Paper short abstract:

In this paper we will provide an analysis of a citizen's knowledge collective in-the-making. The so-called knowledge laboratory changes locations and relations of knowledge exchange; from city centre to neighbourhood, from dissemination to conversation and from matters of fact to matters of concern.

Paper long abstract:

People in low-income neighbourhoods have poorer health than people from middle- and high-income households. The question of how to engage, or, put in more distant vocabulary, 'reach' the people in low-income neighbourhoods therefore constantly occupies health-experts that aim to deploy their professional knowledge to educate lay-citizens. Despite much effort however, these groups seem to benefit least from professional knowledge.

In our ethnographic study on resilient neighbourhoods we investigate the dynamics of health, participation and knowledge in three low-income neighbourhoods in the city of Maastricht, the Netherlands. In cooperation with the neighbourhoods, we organize knowledge laboratories on topics related to health and well-being. The project reverses the problem of reach and takes the local perspective: public space in low-income neighbourhoods does not ordinarily cater for an informal exchange of ideas with a university professor.

The knowledge laboratory changes locations and relations of knowledge exchange; from city centre to neighbourhood, from dissemination to conversation and from matters of fact to matters of concern (Latour 2004). We will focus on the knowledge-practices that take place in this re-constellation between 'health-experts' and neighbourhood during the first year of the project. How do participants make translations between medical and lay-perspectives, and academic and neighbourhood-knowledge? What distinctions between participants will be endorsed and what (epistemic) hierarchies will be evened out? We will provide an analysis of how participants as bearers of (local) knowledge perform symmetry and difference in their interactions and what this entails for the neighbourhood knowledge collective in-the-making (Callon 2004, Mol 2008, Latour 2007).