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Paper short abstract:

Drawing on collaborative research undertaken with 13 auto-ethnographic youth researchers across Iraq, Syria and Jordan, this paper presents a toolkit for embodied methods and considers how research practices themselves can further peace, justice and agency.

Paper long abstract:

Emerging out of an ongoing project that seeks to advance decolonial feminist approaches to research, through this contribution we will share initial lessons, findings and challenges encountered by youth researchers (and in the accompaniment of them) in designing, conducting, analysing and publishing auto-ethnographic research into everyday embodied encounters with heritage and its role in peace, protest and resistance.

In doing so, we will together explore participatory aspects of auto-ethnography, whereby youth researchers were invited to engage in co-constructing research questions and workshops, and in developing a methodological toolkit from which they could draw. This included the likes of body mapping, photo voice, reflection circles, creative writing, watercolour painting, movement exercises and heritage walks, as well as visual, audio and written journalling. By facilitating networks of researchers through regular learning circles, we also highlight the importance of trust (in one another and the process) and the role of friendship in and as method in advancing critical reflection. Through such approaches we illustrate the ways in which the methods we use, might themselves, contribute to a felt sense of peace in the midst of insecurity and discuss together how an ethos of care might sit alongside methodological depth and rigour.

For the second part of the panel, we will experiment with one of the methods from the toolkit, guiding participants through a brief visualisation and movement exercise, which allows for different levels of engagement according to different bodies and comfort levels, followed by a short reflection exercise.