Engaging the Discourse of Empowerment for Marginalized Communities Through Research and Design Participation

This paper goes beyond the current empowerment discourse in the SIGCHI community to address how we primarily focus on research and design contexts and technological contributions. It argues that existing literature on empowerment does not fully account for the complexity of marginalized communities, including factors such as poverty, lack of digital literacy, or access to technology, which can affect a community’s decision to participate in research and their effectiveness during participation. The paper presents two provocations: 1) research must adopt methods of partnership that empower the community, and 2) researchers must consider how empowerment is sustained both within and outside of research and design settings and technological contributions. The paper concludes with a call to action for a holistic empowerment strategy within HCI to stimulate further discussion on empowering marginalized communities beyond research and design.