ABSTRACT
Askeladden is a central figure in Norwegian folk tales and features prominently in the classic collections compiled by Asbjørnsen and Moe. This chapter attempts to situate the diverse contributions within a wider perspective on design research that addresses matters of emerging technologies, exploratory practice, and transdisciplinary analysis. Narrative, dramaturgical, and performative aspects of the enactment and articulation of design-centered technology application are often bypassed, and functionalist and instrumentalist arguments and approaches predominate that are characterized by tool and technology promotion and the presentation of uncritical determinist views. It is within focalization that Askeladden features as a lingerer of sorts who surveys situations as design potential spaces and waits to obtain artifacts dismissed by others, only to relate these artifacts one to another, seeing eventually purposes and means to overcome adversity. Excellent products still need to be designed just as new materials and processes of production need to be teased out and applied.
