Funded by the UK’s Leverhulme Trust, I am currently examining the development and possibilities of exoskeleton technology.
Exoskeleton and other technology is increasingly seen as a viable option for ‘solving’ future (and present) crises of care labour through the automation or augmentation of human labour. This work examines one such technology: exoskeletons which are wearable robotic suits designed to augment the strength and endurance and prevent injury of care workers.
Drawing on interviews with the managers of robotic companies and the designers of occupational exoskeletons, this research presents their claims about the ways in which exoskeletons are a form of care for the bodies of care workers; a means towards race and gender workplace equity; and a vehicle for revaluing care work. This research also questions these technoliberal claims, voicing concerns that exoskeletons can be a means of surveilling workers bodies for the purpose of increasing productivity and efficiency; potentially creating the humanoid robots to replace them; extending life spans of work and thereby supporting the reduction of social security; and hardening national borders against immigrant care workers.
Carried out with my research collaborator, Geraldine Pratt, this work has involved semi-structured interviews with eight different exoskeleton companies based in 7 countries (US, UK, Japan, South Korea, Italy, Germany, France), as well as observation and ‘on-the floor’ interviews at two medical trade fairs (in Germany and the UK). We have concentrated our efforts on following the activities of Cyberdyne and German Bionics, two exoskeleton companies who are prominent players in the evolving global market of occupational and medical exoskeletons.
Related Publications
(under review) ‘Augmenting workers and new technologies of care’, Transactions of the Insitute of British Geographers.
(In press) ‘The Calculation’, in M.Ritts and G.Pratt (eds),What Can Research Do? Speculative Geo-Fictions, Friendship, Geographical Imaginations (Vancouver: UBC Press).
