On Looking at the Vagina through Labella

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On Looking at the Vagina through Labella
Teresa Almeida, Rob Comber, Gavin Wood, Dean Saraf, Madeline Balaam

CHI '16: ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
Session: Citizenry and the Sciences: Design as Inquiry and Participation

Abstract
Women's understandings of their own intimate anatomy has been identified as critical to women's reproductive health and sexual wellbeing. However, talking about it, seeking medical help when necessary as well as examining oneself in order to 'know' oneself is complicated by social-cultural constructions of the vagina, i.e. it is something private, shameful and not to be talked about. In response to this, we designed Labella, an augmented system that supports intimate bodily knowledge and pelvic fitness in women. It combines a pair of underwear and a mobile phone as a tool for embodied intimate self-discovery. In this paper, we describe Labella, and its evaluation with fourteen women, aged 25-63. We show how through situated embodied perception Labella empowers 'looking'. We highlight how the simple act of augmented looking enables the construction of knowledge which ranges from establishing the 'very basics' through to a nuanced understanding of pelvic muscle structure. Finally, we highlight the role of awkwardness and humour in the design of interactions to overcome taboo.

DOI:: http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2858036.2858119
WEB:: https://chi2016.acm.org/

Recorded at the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in San Jose, CA, United States, May 7-12, 2016

YouTube url:	http://youtube.com/watch?v=QGoBXtBOfnw
Created:	30. 9. 2021 13:00:36

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On Looking at the Vagina through Labella