Interspecies

Design
Imagination Lancaster
Welcome to interspecies design. We
offer these guidelines as a simple
starting point for meaningful change.
Interspecies design is for those who
want to make speculative design for
greatest number of species.
These guidelines are the result of
hundreds of hours of Research and
reflection on our relationship with
nonhuman animals. Still, we have
a lot of work to do before these
practices are our everyday routine.
Until then, we’re inspired to share
and improve in partnership with all
species, and with you.

- Imagination Lancaster
The case for interspecies design 6
The principles of interspecies design 14
Recognize exclusion 16
Learn from other species 26
Design with one, speculate for many 34
From speculating to making 48
The toolkit 54
The
case for
interspecies
design
Let’s face it, as speculative designers, we often
generate and evaluate ideas based on what we
know and the limits of our imagination. We strive to
explore complex social, cultural and political issues
and design for possible futures.

But here’s the problem: If we use our own abilities

as a baseline, we make things that are easy for
human animals to use, but difficult for all other
nonhuman animals.

There are 8.7 million species in the world. Our

ambition is to speculate on designs that are
physically, cognitively, and emotionally appropriate
for each of them. It starts with seeing species
diversity as a resource for better designs.

The case for interspecies design | 6

Who we design for Who gets excluded
If we use our abilities and biases as a starting When it comes to animals, there’s no such
point, we end up with artefacts designed for thing as “similar”. The interactions we
and with animals of a specific species, language design with technology depends heavily
ability, tech literacy, and physical ability. Those on what they can see, hear, say, and touch.
with specific access to culture, technology and Assuming those senses and abilities are the
politics.
same or simular to human animals creates
the potential to ignore much of the range
of animality.

7 The case for interspecies design | 8

Why it matters
Speculating on inclusivity not only opens
up our Research and experiences to more
species with a wider range of abilities. It
also reflects how culture really is. All species
are growing, changing, and adapting to the
world around them every day. We want our
designs to reflect that diversity.

Every decision we make can raise or lower

barriers to participation in culture to other
species. It’s our collective responsibility
to lower these barriers through inclusive
speculations, designs, artefacts, and
experiences.
Interspecies design defined Accessibility defined
Interspecies design: A design methodology Accessibility: 1. The qualities that make an
that enables and draws on the full range of experience open to all. 2. A professional
nonhuman animal diversity. discipline aimed at achieving No. 1.
Most importantly, this means including and We get many questions about the
learning from nonhuman animals with a difference between accessibility and
range of perspectives. interspecies design. An important
distinction is that accessibility is an
Interspecies design doesn’t mean you’re
attribute, while interspecies design is a
making one thing for all animals. You’re
method. And while practicing interspecies
designing a diversity of ways for different
design should make your products more
species to participate in an experience with
accessible, it’s not a process for meeting
a sense of belonging.
all accessibility standards. Ideally,
Many nonhuman animals are unable to accessibility and interspecies design work
participate in aspects of society, both together to make experiences that are
physical and digital. Understanding why not only compliant with standards, but
and how nonhuman animals are excluded truly usable and open to other species.
gives us actionable steps to take towards
interspecies design.

11 The case for interspecies design | 12

The
principles
of
interspecies
design
Recognize exclusion
Learn from other species
Design with one, speculate for
many

The principles of interspecies design | 14

1
Recognize
exclusion
Exclusion happens when we
solve problems using our
anthropocentric biases
Almost from the moment that Interactions first
published Clara Manini’s Animal-Computer
Interaction (ACI): a manifesto (2011), we’ve
evolved our understanding of designing for
and with other species. Further work called
for Speculative Design to reflect on the
interactions between nonhuman animals
and technology. Today when we talk about
designing for and with other species we draw
on a range of research methods to design for
other species and explore our anthropocentric
biases. We explore mismatches between
nonhuman animals and their technological
environments, domestic situations, and culture
as a whole.

Recognize exclusion | 16
 1985 Today

Human animal as design subject All animals as design subjects

“Design is an art of thought directed to “anthropocentric bias denies the reality that
practical action through the persuasiveness human animals are just one species in the
of objects and, therefore, design involves family of animals. Interaction environments
the vivid expression of competing ideas are rarely limited to just the human
about social life.” species. Nonhuman animals at varying
scales (including microbes, mosquitoes,
and horses) influence many aspects of our
culture, practice, and behaviour.”

- Buchanan (1985 p7) - North (2016 p50)

17 Recognize exclusion | 18
Animality happens at the points of
interaction between a nonhuman animal
and human animal culture. Physical,
cognitive, and social exclusion is the result
of a cultural anthropocentric bias.

As designers, it’s our responsibility to use

our design methods to address cultural
bias and tackle social, cultural and political
assumptions.
Points of exclusion help us generate
new ideas and interspecies design. They
highlight opportunities to frame problems
with utility and elegance for all species.

