Sarah Teasley

Sarah Teasley works across social history and design research. Her research explores how people use emergent technologies and concepts in everyday work settings, with particular attention how intersectional aspects such as gender, class and culture shape experience and access to power. She is known for her research in the history of design, craft and manufacturing industry and policy in modern Japan, and for her extensive collaborations with the galleries, museums, libraries and archives (GLAM) sector.

One strand of her research, teaching and PhD supervision explores how designers, makers and people more widely engage with emergent technologies and materials in everyday practice. Current projects include the ARC-funded AusEaaSI, the Australian Emulation Network preserving and making accessible Australia's born digital cultural heritage, and Fibers of Existence, a collaboration to rethink practices of repair as technical know-how through the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science.

She is equally invested in supporting equitable access to design power and knowledge through her research, teaching, PhD supervisions and organisational leadership. She has published extensively on gender, class and agency and works as part of Designing Entangled Social Innovation in Asia-Pacific (DESIAP).

Her other core commitment is to transdisciplinary approaches and exchange between academic disciplines and between researchers and diverse industry and social communities, to enable and strengthen capacities for meaningful social and environmental change.

Her publications include Global Design History (Routledge 2011) and Designing Modern Japan (Reaktion 2022), as well as numerous book chapters and articles in journals such as Design Issues, The Journal of Design History and The Review of Japanese Society and Culture. She is a member of the Advisory Boards of Design and Culture and Design Issues, and previously served as Associate Editor of Design and Culture and Vice President of the Design Studies Forum.

At RMIT, she serves as Associate Dean for Research and Innovation in the School of Design. She teaches onto the Masters in Design Innovation and Technology (MDIT), and offers HDR supervisions in Design. Prior to joining RMIT in 2020, she was Reader in Design History and Head of Programme for History of Design at the Royal College of Art.

Sarah Teasley has extensive experience in industry and cross-disciplinary academic partnerships with museums, charities and design researchers and practitioners, and in consultancy for museums, government and the private sector. Prior to becoming a full-time academic, she worked in film and publishing, including in grassroots, bottom-up community organisations, and gained a diploma in musical performance. 

Her consultancy work as an expert in design history, particularly design in modern Japan and histories of design innovation policy and practice, includes engagement with museums (exhibitions, permanent collections and public programming), national and local governments in Japan and the UK, SMEs and major multinational corporations. 

She is a strong advocate for multidisciplinary, industry-integrated research and learning and for responsive, respectful research that facilitates individual and community agency in decision-making.