Prof. Krista Harper (UMass Amherst), "Participatory Visual and Digital Research: Studying and transforming Urban Environments." Keynote at the 2014 Futures of Visual Anthropology conference, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA. April 4, 2014.

1. ParticipatoryVisual&DigitalResearch:
Studying&TransformingUrbanEnvironments
Prof. Krista Harper
Anthropology & CPPA
University of Massachusetts Amherst
kharper@anthro.umass.edu
@kristamharper

2. Studying urban environments:
The view from anthropology
 Beliefs, power, & urban environments
 “Senses of place” & place attachment
 Cultural forms of wayfinding, dwelling, &
everyday practices
 Methods: participant observation, interviews,
“eliciting the participants’ point of view”

3. Transforming Urban Environments:
Planning, Policy, & Design
 Human environment
 Participatory Design
 Universal Design
 But how do we get
there from here?

4. Participatory
Visual & Digital
Research
Participatory
action
research
(PAR) Visual &
digital
media

5. The Participatory Turn
 Critique of traditional ethnography
 Post-colonial, feminist, postmodern
 Awareness of power relationships
 Calls for “engaged research”
 Rise of Participatory Action Research (PAR)

6. Digital Media Technology
Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control

7. Studying Environments
with Participatory Visual & Digital Methods
 Participatory digital archives, museums, &
exhibitions
 Participatory GIS (PGIS) & mapping
 Participatory video
 Digital storytelling
 PhotoVoice

8. The PVDR process
 Negotiating goals
 Integrating participants in research process
 Using appropriate technologies
 Considering ethics of representation
 Anticipating audiences and dissemination

9. Participatory Digital Archives
Photo credits:
Brown Paper photo
archives (top)

10. Photo credits: Ilya
Utekhin

11. PGIS
 South Africa:
Decolonizing land
use planning
 New Zealand:
Māori GIS (left)

12. PGIS & Storymapping
“Third Ward Speaks”:
Putting an African-
American
neighborhood’s
history on the map

13. murmur
Toronto
“locative
storytelling”via
web &
smartphone

14. Participatory
Video

15. Digital Storytelling
 Darcy Alexandra’s work with asylum seekers
in Ireland

16. Photovoice
• Photo
• Voice
• Being heard

17. Using Photovoice to study
urban environments
 Hungary: Understandings of environmental injustice
 United States: “A place for stories” after urban renewal
 Portugal: Senses & affect in urban gardening

18. Hungary: Understandings of
environmental injustice
Sajószentpéter
• Pop. 14000 (2500 Roma),
no. Hungary
• Glass & coal city;
hard hit after 1989
• Roma (Gypsy)
neighborhood
• Collaboration with
SAKKF, community
organization

19. •Six young people from SAKKF, a Roma community org.
•Anthropologist & SAKKF president as facilitators

20. Environment:
Values & Issues
Photos: Judit Bari
& Sándor Keleman

21. Photo: Gábor Szabó
Values: Bicycling

22. Concerns: Sewerage
Photo:
Sándor
Keleman

23. Photo: Betti Rúzsa
Concerns: Water

24. Photo: Klaudia Keleman

25. Photo
Exhibitions
in Sajószentpéter
& Budapest

26. United States:
“A place for stories” after urban renewal
Tallahassee, FL & Springfield, MA

28. Photo: Gretchen Gano

29. Portugal:
Senses & affect in urban gardening

30. Photo: Sónia Gáspar
“[Here is] someone literally, with
her hands on the land…Only in
doing it will things germinate,
right? If we are not engaged
and willing to do something –
in this case to plant a garden –
nothing happens. So, we have
to put our hands on the land to
make things grow.”
Gostamos de mexer na terra

31. Adaptamo-nos e resistimos
Photo: Elis Serra

32. Concluding
thoughts
Participatory visual & digital
research offers:
 New ways to elicit stories &
collect data
 Engaging participants
more meaningfully
 Policy impact

33. Thank you!
Questions? Contact me at
kharper@anthro.umass.edu
On Twitter: @kristamharper