About me

Gabriela AvramHi! This is the online home of Gabriela Avram.

If you’d like to label me:

The Tipping Point calls my kind of people Connectors; others called us “knowledge brokers” or “boundary spanners”. I get a sort of thrill when it occurs to me that the person I’m talking to seems to have a common interest with someone else I know (or heard of), or could be interested in a particular resource or method or tool I know of.

My different hats:

  • I am currently retired, dedicating my time to gardening, lace making and reading.
  • I am currently attending the IPPOSI Patient Education Programme, attempting to get a better understanding of the opportunities to get involved in patient advocacy.
  • I am the Communications Officer of Friends of Lace Limerick, and I maintain the Limerick Lace website and social media channels.
  • Together with Rosie Finnegan-Bell from the South Armagh Lace Collective, I am running the Laces of Ireland all Ireland lace trail initiative.
  • I worked as a lecturer at the University of Limerick in Ireland, teaching on the Digital Media Design and Music, Media and Performance Technology programmes, as well as the master’s in Interactive Media in UL from 2008 until 2023, when I retired.
  • My research  focuses on  socio-technical practices involved in the collaborative economy, and on the role of technology in supporting civic engagement of local communities.
  • I was the Chair of the CA16121 COST Action (2017-2021), From Sharing to Caring- Examining Socio-Technical Aspects of the Collaborative Economy.
  • Between 2013 and 2017, I led the co-design work package in the meSch EU project, focusing on the design of interactive technologies for cultural heritage settings.
  • Between 2005 and 2008 I was involved  in a project studying collaborative work practices in distributed software development, getting the chance to observe software development teams at work in IBM and to work with an Open Source community.
  • I was a member of Creative Communities Limerick and I am currently running the IxDA Limerick chapter.
  • I was involved in the UL Community Roof garden initiative.
  • Together with Miriam Lohan, we founded and ran  the Limerick Riverpath Volunteers biodiversity group.
  • During 2014 – the Limerick City of Culture year, I was involved in several made in Limerick projects, such as Are You Dancing?- Remembering the Limerick Dancehalls and Limerick Lace.
  • I still help various communities, NGOs and events with their social media strategy and campaigns.

September 08 2008 06:12 am