Participatory Research Methods Workshop

On the 27-28th November, we held a workshop on participatory research methods at the ABI. The aim was to learn from colleagues about their usage of participatory research methods (especially in Africa) and the lessons they draw from this. We sought to discuss the overlap between arts-based methodological and epistemic rethinking from decolonial and Southern lenses as well as how can we balance the emancipatory aim of arts-based participatory methodologies with knowledge creation. We did all this and more. We got insights from brilliant research around cooking pots, gallery spaces and cameras in Uganda, Turkey, South Africa, Colombia and Morocco from Melis Çin, Mariangela Palladino, Viviana García Pinzón and Jan Grill. Duduzile Ndlovu guided as through how we can reimagine research through poetry.  Finally, the group received training in the “Theatre of the Oppressed” research method from one of the leading experts in the field Taísa Oliveira and her Porto-based theatre group Uma Pausa Teatral. The team got some major pointers and ways ahead for our own adaption of theatre workshops to better understand belonging between migrant and host communities. 

We concluded our intense, thoughtful and energetic time together by reflection how such methods can offer us new ways of seeing things and importantly give so much dignity and agency to our research participants in doing so.