Overcoming Legacy Bias: Re-Designing Gesture Interactions in Virtual Reality With a San Community in Namibia

Recent improvements in hand-tracking technologies support novel applications and developments of gesture interactions in virtual reality (VR). Current implementations are mostly convention-based, originating in a Western technological context, thereby creating a legacy bias in gesture interaction implementations. With expanding application contexts and growing user groups and contexts, the design and selection of gestures need to be diversified. In this paper we present an exploration of natural gestures, followed by their implementation in a VR application and co-design of new gestures with a marginalized San community in Namibia. This study contributes to the still scarce empirical work in user-driven gesture design research, aiming to reduce legacy bias, on a methodological and technical level as well as through engaging non-WEIRD participants. Our findings confirm the applicability of our method, combined with Partner and Priming suggested by Morris et al., to the design of gestures inspired by natural interactions. We also consider the implementation of user-designed gestures to be necessary to asses usability, usefulness and technical issues in VR. Furthermore, the research directly advances the HCI agenda for diversity, through an ongoing research and design partnership with an indigenous community in Southern Africa, thereby challenging systemic bias and promoting design for the pluriverse.