Kat researches invention, mobilities, gender and DIY tech communities of practice
Kat's research explores the role of technologies in relation to mobilities, bodies, gender and DiY cultures. Drawing on STS and Feminist Technoscience, she explores how people radically re-invent and re-imagine socio-political worlds with mundane and ordinary things.
Making and engaging are integral to Kat’s work. Her multi-dimensional practice research spans from time-lapse videos and enquiry-machines to installations and costumes. She started “speculative sewing” in the Bikes & Bloomers research and develops this further in her ERC funded Politics of Patents (POP) project about citizenship, invention and 200 years of wearable-tech. This approach stitches together theory, data and methods into 3D arguments. It opens up for discussion embodied, object-oriented and performative ways of thinking with and about inventive forms of knowledge transmission.
Kat’s research combines critical analysis and inventive practice with a commitment to public engagement. Her focus on mobilities, bodies, gender and DiY cultures contributes to STS, feminist technoscience and queer studies. Her approach is informed by an interest in making arguments in multi-dimensional forms.
Kat has a track record for rigorous, original and interdisciplinary funded research. She has experience leading multi-scaled projects and teams, developing inventive methods and new modes of knowledge transmission. These include ESRC, AHRC, college and industry grants and an ERC consolidator grant.
Projects include:
Politics of Patents - PI
POP is an ambitious European Research Council 5yr project that examines 200yrs of clothing inventions in the European Patent Office and other sites. Kat leads a team of sewing social scientists in the POPLab using quantitative, in-depth visual and document analysis, ethnography, interviews and speculative sewing – making and wearing historic data – to develop insights into the history of invention, wearable technology and citizenship.
Bikes & Bloomers - PI
B&B explores Victorian cycling, early wearable technology and radical feminist cultures of invention. It combines archival research with the making of a collection of “convertible” cycle costumes, inspired by 1890s patents. Kat led an interdisciplinary team - tailor, artist, weaver, researchers - to make costumes, give talks, workshops, performances and exhibitions. The project resulted in a book, articles, animations, time-lapse videos and open access sewing pattern packs.
Transmissions - PI
Transmissions is an ESRC/ Intel funded project that brought together a range of researchers in and outside the academy to explore, critique and foster knowledge exchange around inventive methods and knowledge transmission. Held in UK, US and Germany, events featured talks, workshops, exhibitions and performances. An edited book was published by MIT Press.
Bonham, Jennifer and Jungnickel, Kat. 2022. Cycling and Gender: Past, Present and Paths Ahead. In: Glen Norcliffe; Una Brogan; Peter Cox; Boyang Gao; Tony Hadland; Sheila Hanlon; Tim Jones; Nicholas Oddy and Luis Vivanco, eds. Routledge Companion to Cycling. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 24-32. ISBN 9780367683993
Jungnickel, Kat. 2020. Introducing. In: Kat Jungnickel, ed. Transmissions: Critical tactics for making and communicating research. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, pp. 1-16. ISBN 9780262043403
Jungnickel, Kat. 2020. Making and Wearing. In: Kat Jungnickel, ed. Transmissions: Critical tactics for making and communicating research. Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, pp. 65-83. ISBN 9780262043403
Mchardy, Julien and Jungnickel, Kat. 2020. Machines for Enquiring. In: Katrina Jungnickel, ed. Transmissions: Critical Tactics for Making and Communicating Research. Massachusetts: MIT Press, pp. 36-64. ISBN 9780262043403
Spinney, Justin and Jungnickel, Kat. 2019. Studying Mobilities. In: Paul Atkinson; Sarah Delamont; Alexandru Cernat; Joseph W. Sakshaug and Richard A. Williams, eds. SAGE Research Methods Foundations. London: SAGE Publications. ISBN 9781526421036
