Lucy Suchman
is a Professor in the Center for Science Studies and Department of Sociology at the University of Lancaster. She comes to academia after 20 years as a researcher at Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center. Her research spans the fields of computer-supported cooperative work, science and technology studies, and feminist theory, and has focused on applying ethnographies of everyday practice to new technology design. Suchman’s 1987 book Plans and Situated Actions: The Problem of Human-Machine Communication, along with its 2007 sequel Human-Machine Reconfigurations, have been highly influential to the field of human-computer interaction.
Suchman is a recipient of the CHI Lifetime Achievement Award, the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Computer and Cognitive Science, the Outstanding Contribution to Research Award from the American Sociological Association, and the 4S John Desmond Bernal Prize for Distinguished Contribution to the Field. She also holds an Honorary Doctorate from the Faculty of Culture and Society, Malmo University, Sweden, and serves as an Adjunct Professor at both the University of Technology, Sydney and the Information Technology University, Copenhagen. She is the Collaborating Editor for the Journal of Social Studies of Science and President of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S).