Researching Infrastructural Imaginaries in Education Through Future Workshops

Abstract

Ingrid Forsler is a PhD candidate in Media and Communication Studies at Södertörn University in Stockholm, Sweden. She has a background in art and media education and her PhD project examines the relationship between technology and visual art education. AbstractThis case describes the development and implementation of the Future workshops method, as part of a mixed methodology in a PhD project about media technologies and future imaginaries in school art education. The workshop method described here is an attempt to visualize media infrastructures in teaching and the imaginaries surrounding them, thereby making them possible for the research participants to discuss and critique. The practical lessons learned from this case are that designing a functioning research workshop resembles the pedagogic planning done in teaching. Ritual aspects and emotional labor are highlighted as necessary in the process, as well as staying sensitive to the context where the workshops are performed, and to my role as a researcher in this context. Discussing some of the shortcomings of creative methods, the study concludes that workshop methods benefit from being combined with other methods to include, for example, historical perspectives in the analysis. The messiness and non-linearity of the research process is described in the text as a simultaneous development of research questions, theoretical concepts, experiences, and methods. Learning OutcomesBy the end of this case, students should be able to • Identify key challenges of researching media infrastructures • Identify key challenges of researching social imaginaries • Discuss the possibilities and limits of visual and participatory methodologies in social science or humanities research • Develop and apply a creative workshop design to a chosen field of study Case Study Project Overview and ContextThis case study presents creative workshops as a research method, developed to capture the social imaginaries, or shared norms and ideas about the aim of education, surrounding the use of media technologies in the art classroom, for school administration and for professional development. These technologies, when put to use, are part of structuring everyday practice as well as the way we think about teaching and learning, and are conceptualized in the study as media infrastructures of art education. The workshop approach is informed by participatory and creative approaches from human geography, social development, and critical infrastructure studies. The more specific future workshops methodology used here was developed by Robert Jungk and Norbert Müllert (1987) to create citizen participation in decision-making processes.The workshops were carried out with art teacher students in Sweden and Estonia, as part of my ongoing PhD. The aim of the project is to understand how social imaginaries about media infrastructures is played out in school art education, or more concretely, how the school subject has changed in relation to new media technologies, and how this is negotiated in the art te...

Skeppssamhället: rang, roller och status på örlogsskepp under 1600-talet

“…171 Först från 1700-talets andra hälft finns belägg för att sårade och sjuka togs till ett utrymme som kallas "qvästlafwen" och som då verkligen låg på trossdäcket. 172…”

Imaginary classrooms. Exploring new directions in visual art education through future workshops in teacher training.

“…Future workshops have later also been used as a research method to explore future imaginaries among specific groups such as children and young people (Alminde & Warming, 2020;Clausen et al, 2019) and teachers (Dirckinck-Holmfeld et al, 2019;Forsler, 2018Forsler, , 2020 where it has been considered useful to facilitate discussion and reflection between participants. When used in research, the workshops are usually divided into three phases, a preparation phase where the framework for the workshop is introduced, a critique phase where participants identify and visualize perceived problems and a fantasy phase where they come up with a shared vision of how these problems can be solved.…”

Invitation to Use Your Imagination

“…_ Process Future workshops have later also been used as a research method to explore future imaginaries among specific groups such as children and young people (Alminde & Warming, 2020;Clausen et al, 2019) and teachers (Dirckinck-Holmfeld et al, 2019;Forsler, 2018Forsler, , 2020 where it has been considered useful to facilitate discussion and reflection between participants. When used in research, the workshops are usually divided into three phases, a preparation phase where the framework for the workshop is introduced, a critique phase where participants identify and visualize perceived problems and a fantasy phase where they come up with a shared vision of how these problems can be solved.…”