Profil

Rachel Charlotte Smith is Associate Professor at the Department of Digital Design and Information Studies at Aarhus University. She directs the Centre for Digital and Green Transformation in Cities and Communities (DIGTCOM), leading transdisciplinary research for the digital, social and green transformation of society.

My research focuses on sustainable futures between emerging digital technology and everyday life. Through longterm transdisciplinary projects, my research engages with exploring and transforming everyday practices and co-designing inclusive technologies and futures. I works across diverse contexts such as sustainable transitions and responsible AI in communities, automated future mobility in urban environments, future memory making and decolonisation, emerging technologies education and computational empowerment for future generations. 

International research projects on inclusive and sustainable digital futures include P-AIA Participatory AI for Alternative Sustainable Futures (DFF GREEN 2025-2028), DCODE Fundamentals of Design Competence for our Digital Future, Horizon 2020, Innovative Training Network, Marie Sklodowska-Curie actions (MSCA) (2021-2025), and the future of emerging technology education CEED Computational Empowerment for Emerging Technologies in Education, VILLUM/VELUX Foundations (2020-2025) at the interdisciplinary Research Center for Computational Thinking and Design CCTD. In addition, I have partnered several international research projects such as POEM Participatory Memory Practices: Concepts, Practices, and Media Infrastructures for Social Inclusion, Horizon 2020, Innovative Training Network, Marie Sklodowska-Curie actions (MSCA) (2018-2022), and AHA Design Ethnographic Living Labs for Future Urban Mobility: A Human Approach, VINNOVA Sweden (2019-2022).

My research contributes to theoretical and methodological advancements in Design Anthropology, Participatory Design and Human-Computer Interaction. I have co-authored and edited 16 international volumes and journal special issues, and over 100 peer reviewed publications. Recent volumes include Routledge International Handbook for Contemporary Participatory Design (Smith, et al., 2025, Routledge), Participatory Design (Bødker et al., 2022, Springer), Special Issue on Towards Pluriversality: Decolonizing Design Theory and Practice, (Smith et al., 2024, CoDesign), Special Issue on Computational Empowerment (Schaper et al., 2023, International Journal of Child Computer Interaction), An Anthropology of Technologies and Futures (Lanzeni et al. 2022, Routledge), Special Issue on Design Anthropology (Smith ed., 2022, Design Studies), Design Anthropological Futures (Smith et al. 2016, Routledge).

I am HIAS 2025/2026 Fellow, at the Hamburg Institute fur Advanced Study and a Visiting Fellow at Hamburg University 2022-2026. In 2024/2025 I was Visiting Professor at Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST). Between 2020-2024 I was Chair of the Advisory Board for the international Participatory Design Conference (PDC), during which we expanded and diversified the community across global south contexts of Latin America, Africa and Asia.

I thrive in international research environments and empirically situated contexts and communities. I work through interventional, participatory and future-oriented research, connecting theory and practice, with a vision to create real-world societal change. Competences to do this I have built throughout my career, and wish to use these to address contemporary challenges of technology, knowledge, and socio-ecologies. I am always open to collaborations with researchers, companies and organisations.