The panel explores the impact of arts-based approaches and methods in conflict resolution and peacebuilding in Africa. The use of creative arts methods can include music, drama, dance, poetry, painting and collage-making, as well as participatory methods such as video, photovoice and storytelling.
Long Abstract:
Arts-based approaches and methods offer spaces for creating peace and building trust among people in societies torn by conflict. Yet there is an important knowledge gap in comprehending the actual impact of arts-based approaches on peace efforts, especially in sub-Saharan African countries. The devastating impact of ongoing conflicts in, for instance, Cameroon, Nigeria and Central African Republic, and the failure of conventional approaches to effectively resolve them, make the understanding and potential up-scaling of arts-based approaches both important and necessary.
The use of creative arts methods can include music, drama, dance, poetry, painting and collage-making, and overlap with participatory methods such as video, photovoice and storytelling. Such methods have gained considerable traction in the practice of conflict resolution and peacebuilding (Bergh and Sloboda 2010, 1), with both academic researchers and NGO practitioners at the forefront of many arts-based peace initiatives (Almusaly 2017, 74). Yet, while there is growing recognition of their contribution, knowledge remains limited about the impact of arts-based approaches both in practice and in conducting research on peace processes in sub-Saharan Africa. In particular, there is a paucity of knowledge on the potential impact of local NGO and community-initiated art projects in charting the way for building peace and trust.
This panel seeks to bring together researchers and practitioners to further our understanding of the role played by arts-based approaches and methods in peace processes in sub-Saharan Africa, inclusive of challenges and limitations and ways to counter these. By sharing experiences, the panel also intends to build a network of researchers and practitioners to examine the role of creative arts in preserving or restoring peace in divided communities. It will therefore chart new directions for policy and inform the work of academic researchers and NGOs alike with the overall aim to improve the situation of people in communities torn by conflict.
Methodology:
The panel is paper-based, but with an interactive format rather than formal presentations. Prior to the conference, we will invite accepted paper givers to submit an outline of their contribution in an appropriate format that they select. This could be a maximum 10 minute video, podcast or audio recording, a slide presentation or poster, or something else entirely— as long as it can be shared online. The purpose of each submission is to set out the author(s)' thinking and share what is important about their work ahead of the conference. These submissions will be made available to all conference participants. During the conference, we will use the 40 minute panel sessions to hold interactive discussions. These will be organised along the lines of a Roundtable with a moderator (one of the convenors) who will pose questions on the topic and invite answers from 3 or 4 speakers. The pre-conference online submissions will help to inform these sessions, and maximise discussion that moves us forward collectively in relation to the central questions around the role and impact of arts-based approaches and methods in conflict resolution and peacebuilding in Africa.
In this paper, I bring practical experience of using participatory methodology as a tool for knowledge production and the importance of women's voices in the peace and conflict dynamics in Africa. In rethinking thinking, I argue for the importance of visual methodologies for research impact.
Paper long abstract:
In rethinking the way knowledge is produced, this reflects concerns about the ways knowledge from projects and studies, especially on the global south, are manipulated, with concerns about who will benefit. The situated nature of knowledge, the wish to create non-hierarchical knowledge, and the orientation towards emancipatory action form part of these concerns. Participatory approaches and methodologies have long been advocated as a means to generate knowledge that addresses power inequalities, passing power from researcher(s) to research participants (Chambers 1997), and endorsing diverse perspectives of social realities as endogenous knowledge. In this paper, I argue for the use of participatory methodologies and in particular, storytelling and participatory video to document women's experiences in conflict situations. In rethinking thinking on how we study women in research, there is the need to rethink whose work we are drawing on, contest the methods we use to measure inequalities and development, and ground the knowledge reproduced in our local contexts. Specifically, we as researchers should have a research agenda that is not extractivist by sharing with the people and participants we work with.
This paper pieces together the fragmented and insecure realities of women in South Sudan through the art form called Milaya (bed sheet embroidery). Focusing on art is an important way into a deeper more nuanced picture of how women maintain resilience in humanitarian contexts of extreme crisis.
Paper long abstract:
"The eye is the strongest thing …. You draw anything that comes to mind … every woman is doing embroidery, no woman is idol because it is important in the life of a woman, when you come to that age you start, you draw meaning, the skill will come to your mind, whatever you want in life." This passage was shared by a married woman 33 years of age living in Juba, South Sudan. She is a bed sheet embroiderer. Here she describes how she draws on her imagination to create designs that are beautiful and as this paper will argue, allows those that make them and those that receive and use them, to imagine a different and more beautiful life. The fundamental relationship between art and womanhood (as it is understood by many women in South Sudan) is very striking in this passage and in many stories often shared. This paper attempts to piece together the fragmented and insecure realities of women in South Sudan through the lens of a specific art form called Milaya. The paper argues that focusing on art is an important way into a deeper more nuanced picture of how women find and maintain resilience in humanitarian contexts of extreme crisis.
