- Convenors:
-
Nada Al-Hudaid
(Lund University)
Yafa Shanneik (Lund University)
Send message to Convenors
- Format:
- Panel
- Sessions:
- Monday 6 March, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
Digital ethnography facilitated the empowerment of research participants and help articulate what matters to them. This panel is open for case studies that used video, sound, VR and/or AR to communicate and engage audience to achieving specific types of experiences that other means cannot.
Long Abstract:
Digital tools have significantly expanded research methodologies and allowed scholars to become more linked to their field sites than ever before (Pink et. Al 2015). Many anthropologists and researchers are interested in involving their research participants in approaches that empower them and encourage use of technologies that can facilitate the articulation of emotions in a relatable way, hence aiding in the development of empathy for the subject matter. This is efficiently accomplished using digital and multi-sensory ethnographic research methods. Video, sound, Virtual Reality (VR), and Augmented Reality are a few examples of these technologies (AR).
For instance, Yafa Shanneik was able to create an embodied and immersive virtual experience of Syrian and Iraqi women refugees in Jordan using art, AR and VR. This experience was significant for the research participants in certain ways, as was the impact it had on those who experienced the VR and AR. We seek to learn more about other ethnographers' experiences in which giving back through digital technology is invaluable. We want to hear more about other ethnographers' experiences with giving back using digital technologies.
This panel welcomes submissions that focuses on case studies of researchers who used any of these strategies to not only give back to the community, but also communicate research findings in a variety of ways to help viewers/audiences engage with the subjects covered.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Monday 6 March, 2023, -Yafa Shanneik (Lund University)
Paper short abstract:
This paper introduces arts-based and arts-informed research as creative approaches for studying the lived experiences of Iraqi and Syrian refugees. The use of art and embodied virtual reality will be introduced as methodological tools that enables refugees to become co-producers of knowledge.
Paper long abstract:
Millions of refugees fleeing from civil unrest and war in Syria and Iraq have found refuge in various neighbouring countries in the Middle East and in Europe. Arts-based and arts-informed research are creative approaches for studying migration and the lived experiences of families and young people.
This paper uses aesthetic forms of research in form of art and virtual reality (VR) as a methodology for enhancing our understanding of the diversity and complexity of human experiences. The first part of the paper introduces body mapping (Solomon et al., 2005) which is an artistic technique for creating life-sized images that traces the contours of the individual’s body. The act of creating a body tracing allows participants to directly communicate a story about their body. Body mapping has proven to be very useful in providing refugees with an alternative tool to share their own experiences of displacement (Shanneik 2018). The second part, discusses the production of virtual reality in which the refugees I worked with become co-producers of knowledge directed to its user. The paper engages critically with the use of creative approaches during various stages of the research process, from inception to dissemination, and the kind of knowledge produced about migration.
The paper is based on ethnographic fieldwork and participatory research conducted among Syrian and Iraqi refugees in Jordan, Germany and the UK since 2017 and is part of the on-going project on Narratives of Displacements funded by the British Academy.
Darelle Bridges (University College London)
Paper short abstract:
This mini-Ethnography explores the visual identifications of litter at Chapel Market. Observing party string change from an object of play, to a discarded piece of litter on the ground, I knew I had sourced a novel topic to undergo participant-observation, with the aid of my smartphone camera.
Paper long abstract:
As a part of my MSc in Social Research Methods, I undertook a mini-Ethnography on Chapel Market and researched vendors' and visitors' visual identifications of litter. My rationale for this topic arose greatly from my gendered experiences of objectification, for I feared objectifying and ‘taking’, from a place that comprised people's identities, histories and stories. As a result, I chose a topic that participants could observe outside of the self and yet be prompted in being introspective of their individual or shared identities and histories, in exploring why objects or spatial areas signified litter. These interviews were undertaken overtly and in centring the participant's perspective in the gathering of data, I’d argue, a novel analysis was elicited. In the analysis, I discuss one exemplar, where discarded fruit and vegetables oscillated between the boundaries of rubbish to the discarded by vendors and a source of life for a visitor, who picked fruit from the discarded trays.
The data catalogue comprising overt interviews, covert observations and photographs taken by participants and myself, highlighted the extent to which litter, is intertwined with themes of the self and communal identities, history and Council policy. This provided an opportunity to be introspective of the apparatuses, that have influenced participants' perceptions in visually identifying litter. This in turn formed and determined the research purpose. Litter is an interesting, novel and visually effective topic, to engage and unite communities local and afar, in exploring their everyday practices in the forming, discarding and processing of litter.
Andrej Naterer (Faculty of Arts, University of Maribor)
Paper short abstract:
Research using ethnographic content analysis focuses on recordings from besieged Dobrinja during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Paper evaluates analysed material as an ethnographic record, as body of knowledge on survival strategies and as a tool of empowerment.
Paper long abstract:
The proposed paper focuses on amateur, semi-amateur and professional video recordings of the events from Dobrinja during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina between 1992 and 1995. By adopting ethnographic content analysis, over 30 hours of video material, accessible via the YouTube platform was analysed. The analysis shows extraordinary ingenuity of people in Dobrinja in developing survival strategies and innovation and efficiency in social and cultural organization, despite the extremely long and harsh siege of the city. Paper strives to evaluate analysed material (1) as an ethnographic record of the events during the siege of the settlement, (2) as potentially transmissive body of knowledge on survival strategies that were developed as a response to exceptionally difficult circumstances and (3) as a tool of empowerment of people that survived the ordeal.