Design & Social Justice Studio

At Georgia Tech, I established and directed the Design and Social Justice Studio, an interdisciplinary research group that together examine the ethical and political dimensions of emerging technologies.

I am currently working to re-imagine and re-establish the studio at University of Washington. Stay tuned and reach out if you like to be involved!

Below is the list students and advisees who contributed to research projects at the studio.

PHD Students & Postdocs

Aditya Anupam (he/him)
Postdoctoral Researcher

Research Interests: Games, Education, STS

Aditya is Postdoctoral Researcher at the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech. He received his Ph.D. in Digital Media in December 2021 from the same department. His research is situated at the confluence of science, media, and learning. Anchored in feminist, STS, and pragmatist scholarship, he explores digital media––particularly games, simulations, and interactive visualizations––as environments to foster the learning of science as a situated practice.

Email: aanupam3@gatech.edu

Sylvia Janicki (she/her)
PhD Student, Digital Media

Research Interests: Civic Media, Accessibility, Design

Sylvia is a first year PhD student in Digital Mediaat the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech, with a background in landscape architecture and urban design. Her research centers on issues of access and justice in urban environments and explores the intersections of built, digital, and bodily spaces. Her work in the Design and Social Justice Studio examines embodied experiences of sensing and data production with implications for designing affective technologies in smart cities.

Email: sjanicki3@gatech.edu

Mohsin Y. K. Yousufi (he/him)
PhD Student, Digital Media

Research Interests: Smart Cities, Data, Design 

Mohsin is a Ph.D. student in Digital Media at the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech. His research is focused on exploring the application and implication of AI and Big Data to architectural design, with a focus on how these technologies can shape the experience of built-environment.

Email: myousufi8@gatech.edu

Katherine Bennett (she/they)
PhD Student, Digital Media

Research Interests: Reproductive Justice, Environmental Justice, Afrofuturist Feminism

Katherine is a PhD student in Digital Media at Georgia Tech. Her research traces intersections of reproductive and environmental justice in the literature and moving image media of speculative Black feminism. Her writing and multimedia fabrications explore how these representations recalibrate old optics of displacement by communicating what it feels like, and is, to queer colonial aesthetics embedded in territorial claims on people and land

Email: kbennett64@gatech.edu

Abigail Ellison (she/her)
Undergraduate Research Assistant, Literature, Media, Communication

Interests: Interactive Design, Accessibility

Abigail is an undergraduate student interested in interactive design, accessible design, and how spaces can be transformed to aid our communities. She is currently working with the Computational Media Capstone at Georgia Tech to document their projects.


Email: aellison32@gatech.edu

Ren Zheng (they/them)
Undergraduate Student, Computational Media

Interests: Visual Design, Interactive Art, Critical Making

Ren is an undergraduate student at Georgia Tech interested in exploring and telling interactive narratives about lived experiences. Particularly, their research area encompasses queer spaces/bodies, material culture, and the philosophy of work.

Email: rzheng11@gatech.edu

MS Advisees

Michelle Ramirez

MS, Digital Media (2022)

Master’s Project: “Digital Ghost Stories”

Anushri Kumar

MS, HCI (2021)

Master’s Project: “Engineers Learning Ethics through Interactive Gameplay”

Yash Lara

MS, HCI (2021)

Master’s Project: “Speech on Twitter: Evaluation, Interventions and Solutions”

Huan Deng

MS, Digital Media (2020)

Master’s Project: “A Digital Gallery Experience of Cosmetics in the 20th Century US”

Pragati Singh

MS, HCI (2020)

Master’s Project: “Mapping Surveillance Cameras and Making Urban Environments Readable”

Christina Bui

MS, Digital Media (2020)

Master’s Project: “Heart Link: An Interactive Visualization of Embodied Social Connection”

Shubhangi Gupta

MS, HCI (2020)

Master’s Project: “Analyzing the Social Implications of AI in Smart Cities”

Brooke Bosley

MS, Digital Media (2018)

Master’s Project: “Retelling: An Interactive Afrofuturistic Map”

Horyun Song

MS, HCI (2018)

Master’s Project: “Untangling the Perception of Sex Difference in Biological Research”

Nick Tippens

MS, Digital Media (2018)

Master’s Project: “Came from Nothing: An Interactive Documentary”

Lorina Navarro

MS, HCI (2017)

Master’s Project: “Our Driverless Futures: Speculating Ethical Dilemmas of Self-Driving Cars”

Xiaoxue Zhang

MS, Digital Media (2017)

Master’s Project: “Health Inequity in Atlanta”

Rachel Miles

MS, Digital Media (2017)

Master’s Project: “StoryCar: Connecting Atlanta’s Past with the Present”

Megan Hamilton

MS, HCI (2016)

Master’s Project: “Designing for Conversation: A Digital Decision Aid for Diabetes Medication Choice”

Michelle Partogi

MS, Digital Media (2016)

Master’s Project: “Our AIMS: Changing Organizational Culture through Co-Design”

Tanisha Wagh

MS, HCI (2016)

Master’s Project: “An Interactive Journey through Modern Physics” 

Yasmin Amer

MS, HCI (2015)

Master’s Project: “StoryCar: Connecting Sweet Auburn: Using Locative Mobile Media to Share Stories from Atlanta’s Historic District”

Rose Peng

MS, HCI (2015)

Master’s Project: “Atlanta Beltline Exploration App”

Govind Lingam

MS, Digital Media (2014)

Master’s Project: “Ambient Skyscapes: An Ambient Weather Installation Using Interactive Projection Mapping”

Iris Sun

MS, HCI (2014)

Master’s Project: “Who Said it How (A Visual Analysis of Wendy Davis’s Filibuster News Coverage)” 

Other Studio Members and Contributors

Simin Nasiri (she/her)

MS Student, Digital Media, 2022

Lu Meng

MS Student, HCI

Shreya Shenai

MS Student, HCI

Arpit Mathur

MS, HCI (2021)

Tae Prasongpongchai

MS Student, HCI, 2020

Charlie Denton

MS Student, Digital Media, 2020

Sara Mostofizadeh

MS Student, Digital Media, 2019

Da-In Ryoo

BS Student, Computer Science, 2019

Olivia Cox

BS Student, Neuroscience

Claire Stricklin

PhD Student, Digital Media, 2020

Hannah Tam

BS Mechanical Engineering, 2018

Tae Eun Kim

Visiting Research Scholar,
Digital Media, 2017

Rose Peng

Research Assistant,
MS HCI, 2015

Binjie Sun

Research Assistant,
MS Industrial Design, 2015

Mithila Tople

Research Assistant,
MS HCI, 2015

Ridhima Gupta

Research and Teaching Assistant,
MS HCI, 2016

Brighton Vino Jegarajan

Research Assistant,
MS HCI, 2015

Shaziya Tambawala

MS, HCI, 2016

Fengbo Li

MS, Digital Media, 2014

Baishen Huang

BS Computer Engineering, 2014

Yunnuo Cheng

MS HCI, 2017

Annick Huber

MS, HCI 2016

Justeen Lee

BS, Industrial Design, 2016

Ye-Ji Kim

BS Student, Computational Media