Session Information
99 ERC SES 08 D, Participation in Education
Paper Session
Contribution
In her book 'Belonging: a culture of space', bel hooks writes 'living away from my native place I become more consciously Kentuckian than I was when I lived at home' (hooks 2009/2019, p. 13). This quote shows the significance of places in relation to one's own feelings of belonging. This is exactly where my doctoral project comes in, in which I ask how students with a refugee background experience everyday life in secondary schools in Berlin (Germany). Based on a relational understanding of space, I differentiate between place and space (Löw 2001/2019).
The focus on space in this case becomes interesting when we understand space as a product of physical, mental and social elements where the physical cannot be seen in isolation from the social and relational (Lefebvre). Space therefore can be described as a combination of what is physically present and what is imagined (Soja). The relation between school and out-of-school spaces will be explored, as will the self-positioning of the students within everyday life at school - beyond the classroom. In this context, moments of agency and well-being that arise in the students' everyday life are of particular research interest.
Focusing on a young refugees' perspective can be understood as a form of 'strategic essentialism' (Spivak 1981), that serves to contribute to a systematic thematization of migration, which is still a young phenomenon in the academic landscape. At the same time it is intended to counteract the dominant discourse in which the connection between education and migration is discussed primarily in the context of successful integration (into the existing system) (Mecheril 2013).
In this paper I want to put a special focus on methodological topics around participatory and creative research with students with a refugee background in schools: Which personas do play a key role?, In which way is the research influenced by the structures of the school itself?, and one of the most important questions, how can the participants be recruited in a participatory manner?
Method
The work is orientated towards a performative research logic and draws on creative, artistic and embodied inquiries. In this case, creating a research environment where the well-being of the students is ethically the main priority, playful and experimental elements are significant. During a workshop at a school, it has already been established that the students are very interested in photography. Photography should therefore be used – as part of the Photo Voice method – to explore their own living environment in everyday life. The research perspective is guided by a) a praxeological perspective through which school orders and aspects of materiality can be analysed, as well as b) phenomenological approaches to the students' experiences.
Expected Outcomes
Based on the discourse of a so-called critical migration pedagogy, the aim is to visualise the lived experiences and self-positionings of the students with a refugee background. Contradictory perspectives and counter-narratives can in this case subvert powerful structures. In the sense of a participatory and transformative research design, a rhizomatic logic is followed instead of linear knowledge production. The results should also be made visible to the public, therefore exhibitions inside and outside of the school are an integral part of the research process. Most importantly, students are not seen as objects of the research, but are given the opportunity to engage in an environment that is meaningful to them and, at best, empowering.
References
Beier, Frank (2019): Vom repräsentativen zum ästhetischen Regime – Für eine andere Empirie. In: Mayer, R./Schäfer, A./Wittig, S. (Ed.): Jaques Rancière. Pädagogische Lektüren. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, p. 91-112. Buchner, Tobias und Köpfer, Andreas (2022): Mapping the field: spatial relations in research on inclusion and exclusion in education. In: International Journal of Inclusive Education. DOI: 10.1080/13603116.2022.2073058. Burles, Meridith and Thomas, Roanne (2014). “I Just Don’t Think There’s any other Image that Tells the Story like [This] Picture Does”: Researcher and Participant Reflections on the Use of Participant-Employed Photography in Social Research. In: International Journal of Qualitative Methods, p. 185–205. https://doi.org/10.1177/160940691401300107. Hillebrandt, Frank (2014): Praxistheorie und Schulkultur. In: Böhme, J./Hummrich, M./Kramer, R.-T. (Ed.): Schulkultur. Theoriebildung im Diskurs. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, p. 429-444. Holm, Gunilla (2008). Photography as a Performance. Forum: Qualitative Social Research 9, 2. https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-9.2.394. hooks, bell (2009/2019): Belonging: a culture of space. London: Taylor & Francis. Illich, Ivan (1995): Deschooling Society. London: Marion Boyars Publishers. Kara, Helen (2020): Creative Research Methods. A Practical Guide. Bristol: Policy Press. Kessel, Fabian (2016): Erziehungswissenschaftliche Forschung zu Raum und Räumlichkeit. Eine Verortung des Thementeils „Raum und Räumlichkeit in der erziehungswissenschaftlichen Forschung. In: Zeitschrift für Pädagogik 62 (2016) 1, p. 5-19. Weinheim: Beltz Juventa. Kogler, Michaela and Wintzer, Jeannine (2021): Raum und Bild – Strategien visueller raumbezogener Forschung. Berlin: Springer Spektrum. Lefebvre, Henri (2016/1968): Das Recht auf Stadt. Hamburg: Edition Nautilus. Leigh, Jennifer and Brown, Nicole (2021): Embodied Enquiry. Research Methods. London: Bloomsbury Academic. Löw, Martina (2001): Raumsoziologie. Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp. Mecheril, Paul (2013): Migrationsforschung als Kritik? Erkundung eines epistemischen Anliegens in 57 Schritten. In: Mecheril, Paul et al. (Ed.): Migrationsforschung als Kritik? Konturen einer Forschungsperspektive. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, p. 7-58. Peez, Georg (2003): Fotoanalysen im Rahmen kunstpädagogischer qualitativer Forschung. In: Ehrenspeck, Y./Schäffer, B. (Ed.): Film- und Fotoanalyse in der Erziehungswissenschaft. Eine Einführung. Opladen: Leske+Budrich, p. 289-306. Ploder, Andrea (2013): Widerstände sichtbar machen. Zum Potenzial einer performativen Methodologie für kritische Migrationsforschung. In: Mecheril, Paul et al. (Ed.): Migrationsforschung als Kritik? Konturen einer Forschungsperspektive. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, p. 141-156. Ruby, Jay (1991): Sharing the Power. Perspektief Magazine No 41. Sontag, Susan (1977/2010): On photography. München: Penguin. Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty (2007): Can the Subaltern Speak? Postkolonialität und subalterne Artikulation. Wien: Turia + Kant. Strom, Kathrin J./ Martin, Adrian D. (2017): Becoming-Teacher. A Rhizomatic Look at First-Year Teaching. Rotterdam/Boston/Taipei: Sense Publishers. von Unger, Hella (2014): Partizipative Forschung. Einführung in die Forschungspraxis. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.
Search the ECER Programme
- Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
- Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
- Search for authors and in the respective field.
- For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
- If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.