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4 proposals Propose
Unwriting art ethnography: translating, decoding, and interpreting sensory, embodied, and participatory practices 
Convenors:
Gili Hammer (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Caterina Borelli (Università Ca' Foscari)
Jennifer Clarke (Gray's School of Art, Robert Gordon University)
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Format:
Panel+Roundtable

Short Abstract:

This panel explores how to "unwrite" ethnographic descriptions of artistic, non-verbal, sensory, and embodied practices, challenging the dominance of textual representation and focusing on inclusive, practice-based, bringing marginalized voices into the center of ethnographic discourse.

Long Abstract:

In ethnology, folklore, anthropology, and related disciplines, writing often constrains the complexity of non-verbal, sensory, and embodied practices such as dance, visual arts, and performance. This panel addresses the theme of unwriting by exploring how we might contribute to work that challenges the dominance of textual representation, offering alternative forms of decoding, interpretation, and translation that attend to the material and embodied processes in artistic and cultural practices in general, and disability and performance studies in particular. How can we unwrite, and offer alternatives to, ethnographic descriptions of creative practices? What new forms of understanding and knowledge production emerge at the intersection of ethnography and the arts?

Participants will reflect on methods that bring marginalized voices—such as artists with disabilities or non-verbal creators—into the center of artistic and ethnographic discourse. By prioritizing embodied, participatory, and practice-based research, this panel and roundtable challenge the hegemony of written narratives, offering new frameworks for collaboration. We invite discussions on the politics of translation, interpretation, and representation across ethnographic work. How do we ensure that artistic practices and research complexities are not reduced to text, especially when working across disciplines? How might we translate sensory and non-textual practices for different audiences, ensuring accessibility? How can non-textual and transmodal forms offer ethnographic research new ways of thinking and doing?

This panel seeks to explore more inclusive and equitable forms of knowledge production through unwriting, opening space for a multiplicity of embodied, sensory, and artistic forms and interdisciplinary dialogue.

This Panel+Roundtable has so far received 4 contribution proposal(s).
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