Call for Participation (CfP): CHI 2018 Workshop on Exploring Participatory Design Methods to Engage with Arab Communities
When:   Sunday 22 April 2018
Where:  CHI’18, Montréal, Canada | Room: Palais des Congrès , Room 521C

This one-day workshop will be organised as part of the ACM CHI 2018 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, held in Montréal, Canada between 21 and 26 April 2018.

Important Dates:

• Early Submission Deadline: 5 January 2018
• Early Notification: 20 January 2018
• Final Submission Deadline: 12 February 2018
• Final Notification: 22 February 2018
• Camera-Ready Deadline: 22 March 2018

ArabHCI is an initiative inaugurated in CHI17 SIG Meeting that brought together HCI researchers/practitioners from the Arab World with those who are conducting/interested in research in this context. The goal was to start a community that explores challenges and unique opportunities for future research in Arab countries and with Arab participants. This workshop focuses on one of the themes that derived our community discussions, the extent to which participatory approaches in the Arab context are culturally and methodologically challenged. We invite researchers/practitioners who had success or failure stories designing “with” Arab communities to share their experiences and learned lessons around applying participatory approaches. The workshop will result in developing a research agenda specific to HCI participatory methods in the Arab world. We suggest that submissions cover the following:

• Give sufficient background information about your participants; i.e. culture, traditions, recruitment, etc.
• Describe the design process including: the experienced cultural and contextual challenges, any innovative methods used
• Explain how you approached these challenges, what worked for you (or not) and any future recommendations

Submitted position papers must not exceed 4 pages in the CHI Extended Abstract Format. The submissions should be sent in PDF format to (arabhci@gmail.com) and without the CHI copyright statement on the first page. Position papers will be selected based on the contribution to the workshop theme, quality of presentation, and potential to stimulate discussion. Upon acceptance, at least one of the authors should present during the workshop and must register for both the workshop and for at least one day of the main conference.

Workshop Programme:
09:00 – 09:30     Welcome and Introduction
09:30 – 10:30     Unpacking participation in the Arab Culture (in groups)
10:30 – 11:00     …Coffee Break…
11:00 – 12:30     Panel: Success Stories
12:30 – 14:00     …Lunch Break…
14:00 – 15:30     Panel: Challenges Stories
15:30 – 16:00     …Coffee Break…
16:00 – 17:00     Participatory Challenges in the Arab Context (in groups)
17:00 – 17:30     Research Agenda Discussion and Closing
19:00                  ArabHCI Dinner

Invited Panelists:
Prof. Dr. Volker Wulf – University of Siegen, Siegen, Germany
Prof. Dr. Christian Sturm – Hamm-Lippstadt University of Applied Sciences, Hamm, Germany
Dr. Oussama Metatla – University of Bristol, Bristol, England
Dr. Ahmed Kharrufa – Open Lab, Newcastle University, Newcastle Upon Tyne, England

Organizers:
Ebtisam Alabdulqader – Open Lab, Newcastle University, England
Shaimaa Lazem – Informatics Research Institute, SRTA-city, Egypt
Mohamed Khamis – Ubiquitous Interactive Systems Group, LMU, Munich, Germany
Susan Dray – Dray & Associates, USA

Post-Event & Photo Gallery:
Engage with Arabs Workshop at CHI 2018 was attended by 28 Arab and non-Arab participants. The workshop keynotes and the discussion outcomes will be published soon.

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