ishtiaque Ahmed, Sareeta Amrute, Jeffrey Bardzell, Shaowen Bardzell, Nicola Bidwell, Tawanna Dillahunt, Sane Gaytán, Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Rethinking Safe Mobility: The Case of Safetipin in India (2022)
    12th International Conference on Information & Communication Technologies and Development Authors: Shubhangi Gupta, Sylvia Janicki, Pooja Casula, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Extended Abstract
    Co-designing Resources for Ethics Education in HCI (2021)
    Extended Abstracts of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 1-5 Authors: Ajit G. Pillai , A. Baki Kocaballi, Tuck Wah Leong, Rafael A. Calvo, Nassim Parvin, Katie Shilton, Jenny Waycott, Casey Fiesler, John C. Havens, Naseem Ahmadpour
  • Broadcast Media
    Conspiracy, Complaining, and Cooking (2021)
    Inside Higher Ed Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    ‘We found no violation!’: Twitter's Violent Threats Policy and Toxicity in Online Discourse (2021)
    Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Communities and Technologies, Wicked Problems in the Age of Tech, pp. 151-159 Authors: Pooja Casula, Aditya Anupam, Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Design Challenges for Science Games: The Case of a Quantum Mechanics Game (2020)
    International Journal of Designs for Learning, 11(1), pp. 1–20 Authors: Aditya Anupam, Ridhima Gupta, Shubhangi Gupta, Zhendong Li , Nora Hong, Azad Naeemi, Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    The Conjoined Spectacles of the ‘Smart Super Bowl’ (2020)
    Engaging Science, Technology, and Society, 6(Unknown Issue), pp. 312-319 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Unintended by Design: On the Political Uses of “Unintended Consequences (2020)
    Engaging Science, Technology, and Society, 6(Unknown Issue), pp. 320– 327 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Anne Pollock
  • Refereed Essay
    A Story of Paradise: Interactive, Digitally Enhanced, and Radioactive (2019)
    Interactions, 27(1), pp. 74–76 Authors: Lisa P. Nathan, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Extended Abstract
    Beyond Motivation and Memorization: Fostering Scientific Inquiry with Games (2019)
    Proceedings of the 2019 Annual Symposium on Computer-Human Interaction in Play Companion Extended Abstracts, pp. 323–331 Authors: Aditya Anupam, Shubhangi Gupta, Azad Naeemi, Nassim Parvin
  • Book, Chapter in Scholarly Book-New
    Building on Bauhaus: Design as the Liberal Art of the 21st Century (2019)
    Bauhaus Futures, ISBN/ISSN: 9780262042918 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Look Up and Smile: Seeing through Alexa’s Algorithmic Gaze (2019)
    Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience, 5(1) Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Doing Justice to Stories: Engaging with Digital Story Collection Practices (2018)
    Engaging Science, Technology, and Society, 4(Unknown Issue), pp. 515–534 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Heart Sense: Experiments in Design as a Catalyst for Feminist Reflections on Embodiment (2018)
    Proceedings of 2018 Design Research Society (DRS) Conference, pp. 1–10 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Anne Pollock
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Our Bodies in the Path of the Trolley; Or, Why Self-driving Cars Must *Not* Be Programmed to Kill (2018)
    Science, Technology, and Human Values, 43(2), pp. 302–323 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Particle in a Box: An Experiential Environment for Learning Introductory Quantum Mechanics (2018)
    IEEE Transactions on Education, 61(1), pp. 29–37 Authors: Aditya Anupam, Ridhima Gupta, Azad Naeemi, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Uber in Bangladesh: The Tangled Web of Mobility and Justice (2018)
    The Computer Supported Cooperative Work Conference, pp. 1–20 Authors: Neha Kumar, Nassim Parvin
  • Exploratory Paper
    Parental Controls: Reimagining Technologies for Parent-Child Interaction (2017)
