Senior UX/UI Web Designer: Professional Joke                                                                                      CJ Afternoon Coffee                                                                                               Nashua, New Hampshire                                                                                                                                               October 29, 2020

Informant Data:

CJ was born on December 28, 1976 in Bharuch, India. After completing her undergraduate education at Narmada College in India, she got married and gave birth to a baby daughter. After her daughter turned one year old, she and her husband moved to the States in 2000. After her son was born in 2004, she began taking classes in web design at Nashua Community College and UMASS Lowell, two local colleges. After switching between several different jobs, all in computer science, she has now been working at CAMP Systems, an aircraft management company, as a UX/UI Web Designer for 8 years now.

Contextual Data:

Cultural Context: CAMP Systems is an aircraft management company that works to provide solutions for customers and clients in improving aircraft quality, compliance with regulations, and aircraft maintenance. It is headquartered in Nashua, NH, which is where CJ lives. CJ has specifically been involved in the web design aspect of the job, improving the user experience and the user interface of those who visit the website for personal and professional use.

Social Context: This joke is used when assessing the current state of affairs or current situation, and how convenient it is for a user. For CJ and her colleagues, because they work to improve the user experience, they are always looking to improve things in the real world. Thus, if something is inconvenient, they might comment on it and say so through this joke. Alternatively, if something is convenient, they may compliment the situation on the contrary.

Item:

“What a terrible UX!”

Collector’s Notes:

Often, CJ and her colleagues go out for an afternoon coffee while they are on their lunch break at work. They often assess the position of the pods from the coffee machine, and see how convenient it is for them. Often, the pods are switched around from place to place and they always have to run around to see where the pods are now. If the pods are placed far from the machine, they call it a terrible UX because it is difficult for them to find. But if they are placed close to the machine, they call it a pretty good UX.

Tags:

• Jokes
• Verbal folklore
• Verbal humor
• Computer science/IT

Khevna Joshi

Dartmouth College

RUSS 13

Fall 2020