The paper explores the influential and yet neglected role of art in bringing generations with despair, distrust, and trauma together in the aftermath of the Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.
Paper long abstract:
The 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda left many Rwandan citizens in despair, distrust, and trauma. The effect of the genocide, which took the lives of more than a million people, was intergenerational in many different areas such as culture, economy, and social cohesion. The healing processes require intergenerational compassion and empathy for a peaceful future. This paper presents experiences of using art as a medium of cross-generational and individual healing processes in post-genocide Rwanda. From the experience of practitioners, it emphasizes the unique artistic role in communicating to the traumatized self and different generations, and highlights art as an important socio-economic tool for development. Therefore, the paper urges policymakers in (post)-conflict communities to reconsider the role of art in peacebuilding processes.
We examine collage-making as an arts-based, participatory method in conflict research. It is based on experience of collage-making with internally-displaced persons from the Anglophone conflict in Cameroon, creating a safe space for participants to express themselves creatively and non-verbally.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines collage-making as an arts-based, participatory method for use in conflict research. Its benefits can include the creation of a safe space for participants to express themselves creatively and non-verbally. This is especially important for affected civilians who have experienced first-hand the traumas of conflict and provides an opportunity for them to express their diverse experiences, emotions and perspectives on the conflict. This can be particularly important in civil war contexts where citizens can be fearful of freely verbalising their thoughts and views due to possible reprisal from warring parties. While collage-making has been described by Flicker et al (2016) and others as useful in participatory and decolonising research with endogenous groups, its use in conflict research in Africa remains limited. The paper is based on our experience of using collage-making as a data collection method amongst internally-displaced persons from the Anglophone conflict in Cameroon. Our aim was to bring the voices of those most-affected people into the public domain and influence dialogues for peace. Collage-making sessions were undertaken in four locations with IDPs, composed of mixed intergenerational groups of approximately 15 people in each session. The lived experiences of participants from the conflict-affected communities were captured in their collages, with some participants discussing their collages with the rest of the group after completion. Common themes that emerged from the collages and interviews included marginalisation, displacement, violence, rape, burning of villages, rural history and transformation, hunger, education, dialogue, mediation, the search for peace with justice.
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Zainab Mai-Bornu (University of Leicester)
James Kewir Kiven (African Leadership Centre Trust, Nairobi, Kenya)
Short Abstract:
The panel explores the impact of arts-based approaches and methods in conflict resolution and peacebuilding in Africa. The use of creative arts methods can include music, drama, dance, poetry, painting and collage-making, as well as participatory methods such as video, photovoice and storytelling.
Long Abstract:
Arts-based approaches and methods offer spaces for creating peace and building trust among people in societies torn by conflict. Yet there is an important knowledge gap in comprehending the actual impact of arts-based approaches on peace efforts, especially in sub-Saharan African countries. The devastating impact of ongoing conflicts in, for instance, Cameroon, Nigeria and Central African Republic, and the failure of conventional approaches to effectively resolve them, make the understanding and potential up-scaling of arts-based approaches both important and necessary.
The use of creative arts methods can include music, drama, dance, poetry, painting and collage-making, and overlap with participatory methods such as video, photovoice and storytelling. Such methods have gained considerable traction in the practice of conflict resolution and peacebuilding (Bergh and Sloboda 2010, 1), with both academic researchers and NGO practitioners at the forefront of many arts-based peace initiatives (Almusaly 2017, 74). Yet, while there is growing recognition of their contribution, knowledge remains limited about the impact of arts-based approaches both in practice and in conducting research on peace processes in sub-Saharan Africa. In particular, there is a paucity of knowledge on the potential impact of local NGO and community-initiated art projects in charting the way for building peace and trust.
This panel seeks to bring together researchers and practitioners to further our understanding of the role played by arts-based approaches and methods in peace processes in sub-Saharan Africa, inclusive of challenges and limitations and ways to counter these. By sharing experiences, the panel also intends to build a network of researchers and practitioners to examine the role of creative arts in preserving or restoring peace in divided communities. It will therefore chart new directions for policy and inform the work of academic researchers and NGOs alike with the overall aim to improve the situation of people in communities torn by conflict.
Methodology:
The panel is paper-based, but with an interactive format rather than formal presentations. Prior to the conference, we will invite accepted paper givers to submit an outline of their contribution in an appropriate format that they select. This could be a maximum 10 minute video, podcast or audio recording, a slide presentation or poster, or something else entirely— as long as it can be shared online. The purpose of each submission is to set out the author(s)' thinking and share what is important about their work ahead of the conference. These submissions will be made available to all conference participants. During the conference, we will use the 40 minute panel sessions to hold interactive discussions. These will be organised along the lines of a Roundtable with a moderator (one of the convenors) who will pose questions on the topic and invite answers from 3 or 4 speakers. The pre-conference online submissions will help to inform these sessions, and maximise discussion that moves us forward collectively in relation to the central questions around the role and impact of arts-based approaches and methods in conflict resolution and peacebuilding in Africa.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Friday 8 July, 2022, -