Senior Researchers – Cultural Infrastructure

Dr Liam Magee

Dr Kylie Budge

Senior Research Fellow, Institute for Culture and Society

Liam’s principal research interests focus on the application of social methods and information technology to the areas of urban development and sustainability. His doctoral dissertation, completed in 2010, examined the importance of cultural assumptions in the emerging world of interconnected knowledge systems, including emerging systems such as the Semantic Web. His current work extends this research into the areas of urban development and sustainability.

Liam is presently investigating how online games, simulations and other information technologies can facilitate greater clarity and visibility of sustainability objectives among urban communities and stakeholder groups. This research includes study of the underlying technological requirements for such tools (data structures, communication and visualisation), as well as the social research methods for evaluating those tools in practice.

Senior Research Fellow (Urban Living & Society), School of Humanities & Communication Arts

Kylie Budge researches the intersections between people and technology and society with an interest in how these connections manifest to produce new knowledge about communication and cultural practices. Her interests include digital and material cultures of art and design; cultural institutions, their audiences and social media; cultures of making; identity; creativity; cultural theory and theories of value. Kylie is Senior Research Fellow (Urban Living & Society) investigating the creative city phenomenon by exploring the ways in which creative producers (such as artists and designers), cultural audiences, and social media contribute to the development of such spaces and places. She has a particular interest in the ways visual culture is used through social media such as Instagram to construct meanings of self and place.Previously Kylie worked in the GLAM sector (galleries, libraries, archives, museums), and prior to that universities in both Australia and Japan. She is a member of the Institute for Culture & Society and Digital Humanities Research Group at Western Sydney University, and serves on the Advisory Board of the Australasian Consortium of Humanities Research Centres.