    Proceedings of the 15th European Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work, pp. 18–34 Authors: Marije Nouwen, Nassim Parvin, Bieke Zaman
  • Conference Paper
    A Novel Interactive Paradigm for Teaching Quantum Mechanics (2016)
    11th Annual Games+Learning+Society Conference, pp. 1-4 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Fostering Organizational Change through Co-Designing Collaborative Media (2016)
    The International Conference for Group Work, pp. 441–444 Authors: Michelle Partogi, Nassim Parvin
  • Workshop Paper
    A Value Sensitive Design Case Study: Why Values Do (not) Design (2015)
    Charting the Next Decade for Value Sensitive Design, in association with Decennial Critical Alternatives Conference Authors: Bieke Zaman, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Collective Intelligence or Group Think? Engaging Participation Patterns in World without Oil (2015)
    The Computer Supported Cooperative Work Conference, pp. 1872–1881 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Eric Meyers
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    MRX Design and Criticism: The Confluence of Media Studies, Performance, and Social Interaction (2015)
    Digital Creativity, 26(3-4), pp. 221–227 Authors: Rebecca Rouse, Maria Engberg, Nassim Parvin, Jay Bolter
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    MRX as a Participatory Platform (2015)
    Digital Creativity, 26(3-4), pp. 207–220 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Magazine/Trade Publication
    Play It Seriously: Engaging the Sustainability Agenda with Alternate Reality Games (2015)
    ACM Interactions, 22(1), pp. 68–70 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Eric Meyers
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Values as Hypotheses: Design, Inquiry, and the Service of Values (2015)
    Design Issues, 31(4), pp. 90–103 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Lisa Nathan, Ian Hargraves
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    “MRX: An Interdisciplinary Framework for Mixed Reality Experience Design and Criticism (2015)
    Digital Creativity, 26(3-4), pp. 175–181 Authors: Rebecca Rouse, Maria Engberg, Nassim Parvin, Jay Bolter
  • Conference Paper
    Designing Meaningful Participation: Analyzing Contribution Patterns in an Alternate Reality Game (2014)
    The International Conference for Group Work, pp. 306–309 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Eric Meyers, Allison Trumble
  • Essay
    Designs, Values, and Democracy (2014)
    Humanistic Perspectives in a Technological World, pp. 130–132 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Interactive Visualizations for Teaching Quantum Mechanics and Semiconductor Physics (2014)
    The Proceedings of 2014 Frontiers in Education Conference, pp. 1-4 Authors: Rose Peng, Bill Dorn, Azad Naeemi, Nassim Parvin
  • Journal Article, Professional Journal
    Towards a Community of Practice of a Leadership Model for the Research University (2014)
    Journal of Global Strategic Management, 15(1), pp. 5–15 Authors: Steven Cross, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Exploring the Character of Participation in Social Media: The Case of Google Image Labeler (2012)
    Proceedings of the 2012 iConference, pp. 72–80 Author: Nassim Parvin
  • Magazine/Trade Publication
    Meta-making: Crafting the Conversation of Values and Design (2012)
    ACM Interactions, 19(3), pp. 54–59 Authors: Ingrid Erickson, Lisa Nathan, Nassim Parvin, Cory Knobel, Matthew Ratto
  • Journal Article, Academic Journal
    Re-establishing the Center in HumanCentered Design: From Opportunity to Significance in Human Life and Living (2012)
    Zoontechnica: The Journal of Redirective Design, 1(2) Authors: Ian Hargraves, Nassim Parvin
  • Conference Paper
    Breakaway: An Ambient Display Designed to Change Human Behavior (2005)
    Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 1945–1948 Authors: Nassim Parvin, Jodi Forlizzi, Amy Hurst, John Zimmerman

Presentations

  • AI, post-colonialism and feminist techno-politics (2024)
