Melisa Duque Hurtado

Dr

Accepting PhD Students

20152023

Research activity per year

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Personal profile

Biography

Melisa is a part time Research Fellow of the Emerging Technologies Research Lab, where she leads the Future Health and Wellbeing research program and co-leads the Sustainability research theme. She is based at the Department of Design MADA. As a design researcher, her works sits at the intersection of Design Anthropology, Participatory Design and Everyday Design. Melisa’s latest projects explore healthcare and wellbeing design ethnography with ageing people in the contexts of the home, the hospital and residential aged care. Where she learns about the ways in which built design environments and technologies of care are used and adapted by people in their everyday routines. She is particularly interested in emergent practices of design for revaluing, including: the ongoing transformation by design-in-use of spaces and devices, collaborative repair, and creative crafts of reuse. Melisa’s interdisciplinary work is featured in the latest ethnographic film Smart Homes for Seniors. She is a co-author of the recent book Design Ethnography: Research, Responsibilities and Futures (Routledge, 2022), and currently working on her book Designing Homeliness: Everyday Practices of Care (Routledge).

Melisa has a PhD from the School of Design at RMIT, a Masters of Design (by research) from Monash University, and she was trained as an Industrial Designer at Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana (UPB) in Medellin, Colombia. She has done design teaching at these three Universities and Design Schools.

Diseñadora e investigadora colombiana viviendo en Australia. Interesada en practicas de diseño cotidiano para la revaluación y el bienestar. Trabajando actualmente con temas de salud, tecnología y revaluación.

Expertise related to UN Sustainable Development Goals

In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. This person’s work contributes towards the following SDG(s):

  • SDG 3 - Good Health and Well-being
  • SDG 11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities
  • SDG 13 - Climate Action

Education/Academic qualification

Design Research, Doctor in Philosophy, Everyday Designing for Revaluing, RMIT University

Award Date: 27 Sept 2018

Research area keywords

  • design research
  • design anthropology
  • ethnographic practice
  • everyday design
  • sustainable design
  • design ethnography
  • emerging technologies
  • design for revaluing

Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years

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