Making design researchers' information sharing visible through material objects

This article seeks to make visible information‐sharing activities that take place within a geographically dispersed network of design researchers. For this purpose, a theoretical approach is applied that comprises the analytical notion of material objects and a document theory. Empirical material was primarily ethnographically produced over a period of 6 months, including 2 seminars within the network. Trajectories of sharing that reach across time and space have been identified by studying how people interact with multidimensional objects, such as documents. These were found to coordinate and shape the social practice under study. The theoretical framework has made it possible to highlight aspects of information sharing that have tended to be blackboxed in previous research. It has been suggested in previous research that the concept of information sharing can be reduced to that of mere sharing. Such a stance potentially entails reduction of conceptual ambiguity but may also decrease analytical sharpness. Based on the present study, it appears beneficial to adopt the concept of document into the discourse of information‐sharing research. By adding the concept of document to our analytical toolbox, which hitherto has been dominated by the slightly diffuse concept of information, material features can be emphasized without reducing the social and cognitive dimensions of information sharing. The article offers insight into the information‐sharing activities of design researchers. Through its focus on materiality, it presents a novel theoretical approach and methodological strategy for studying information practices.