Worlding with Tarot: Design, Divination, and the Technological Imagination

Design cards have long played an important role in reflection--directing the designer’s gaze toward unasked questions, hidden consequences, and new horizons for speculative futuring. But few questions have been asked about what motivates the design process and how deck designers see their role in inquiry and/or world building. This paper looks to the Tarot deck as one iconic example of such a process. Drawing on interviews with nine Tarot deck creators, we surface themes of Tarot as scaffolding modes of personal and collective growth, forms of carework, and pathways for different ways of knowing. We discuss expanding design inquiry methods for understanding and elevating forms of spiritual connection and care; and moving from anti-appropriation to ante-appropriation.