Biography

Eric Gordon is a professor of civic media and the director of the Engagement Lab at Emerson College in Boston. His research focuses on building better interfaces between publics and civic organizations in a context of diminishing trust. He has served as an expert advisor for government and NGOs around the world, with a special emphasis on play, delight, and deliberation. In addition to dozens of articles and chapters on play, civic engagement, technology and urbanism, he is the author of two books, The Urban Spectator (Dartmouth, 2010), and Net Locality: Why Location Matters in a Networked World (Blackwell, 2011). He is the editor, along with Paul Mihailidis, of Civic Media: Technology, Design, Practice (MIT Press, 2016). And his new book, written with Gabriel Mugar, is called Meaningful Inefficiencies: How Designers are Transforming Civic Life by Creating Opportunities to Care. It is forthcoming from Oxford University Press.