    Institute for Advanced Study, University of Amsterdam - Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • ChatGPT!: Make Me Sound White (2024)
    Institute for Advanced Study, University of Amsterdam - Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • "Epistemic Injustice in Technology and Policy Design: Lessons from New York City’s Heat Complaints System (2023)
    CHI 2023 Workshop: Designing Technology and Policy Simultaneously: Towards A Research Agenda and New Practice - Hamburg, Germany
  • Feminist Technoscience Publishing as Dissidence, Resistance, Creative World-building (2023)
    National Women's Studies Association - Baltimore, Maryland
  • Sensing Bodies: Being, Feeling, and Breathing with Plants (2023)
    DIS ’23 Workshop: Temporalities of Thinking with Care - Pittsburgh, PA
  • Social Innovation as Cooking and Conspiracy (2023)
    Code for America - Virtual
  • Technocreep in Smart Forests: Centering Touch and Slow movements with(in) nature (2023)
    Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science - Honolulu, HI
  • Humble Materials & Transformative Play (2022)
    Transformative Play Initiative Seminar: Role-playing, Culture and Heritage - Visby, Sweden
  • Technocreep and the Politics of Things Unseen (2022)
    2022 Meeting of the Society for Literature, Science and the Arts (SLSA) - West Lafayette, Indiana
  • AI Enabled Fashion Assistants and the Politics of Embodied Interactions (2021)
    2021 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) - Toronto, CA
  • Conspiracy, Complaining, and Cooking (2021)
    What After, What Beyond? Life After the PhD, Work Outside of Academy: 2021 North American PhD by Design Symposium - Virtual
  • Feminist Philosophical Toys (2021)
    2021 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) Making and Doing - Toronto, CA
  • Heart Sense (2021)
    ACC Smithsonian Creativity and Innovation Festival - Washington, D.C.
  • The Digital Underground: Methods and Principles of Radical Experimentation (2021)
    First Annual Digital IDEAS: A Summer Institute for Anti-Racist Critical Digital Studies, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, MI
  • Cars, Fashion, and the False Promise of Algorithmic Judgment (2019)
    Design@Large, University of California San Diego - San Diego, CA
  • Code is Rigid, Care is Storied (2019)
    Coding Caring Symposium, Stanford University (Part of One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence (AI100) - Stanford, CA
  • New Technologies, Old Dogmas: Why We Need to Ignite Our Ethical Imagination (2019)
    ACM Communities and Technologies Conference - Vienna, Austria
  • Principles and Uncertainty: Possibilities of Ethical Imaginative Inquiry (2019)
    Experience and Principles of Design International Conference, Tongji University - Shanghai, China
  • Smart Technologies & Feminist Intelligence (2019)
    2019 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) - New Orleans, LA
  • AI, Work and Leadership (2018)
    The Google School for Leaders - Mountain View, CA
  • Algorithms, Mobility, & Justice (2018)
    Science and Justice Research Center, University of California Santa Cruz - Santa Cruz, CA
  • Design Ethics in the Age of Algorithmic Everything (2018)
    Royal College of Art - London, England
  • Design, Ethics, and the Smart City (2018)
    Institute of Design, Illinois Institute of Technology - Chicago, IL
  • Heart Sense: Reflections on Physiology and Embodiment (2018)
    Centre for Invention and Social Process (CISP), Goldsmiths, University of London - London, England
  • Of Algorithms and Inclusion: the Interaction Design Challenges of Smart Technologies (2018)
    IxDA World Interaction Design Day - Atlanta, GA
  • Psi and Delta (2018)
    ACC Smithsonian Creativity and Innovation Festival - Washington, D.C
  • Reimagining Cities: Feminist Alternatives to the Smart (2018)
    2018 National Women's Studies Association (NWSA) - Atlanta, GA
  • The Tyranny of Algorithms: Why Self-driving Cars Must *NOT* be Programmed to Kil (2018)
    STS Faculty Research Presentations, Georgia Tech - Atlanta, GA
