GIDEST

Created through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and based at The New School for Social Research, GIDEST (the Graduate Institute for Design, Ethnography & Social Thought) incubates transdisciplinary ethnographic research at the intersection of social theory, art, and design and fosters dialogue on related themes across the university. GIDEST draws on The New School’s tradition of politically-engaged, historically-grounded, and theoretically-innovative social research, and our strengths as a center for a broad range of situated aesthetic practices.

As well as our popular bi-weekly public seminar series with presenters from the social sciences, arts, and design, we annually support five faculty fellows and five doctoral fellows, and provide members of the campus community with a lively and inventive research environment as well as a focused interdisciplinary space in which to develop their ideas. Through our lab at 63 Fifth Avenue, we serve as a university-wide hub for collaborative faculty research, interdisciplinary doctoral dissertations, and innovative scholarly practice that draws centrally on ethnographic methodologies and sensibilities.

THE FELLOWSHIPS

GIDEST annually awards five faculty and five doctoral fellowships to New School faculty and doctoral students. Please visit our Apply page for information on our fellowship competition. 

CONTACT US

To inquire about our fellowship program or seminar series, or to be added to our mailing list, please write to GIDEST@newschool.edu.  

THE SEMINAR

The bi-weekly GIDEST seminar is a site for the exploration of work-in-progress presented by scholars and practitioners who share our commitment to innovative and substantive transdisciplinary research. 

Sessions are entirely devoted to discussion of pre-circulated papers that can be downloaded one week in advance from our Events page.

The seminar is held on Fridays from 12-1.30pm in the GIDEST Lab, Room 411 in The New School’s University Center, 63 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY, on the traditional, ancestral, unceded, and continuing territory of Lenapehoking and the Lenape people.

THE STEERING COMMITTEE

The GIDEST Steering Committee oversees the Institute’s activities, planning, and the annual selection of fellows:

Shana Agid, Dean, School of Art, Media, and Technology, Parsons School of Design

Oz Frankel, Associate Professor of History, Eugene Lang College and The New School for Social for Social Research

Hugh Raffles, Director, GIDEST; Professor of Anthropology, Eugene Lang College and The New School for Social Research

Radhika Subramaniam, Associate Professor of Visual Culture, Parsons School of Design

Soyoung Yoon, Program Director and Assistant Professor, Visual Studies, Eugene Lang College

Genevieve Yue, Program Director for Screen Studies and Associate Professor of Culture and Media, Eugene Lang College

THE ADVISORY Group

The GIDEST Advisory Group provides the Institute with strategic advice and support:

Fred Dust, Board of Trustees, The New School

Caitlin McEvoy, Board Member, The New School for Social Research

Will Milberg, Dean, The New School for Social Research

Paul Vidich, Board Member, The New School for Social Research  

CREDITS

Video direction and camera: Orfeas Skutelis |Website: Matthew Tarr |Logo: Simoul Alva |Special thanks to Jennifer Bressler and Sharon Simpson|About page image: James Ewing|FGWL Image:  Hilma af Klint - What a Human Being Is | Jussara Raxlen image: Linda Peters|Margot Bouman image: Paulo Salud|Ralph Lemon image: Dan Merlo|Lucy Sante image: Marie Tomanova |Tanya Kalmanovitch image: Yola Monakhov Stockton|Vijay Iyer image: Jimmy Katz |Wadada Leo Smith image: Phil Penman | Wayne Koestenbaum image: Ebru Yildiz | Margo Jefferson images: Claire Holt; Michael Lionstar | Virag Molnar image: Annette Hornischer/American Academy in Berlin|Olivia Steiert image: Alexander Henting| Jenny Perlin images: courtesy Jenny Perlin 2024 | Carin Kuoni image: Matt Mathews, courtesy VLC | Mendi + Keith Obadike image: Anson Wigner | Lydia Davis image: Theo Cote | Creative Commons images used for Kumar, Parasecoli, and Sherman: https://flic.kr/p/acWebj, https://flic.kr/p/4ZpRkv, https://flic.kr/p/acPYKK, https://flic.kr/p/kcP3uv, https://flic.kr/p/67XXe1, https://flic.kr/p/bqmNxn, https://flic.kr/p/dRUGgm, http://tinyurl.com/nqpebfk