Context is Everything

Recently named one of the top 50 most creative people in Business (Fast Company,) Genevieve Bell is an Intel Fellow and director of the Interaction and Experience Research Group within the Intel Labs. Bell joined Intel in 1998 and has come to lead an R&D team of social scientists, interaction designers and human factors engineers to drive human-centric product innovation in Intel’s consumer electronics business. In this role, she is responsible for setting research directions, conducting comparative qualitative and quantitative research globally, leading new product strategy and definition, and championing consumer-centric innovation and thinking across the company. Prior to joining Intel, Bell was a lecturer in the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University. She has written more than 30 journal articles and book chapters on a range of subjects focused on the intersection of technology and society. Her book, “Techno-Cultural Tales,” co-authored with Prof. Paul Dourish, will be released by MIT Press in 2011. In 2009, she had a distinguished appointment as South Australia’s 15th Thinker-in-Residence. In this role, she helped develop new policy and strategic directions for governmental responses to high-speed internet. Raised in Australia, Bell received her bachelor’s degree in anthropology from Bryn Mawr College in 1990. She received her master’s and doctorate degrees in anthropology from Stanford University in 1993 and 1998, respectively.