  • Ethical Inquiry and Design Imagination (2017)
    Stamps School of Art and Design, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, MI
  • Heart Sense: Design as a Catalyst for Feminist Reflections on Embodiment (2017)
    Stamps School of Art and Design, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor, MI
  • Heart Time: Reflections on Physiology and Embodiment (2017)
    2017 Meeting of the Society for Literature, Science and the Arts (SLSA) - Tempe, AZ
  • Smart yet (in)Sensible? Feminist Critical Perspectives on “Smart Cities" (2017)
    2017 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) - Boston, MA
  • Exposing the Myth of Algorithmic Morality or, Why Self- Driving Cars Should *not* be Programmed to Kill (2016)
    Value Sensitive Design: Charting the Next Decade, Lorentz International Center for Scientific Workshops - The Netherlands
  • Moral Algorithms: The New Media of Mobility (2016)
    Faculty of Culture and Society, Malmö University - Malmö, Sweden
  • Participatory Urban Media (2016)
    Toward a Typology of Participation in Crowdwork, in association with ACM CSCW - San Francisco, CA
  • Probing Design and Democracy through the Lens of Participatory Media (2016)
    Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology - Delft, The Netherlands
  • The Data of Experience and the Experience of Data: A Design Perspective on Digital Scholarship (2016)
    Doing Sport History in the Digital Present, School of History and Sociology, Georgia Tech - Atlanta, GA
  • A Novel Interactive Paradigm for Teaching Quantum Mechanics (2015)
    Georgia Tech STEM Education Research Expo - Atlanta, GA
  • Communicating Evidence toward Policy Change: An Intervention Approach to Address the Science to Service Gap (2015)
    International Research Society for Public Management Conference - Birmingham, England
  • Feminism and Feminist Approaches in Social Computing Workshop (2015)
    Computer Supported Cooperative Work Conference - Vancouver, Canada
  • Participatory Media and Democracy: A Critical Perspective (2015)
    IT University of Copenhagen - Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Tracing the Challenges and Opportunities of Locative Participatory Media (2015)
    Centre for User Experience Research (CUO) Institute for Media Studies, KU Leuven - Leuven, Belgium
  • Digital Policy: Communication Tools to Shrink the Science to Policy Gap (2014)
    GVU Talks, Georgia Tech - Atlanta, GA
  • Engaging the Concept and Ideal of Democracy in Contemporary Design Discourse (2014)
    University of British Columbia iSchool - Vancouver, BC, Canada
  • Participatory Media and Democracy: A Critical Perspective (2014)
    Centre for User Experience Research (CUO) Institute for Media Studies, KU Leuven - Leuven, Belgium
  • Seeing through Time: The Sweet Auburn Digital Media Initiative (2014)
    National Trust for Historic Preservation Conference - Savannah, GA
  • Design and Democracy: Expression, Participation, and Community in Contemporary Products (2013)
    MIT Civic Media - Cambridge, MA
  • Examining the Quality of Social Interaction in Participatory Media (2013)
    GVU Talks, Georgia Tech - Atlanta, GA
  • World Without Oil and the Challenge of Cultivating Educational Experiences (2013)
    Digital Games Research Association Conference (DiGRA 2013) - Atlanta, GA
  • Writing, Performance, Design: Frameworks for Understanding & Creating New Narratives in Augmented Reality (2013)
    HASTAC 2013 – The Storm of Progress: New Horizons, New Narratives, New Codes - Toronto, CA
  • Civic Logon: Exploring Technologies for Civic Engagement (2012)
    2012 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) - Copenhage, Denmark
  • Organizations and Social Media: Hypotheses for Organizing (2010)
    Convergence: Managing + Designing Conference, Weatherhead School of Management - Cleveland, OH
  • The Idea of Liberty and the Form of Social Interaction (2009)
    Fourth Order Design: A Working Conference on Service Design, Interaction, and Social Environments, Weatherhead School of Management and The Cleveland Institute of Art - Cleveland, OH