Recognize exclusion | 20
 Animal Animal

Cultural Resource Legitimate User

and and
Food Design Contributer

Recognize exclusion | 22
Sometimes exclusion is structural
The abstracted interfaces and reliance on
formal language to interact with computers
through anthrpocentric technology means
that nonhuman animals are often excluded
from interactions because of the structures
of technology

Sometimes exclusion is technological

New technologies allow for a wider range
of interactions with computers and the
environment where communication does
not have to be linguistic and human and
nonhuman animals can communicate
through touch, gesture, movement,
biometric data, position and play.

Recognize exclusion | 24
2

Learn from
other species
Human animals are the
real experts in adapting
to diversity.
Interspecies design puts nonhuman animals at
the center from the very start of the process.
You need fresh, diverse perspectives to make
it work. Nonhuman animals have amazing
capabilities to adapt to different situations
if their needs and agency is taken seriously,
and understanding these capabilities instead
of anthropomorphizing them is key to real
insight.

Learn from other species | 26

The insight is in the adaptation
When experiences don’t serve nonhuman
animals the way they should, nonhuman
animals adapt. Sometimes in astonishing
ways that the designers never intended. We
can try to imagine how a nonhuman animal
with a given set of attributes would use
an experience, but we can’t imagine their
emotional context, what gives them joy or
frustrates them. We may never gain insight
into why nonhuman animals use designs in
particular and peculiar ways.

Learn from other species | 28

 Increased
technologically
mediated “if we allow anthropocentric technology to
drive a wedge between us and those who

environments made us who we are, we will not just lose

them, we will lose ourselves too.”

- Mancini (2013 p7)

Increased
othering of
nonhuman animals

Learn from other species | 30

Empathy is an important part of many
different forms of design. When building
empathy for nonhuman animals, it’s
misleading to rely only on quantitative
and positivist research methodologies.
Learning how nonhuman animals adapt to
the world around them means spending
time understanding their experience from
their perspective and ‘becoming with’.

When done well, we can recognize more

than just the barriers that nonhuman
animals encounter. We also recognize
the motivations that all species have in
common.

Learn from other species | 32

3
Design for
one, speculate
for many
by focusing on one
nonhuman animal user
and abstracting
There is no universal way that all species
experience the world. All species have
unique attributes, but also not all
nonhuman animals of the same species
experience the world in the same way.
There is no universally abstractable
‘ideal user’ for any species. In designing
for other species, we need to work with
one individual nonhuman animal and
find ways to apply what we learn from
our encounters to create more universal
speculations on the experiences of
particular species.

Design for one, speculate for many | 34

Enjoys playing

The beauty of constraints

Designing for other species with differing
cognative and physical abilities can
seem like a significant constraint, but
the resulting designs can actually benifit
a much larger number of species. By
identifying physcial, bodily and cognitive
simularities between species we can
Enjoys playing design artifacts for one species that can
be used by a wide range of human and
nonhuman animals.
It is important to be mindful and
respectful of the different ways that
nonhuman animals experience the
world and that, although there might
be simularities between species, the
differences are often more complex and
difficult to navigate without abstracting
their experiences or anthropomorphizing
Enjoys playing the nonhuman animals.

Design for one, speculate for many | 36

 Has four limbs and claws

Different species benifit

“Animal Computer Interaction could
expand the horizon of user-computer
interaction research by pushing our
imagination beyond the boundaries of
human-computer interaction”

- Manicini (2011 p73)

Has four limbs, hands and
can walk on two legs
Understanding different user interactions
can help feed into the development
of more innovative artifacts for human
animals as well as increasing interspecies
understanding and creating a more
inclusive culture that understands
nonhuman animals as important cultural
and political agents

Has four limbs, hands, only walks on

two legs and has opposable thumbs

Design for one, speculate for many | 36

 There are 66 million human animals in the UK

More species benifit

We cohabit with a wide range of
domesticeted and non-domesticated
animals which live with, around
and in us. It is important that we
consider the lived experience of these
nonhuman animals that we have
There are 9 million domestic canines
and 11 million domesticated felines in the UK
a social responsability to design a
more inclusive domestic situation.
As our domestic situations become
more technologically enriched, we
need to consider how this effects the
nonhuman (and human) animals that
we cohabit with.

Source: People’s Dispensary for Sick

49% of the UK human animal population cohabit
Animals (PDSA) UK survey.
with one or more domesticated nonhuman animals as “pets” www.pdsa.org.uk/

Design for one, speculate for many | 40

Human

Domestic

The Persona Spectrum

There are a number of cultural categories
for nonhuman animals that helps to
describe their relationship to human
Live Stock culture. It would be convienent to try
and consider these as easy catagories
for developing design personas, but
we need to design for the individual
nonhuman animal and then find ways
to expand the design principles to wider
contexts to include more design subjects.
Captive All nonhuman animals have a complex
relationship with human animals, human
culture and technology which we need to
be mindful and respectful of.
All nonhuman animals are individual.

