I feel like I have been looking for this book ever since I started field studies. I am one of those "others for whom these research conventions make what was once a passion start to feel more like a job" (1). This is why I have always turned towards more artistic approaches, and my whole avatar framework I developed in Ghana would certainly fall under this. I loved this article because it articulated what I have been internally screaming for years. Here are some of the insights I gathered.
By doing arts-based "research," we can "bridge and not divide both the artistic-self and the researcher-self." There is a "profound relationship between the arts and sciences," and there are several viable reasons that more and more people are turning towards alternative methods (2). Art-based research is more holistic, it is a new genre that "comprises new theoretical and epistemological groundings that are expanding the qualitative paradigm" (3). In many ways it can capture and represent what traditional research cannot, some of the most fundamental aspects of human experience. Additionally, there are "tremendous meaning-making and pedagogical capabilities" within this emerging genre. It is not merely used at the representation stage of research, but during all phases instead (4).
This chapter also talked about the qualitative paradigm and how it has changed based on the emergence of ethnography with people like Geertz and Goffman coming into the picture. Starting int he 90's though, art-based practices became a legit new method. The cool thing I find about this is that it looks at "knowledge as a process, a temporary state" (9)and that it is not linear. Rather, it is iterative, and meaning emerges through "labeling, identifying, and classifying emerging concepts and testing hypotheses; finding patterns; and generating theory" It helps us to look more at the process of meaning-making as well (10).
Someone named Saarnivaara is also quoted in this chapter and talks about how there is an unnecessary "chasm" between social inquiry and artistic practices, but that since they go through such a similar process there really is no dualism (11). This is something I do not quite grasp, but it would be good to look more into.
Now we get to some of the benefits to using this alternative method. "Art-based practices allow research questions to be posed in new ways, entirely new questions to be asked, and new nonacademic audeinces to be reached" (12). It requires us to be more flexible, and crosses disciplines (18). It pays more attention to process, and focuses on the immediacy that is special to art. This communicates the "emotional aspects of social life." Additionally, this method gives a voice to subjugated perspectives (13), promotes dialogue, and brings academic scholarship to a wider audience. It is not so much concerned with denoting meaning as it is evoking it, not trying to disguise the subjective role of the researcher (14). Multiple viewpoints are also easier to represent with art-based research, which reminds me a lot of Geertz and the idea of "layered" representation, which is an important part of my project.
Something else I want to look further into after looking at this reading is the "Analysis Cycles." It refers to something as triangulation, but I do not quite understand it. I also freak out when drafting a project proposal when I get to the "analysis" section because I have no idea where my work fits into that. Maybe now I will have something to put down instead of omitting it altogether.
This is a great book for anyone who is interested in a creative approach to research and documenting cross-cultural experiences. I hope to dive more into the other chapters in the near future.
Leavy, Patricia. Method Meets Art: Arts-Based Research Practice: New York: The Guilford Press, 2009. Print.
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