Paula Gardner
Professor, Communication Studies & Media Arts

Paula Gardner, PhD, is Asper Chair in Communications in the Faculty of Communication Studies and Media Arts, at McMaster University, where she directs Pulse Lab, which engages in rigorous community driven collaboration to create beneficial technology practices and tools . Gardner is a critical, feminist media scholar, with expertise in participatory and co-design methods, media studies, transdisciplinary methods, and disability-informed multimodal practice. Her collaborative trans-faculty projects include interactive aging and mobility projects, and ABLE, an art-movement-mind platform that enhances cognitive, physical and affective health, while improving social and family bonds and dignity for older adults. Gardner’s multimodal and assistive technology work and media and methods scholarship is published in Communication, Feminist, Science and Technology Studies (STS), and HCI journals and books; she is currently completing a manuscript entitled Policing our Pace: the Racial Economy of Activity Tracking and the Demise of the Social

Gardner is a member of trans-faculty, interdisciplinary research projects at McMaster University including:
ABLE Village
MAC M3
The Check-In BIPOC Podcast Series
Feminist and Decolonial Digital Literacy Workshopping- in Canada and South Africa

Visit the Pulse Lab website for more research information: https://pulselab.humanities.mcmaster.ca/