Would you be able to expand on the data collection/analysis methods? You mentioned autoethnography—was this student/participant autoethnography or researcher autoethnography?  

I elaborate on the data collection methods in Blog Post 06: Data Collection Tools (available via PDF). 

I ended up collecting a lot of data because I chose to focus the project on a series of activities rather than just one. This included formal and informal interviews with students, students’ creative work, my own field notes, reflection sessions with my co-tutor Roland. I chose to focus on the following data for my ARP project:

1. discussions with co-tutor Roland Reemaa (method: collective autoethnography) (Ellis, Bochner, 2019);
2. analysis of artefacts made by students in response to assignments (method: document/object analysis);
3. interviewing a focus group of students alongside the work they’ve produced (method: interview, object elicitation (Pauwels, 2019));

However, as the start of my parental leave meant an overwhelming amount of deadlines, I didn’t manage to interview a focus group of students. Instead, I decided to use the data gathered at the group conversation in the end of the drawing workshop. 

I used autoethnographic methods in two ways. Firstly, after reading some of the texts the PGCert course provided, I was inspired to incorporate autoethnographic methods into my teaching. This meant that as part of the Site Research Cycle, students were using autoethnography to research the site—they were encouraged to analyse the site through their individual lens. 

Secondly, I also used autoethnography to gather and analyse data for my ARP project. I did this in conversation with my co-tutor Roland, with whom we reflected on the workshop and compared it to previous iterations we had conducted at CSM, at the Estonian Academy of Arts and at TU Delft (Ellis, Bochner, 2019).

Could you expand slightly upon the social justice element of the project?

During the Inclusive Practices Unit, I realised that we are really missing an opportunity at CSM by not paying enough attention to the students’ lived experiences. UAL admission policies which are rooted in social justice have successfully increased diversity in the student cohort, but tutors are not provided with resource to focus on it in their teaching (re-think teaching, give extra attention to inter-personal relationships amongst students), which means diversification might become a mere tick box exercise (Tate 2018, Sadiq 2023). 

I was inspired by bell hooks’ idea for a learning community—creating an environment where the diverse student group can learn from each other (hooks, 1994). I am convinced this could be the best way to bring inclusivity to their learning and lay a foundation for social justice whatever the subject they are learning. I was inspired to tackle this issue in architectural site research after reading Kim England’s text ‘Getting personal: reflexivity, positionality, and feminist research’ (England, 1994). I realised, focussing on the lived experiences of the students when analysing a site for a project can reveal how people of different backgrounds experience a single place in varied ways. For example, people from minority backgrounds might feel in danger in certain places that are safe spaces for others, or simply someone whose main concern is the wellbeing of animals might really appreciate dark parks whereas someone else might have a bad personal experience from such a space, and their view on darkness in parks might be very different. Such complexities of understanding difference are often lost in professional architecture work, however, building empathy and teaching students to consider varied lived experiences is a way to bring more diverse opinions back into architecture via future practitioners.

Something similar is true for the nature of architecture projects. Currently, the discipline is dominated by speculation, gentrification, commercialisation and many of the more socially driven projects are not even seen as real architecture projects, because they might not end up with a building. However, by encouraging young architects to become spatial practitioners who propose spatial projects that would make a difference to their lived experience, be it a temporary spatial improvement, a community build, etc., we encourage a more spatially just discipline. We don’t want people to lose their experience and adapt to someone else’s understanding what architecture is. Rather, we want them as spatial practitioners to shape architecture. 

Were there any limitations to your project? Would you make any changes if you were to conduct the research again? 

The main limitation was the amount of work I needed to do before starting my parental leave. It meant I didn’t manage to discuss the actions I had taken with the student group as much as I had wanted to. If I was to conduct the research again, I’d definitely want to conduct focus group interviews throughout the Site Research Cycle. I’d like to use the method of visual/object elicitation (Pauwels, 2019) , i.e. use the ‘Act of Repair’ objects as well as the drawings to encourage the discussions.

Bibliography:

[1] Ellis, C.S. & Bochner, A.P., 2006. Analyzing analytic autoethnography: An autopsy. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 35(4), pp.429–449.

[2] Pauwels, L., 2019. Visual elicitation in interviews. In: P. Atkinson, S. Delamont, M.A. Hardy and M. Williams, eds. SAGE Research Methods Foundations. London: SAGE Publications Ltd, pp.3–13.

[3] Sadiq, A. (2023). Diversity, Equity & Inclusion. Learning how to get it right. TEDx [Online]. Youtube. 2 March.

[4] Tate, S.A. (2018). Tackling the ‘BPOC’ Attainment Gap in UK Universities [Online]. Youtube. TEDx/Re:Act, Royal School of Speech & Drama. October.

[5] hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to Transgress. Educations as the Practice of Freedom. New York: Routledge.
[6] England, K. (1994) ‘Getting personal: reflexivity, positionality, and feminist research’, The Professional Geographer, 46(1), pp.80-89. Available at: https://atrium.lib.uoguelph.ca/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10214/1811/18-England.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y  (Accessed 20 January 2025).