Authors:
Gopinaath Kannabiran, Anna Brynskov
In this column, I engage in a discussion with Anna Brynskov, a fellow HCI researcher who is working on projects related to sexual well-being. My work explores the intersection of sexuality and ecological issues through an ecofeminist approach, while hers examines the intersection of sexuality and disability through a cyberfeminist approach.
Gopinaath Kannabiran: Can you share an overview of your work?
Anna Brynskov: I'm interested in the politics at play in humans' relationships with technologies. Sexual well-being is a fundamental human rights issue. Since technologies play an increasingly pervasive role in our societies and everyday lives, the perspective of disabled people also needs to be represented in regard to sexuality and HCI. Addressing this need, I work at the intersection of HCI, sexuality, and disability. Expanding the horizon of knowledge in this area could provide refined methods for engaging disabled people's perspectives on technologies, and theories that enable us to further understand the relations and interactions between bodies and technologies. The goal of my work is to help reduce harmful biases against people with disabilities and support at least three aspects of their sexual well-being:
- Personal integrity of more individuals
- Broader access to professional and nuanced sex education
- The ability to shape our society and its technologies on a critically aware ground.
The latter could involve technologies that reflect a more profound recognition of diversity in bodies and minds, individual sexual preferences, and language for sustaining and navigating healthy intimate relations.
While doing background reading for my work, I noticed that most of the literature on sexuality and disability exists in the fields of psychology and sociology. Interactions with technology and its effect in relation to sexuality and disability are rarely treated from an HCI and design perspective. Two notable exceptions are Franchesca Spektor and Sarah Fox, who explore disabled people's sexual digital communities [1]. Recent HCI research on sexual technologies calls for more future work that engages with disabled people's perspectives [2]. Engaging with sexuality from a disability perspective is necessary to create more socially sustainable futures. And yet, sexuality and disability have mostly remained separate topics of inquiry for HCI research and practice.
As an HCI researcher, what are your thoughts about the intersections of sexuality and disability?
 | Cloud Breathe Lust device designed by Anna Brynskov. |
GK: Kam Redlawsk, an industrial designer and disability advocate, pointed out that the "disabled are often desexualized, ignored and babied, and if one happens to have a partner, then that person is deemed some kind of saint for even considering taking on the wounded—as if disabled individuals are incapable of inspiring romantic love or eroticism" [3]. The issues raised by Redlawsk underscore the necessity to engage with the intersection of sexuality and disability to design for more socially sustainable futures, as you have stated. People with disabilities have a fundamental human right to express their erotic desires. Black lesbian feminist Audre Lorde described the erotic as the power that comes from sharing deeply with another person. Lorde's work linked sexuality, spirituality, and politics by arguing that being in touch with the erotic makes us become less willing to accept powerlessness or self-denial [4]. Responding to Redlawsk's concerns and taking inspiration from Lorde, it is vital to design technology for sexual well-being by approaching erotic pleasure as a life-affirming experience.
I am an ecofeminist HCI researcher and a matrifocal tantra yoga teacher. For me, erotic pleasure is inextricably linked to spiritual development and ecological well-being. From a tantric yoga perspective, eco-spiritual maladies of alienation and disenchantment must be countered through authentic intimacy, erotic play, and life-affirming pleasure. In my earlier work, I pointed out that experiences of bodily pleasure can "present opportunities for self-growth in relation to an-Other" and advocated to explore design possibilities for "who one becomes in relation to the touch of a lover" [5]. For me, sexual well-being is spiritually and politically anchored in the profound recognition of one's authentic self and the potential for experiencing erotic pleasure together. Bringing insights from ecofeminism and matrifocal tantra, I posit that designing technology for sexual well-being can and must be an act of re-enchantment for authentic living. Initiating, exploring, negotiating, nurturing, repairing, and celebrating sexual pleasure and intimacy between different bodies is mediated by technology. More research is required to explore how design interventions related to sexual well-being engage with experiences and desires of people with disabilities and how they can inform future possibilities.
Can you share some specifics about how you engage with the sexual desires of people with disabilities through your design work?
AB: I began to explore breathing as a modality of agency. The tension between breath and lust is especially cultivated in tantric sex. I participated in a one-day session of somatic yoga inspired by tantric techniques. In a room of eight women, the instructor guided us through sensations of lust by breathing techniques, and it made me interested in exploring it further through design. My design practice is rooted in design fiction, speculative design, and storytelling in modalities that include physical prototyping, written stories, and filmmaking. These tools have proved particularly useful for tapping into taboo and sensitive issues that require care, thoughtfulness, and anonymity. Furthermore, stories are a unique tool for fostering make-believe, which can allow new ideas to take root in people's imaginings and, in the end, potentially become a reality.
 | Design fiction scenario of Cloud Breathe Lust. |
I recently designed an alternative sex toy called Cloud Breathe Lust (CBL) as part of my Ph.D. project [6]. It is a digital device for two people sitting close together in bed, for example, or, as the photo shows, in a field. When one person breathes into the cloud, the breath is translated via an Arduino, an open-source electronics platform, into heat on the other person's body as an indication of lust. The experience can be supported through eye contact, caressing, and verbal exchanges. CBL is meant for lovers in any kind of erotic relation with a mutual sexual interest, not necessarily a romantic one. By functionality, CBL is a sex toy for disabled people to express their lust to their sex partner as foreplay, for instance. As design fiction, it is an experiential manifestation of the fact that disabled people can be lustful individuals and that acknowledging this is important and often neglected. CBL affords an alternative mediated language for expressing lust, based on principles of accessibility. Therefore, it is an imaginary of a playful and balanced power dynamic in a sexual relation in which at least one person is disabled.
CBL is a material and narrative counter-reaction to the negative stereotypes that surround disabled people's sexuality and personal relationships. Exploring ways to educate people that would lead to their acknowledging disabled people as sexual subjects, I started to speculate: How can design create access for disabled people to reclaim their lust? CBL is the result of this speculation.
References
1. Spektor, F. and Fox, S. The 'working body': Interrogating and reimagining the productivist impulses of transhumanism through crip-centered speculative design. Somatechnics 10, 3 (2020), 327–54.
2. Hua, D.M., Jones, R., Bardzell, J., and Bardzell, S. The hidden language of vibrators: A politico-ontological reading. Proc. of the 2022 ACM Designing Interactive Systems Conference. ACM, New York, 2022, 400–14.
3. Redlawsk, K. I document the progression of my rare disease in heartbreaking illustrations. Bored Panda, 2017; https://www.boredpanda.com/illustrations-orphan-disease-hibm-kam-redlawsk/
4. Lorde, A. Uses of the erotic: The erotic as power. In Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches. Crossing Press, Berkeley, 1984, 53–59.
5. Kannabiran, G. "Embodied wellbeing": A re-imagination of sustainability and desire in HCI. Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University, 2017.
6. Brynskov, A. How can we design sexual technologies that touch well? Paper presented at the ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems 2024; https://www.annabrynskov.com/
Authors
Gopinaath Kannabiran is an HCI researcher, design educator, sexual rights activist, small-scale eco-farmer, and tantra yoga teacher. His work aims to explore how the design of technology might aid holistic well-being through interdisciplinary approaches. [email protected]
Anna Brynskov is a design researcher and Ph.D. fellow at the IT University of Copenhagen. She explores political, social, and cultural implications in digital futures of sexuality, reimagining the politics and aesthetics of sexual technologies. Her research is rooted in interaction design prototyping, cyberfeminist theories, and critical disability studies. [email protected]
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