Wild

Design for one, speculate for many | 42

 Farmer

Animal Wellfare

The Persona Network

Just as no animal (human or nonhuman)
exists in isolation, neither does the
Persona Spectrum. The Persona Network
addresses the many levels of cultural
entanglement that we have with
Consumer
nonhuman animals and respects the
complexity of our relationships.

Design for one, speculate for many | 44

We aim to build experiences that unify
species and embrace individuality. These
experiences are rooted in interaction
with nonhuman animals and artefacts in
the world around us. Seeing nonhuman
animals differently and understanding
exclusion helps us extend a solution from
one species to many species.
From
speculating
to making
We’ve come to see interspecies design
as a set of perspectives and practices
that champion species diversity and
consider the nonhuman animal as a
cultural, political and social agent. Take
a moment to consider the complex
social and cultural entanglment that you
have with different species. Consider
the wide range of species that yuo
knowingly and often unknowingly have
with nonhuman animals at different
scales. Observe how nonhuman animals
with different circumstances and abilities
are excluded from participating or
anthropomorphized.
Being inclusive starts with changing our
perception.
Now it’s time to put this mindset into
action. It’s time to create new ways of
making. Let’s get started.

From speculating to making | 48

 te rs ecies des
pssas
In i gn
Tools

Methods

Mindset

Nonhuman
Animal
centered

Traditional user-centred design has

many techniques to clarify human animal
needs, from personas to scenarios to
usability testing. But, we need tools that
reintroduce other species back into the
design process.
We need ways to check, balance, and
measure the species inclusion of our
designs.

From speculating to making | 50

Benifits of interspecies design
Technology that’s designed through in
interspecies practices pays off in many
ways including:
1. Increased access
2. Shared experiences
3. Understanding nonhuman animals
The impact of interspecies design
is more than just the products that
nonhuman animals use. It’s also the
shift in our mindset, methods and
behaviours. What we design is a
byproduct of how we design. Measuring
the benifits includes measuring the shift
in our culture and ourselves to a less
anthropocentric, more inclusive culture
that engages with posthumanism in
direct and tangable ways.

From speculating to making | 52

The toolkit
This set of guidelines is part of Interspecies
Design: An Imagination Lancaster Design
Toolkit. The toolkit is made to work within
an existing design process. It’s based on
three principlies:
Recognize exclusion
Learn from other species
Design with one, speculate for many
We can use this toolkit to evaluate our
existing processes, and develop new
practices. It will continue to evolve as we
learn through experience.

The toolkit | 54
The toolkit in practice
Most design processes are iterative and
heuristic. The interspecies design toolkit
aims to complement, not replace, the many
existing types of design process. There are
great human animal-centred design methods
and other inclusive design frameworks
available from multiple sources. Like a chef’s
recipe, your own design process should be
the primary direction for your design. The
elements of this toolkit can be added, like
ingredients, to improve the inclusivity of your
process. How and when you integrate them is
up to you.

Resources
1. Activities: Please download the PDF
labeled “Activities” to dive in. Go to:
cryptoludology.com/?page_id=938
2. Contrast: This project explores the
political and rhetorical similarities and
tensions between Inclusive Design and
Interspecies Design.
The toolkit | 56
As designers, it’s our responsability to
understand the power of the interactions
we design for human and nonhuman
animals. We design to embrace the things
that make us human animals. It’s what
drives us to create a world that makes all
lives better, not just human animal lives.
The result is technology that’s inclusive,
inter and multispecies.

For more information, contact

[email protected] or [email protected]

58
Acknowledgments
We wish to thank the many people who
contributed to this toolkit. By design, it’s a
living collection of ideas and practices drawn
from Animal Computer Interaction, Animal
Architecture, Posthumanist discourse and the
work of scholars such as Clara Mancini, Steve
North, Michelle Westerlaken, Hanna Wirman,
Anne Galloway, Patricia Pons and Donna
Haraway. The project is a speculative design
proposal which explores the political and
rhetorical similarities and tensions between
Inclusive Design and Interspecies Design.
It is based on, and critiques, Microsoft’s
Inclusive Design guidebook and toolkit and
is best understood in contrast with the work
undertaken in the Inclusive Design guidebook.

This toolkit was created by Alan Hook as

part of his research at Lancaster University in
Speculative Design at Imagination Lancaster
and at Ulster University in Media and Play at
the Center for Media Research. Thankyou to
Dr. Robert Porter as the Director of Research,
and Prof. Paul Coulton as PhD Supervisor and
Academic Swashbuckler.