The librarians at FLITE are working on a project that uses yarn to show individuality and interconnection amongst students.
Project I-Dentify is an interactive art project funded by a grant from the Ferris Diversity and Inclusion Office. The project, which is projected to be ready by the end of March, will allow students to show their traits and interests, as well as compare them to those of other Bulldogs.
“We’re gonna have this big board with different diversity descriptors: male, democrat, religion, socioeconomic things, kids, I like to play sports, I like to watch sports. That kind of stuff. We’ll have this yarn that people can wrap around each descriptor that fits them. Our goal is that it’ll be this neat art thing that will show how a lot of us are very similar, and also how we’re different, because there will be a lot of overlap,” Ferris Outreach and User Engagement Librarian David Scott said.
The project will be available for student interaction for a month before being displayed indefinitely as artwork in FLITE.
The idea for Project I-Dentify came from Ferris Creative Learning Librarian Mari Kermit-Canfield, who was inspired after hearing about the Unity Project, which is similar to Project I-Dentify.
“Project I-Dentify seeks to represent the Ferris community in a visually interpretable form. Participants and viewers should be able to follow the diversity indicators for an individual, judge all the ways that person is unique and then step back and see a broad intersecting web representing the multifaceted huge community of Ferris as a whole,” Kermit-Canfield said.
Ferris graphic design senior and FLITE Graphic Design Assistant Allicyn Crippen has also assisted with Project I-Dentify.
“I think that this is a really crucial time—it being 2018, everything is going on. I mean, there’s a lot of issues with different social groups, I think, so I think this is a really good way for people to see that we are all still connected and even though that you think you’re so different from somebody, you’re also very similar. And I think it’s a really nice way to connect those people who might have issues,” Crippen said.
Kermit-Canfield hopes students will benefit from seeing how diversity exists at Ferris.
“When we support and learn from each other, we grow,” Kermit-Canfield said.
Students can participate in Project I-Dentify following its installment at the end of March. The project will be accessible on one of the pillars through the entrance of FLITE.
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