Welcoming the Unknown Other. Towards a new ethnography for multispecies design

Abstract

This thesis presents relation-oriented multispecies design as a possible tool to facilitate human-nonhuman relationships and interaction with Otherness. The research has been carried out in the context of the San Marino Republic Pavilion at the 18th Architecture Biennale in Venice: here, the concept of hospitality has been used to investigate the tensions and negotiations inherent in human-nonhuman interactions. Supporting the analysis through the work of Haraway, Tsing, and Derrida, the collected data have been presented as case studies for creating a set of practices for a new methodological approach dedicated to multispecies design. The first part of the thesis analyzes the city as a commons and as the space where the conflicts between humans and Otherness are more evident. Design and its materiality are then proposed as valuable tools to understand and unpack those tensions, serving as a premise for the second part of the research. Subsequently, the several approaches and visions for a hospitable design that have been collected and analyzed over the months, together with the analysis of different multispecies ethnography methodologies, are examined. Eventually, drawing on the reflections that emerged from observing those approaches, some recommendations for creating an alternative multispecies ethnographic method for designers are put forward.