Unconsented Sterilisation, Participatory Story‐Telling, and Digital Counter‐Memory in Peru

Abstract

This article aims to prompt reflection on the ways in which digital research methods can support or undermine participatory research. Building on our experiences of working on the Quipu Project (quipu-project.com), an interactive, multimedia documentary on unconsented sterilisation in Peru, it explores the ways in which digital technologies can enable participatory knowledge production across geographic, social and linguistic divides. It also considers the new forms of engagement between knowledgeproducers and audiences that digital methods can encourage. Digital technologies can, we contend, help build new spaces for, and modes of engagement with, participatory research, even in contexts such as the Peruvian Andes where digital technologies are not well established or commonly used. Doing so, we argue, entails responding sensitively to the social, linguistic and digital inequalities that shape specific research contexts, and centring the human relationships that are easily sacrificed at the altar of technological innovation. Resumen: Este artículo tiene por propósito impulsar la reflexión sobre como los métodos de investigación digitales pueden apoyar o menoscabar la investigación participativa. Construyendo desde nuestra experiencia de trabajo en el Proyecto Quipu (proyectoquipu.com), el artículo explora como las tecnologías digitales pueden facilitar la producción participativa de conocimiento a través de las divisiones geográficas, sociales y lingüísticas. También considera las nuevas formas de compromiso que los métodos digitales pueden promover entre los productores de conocimiento y los públicos. Insistimos en que las tecnologías digitales pueden abrir nuevos espacios para, y nuevos modos de compromiso con, la investigación participativa, incluso en contextos como los andes peruanos donde las tecnologías digitales no están bien establecidas ni son muy usadas. Argumentamos que hacer esto implica responder con sensibilidad a las inequidades sociales, lingüísticas y digitales que moldean los contextos de investigación específicos. También supone enfatizar en las relaciones humanas que se sacrifican fácilmente en el altar de la innovación tecnológica.

Qualitative methods III: On different ways of describing our work

“…Hayes-Conroy (2018) used participatory mapping and co-organised a symposium, along with interviews and observation, in her study of Columbian anti-violence movements. And Brown and Tucker (2017) tell us about how they set up an anonymous phone line to record the testimonies of Peruvian women who had been subjected to unconsented sterilisation.…”

Redressing forced sterilisation: the role of the medical profession

“…It was intended to reduce the national birth rate using measures such as sterilisation quotas, incentives and penalties, thereby coercing some professionals 6. Approximately 300 000 persons, mainly women but also 21 000 men, were forcibly sterilised 7. Rural indigenous Quechua‐speaking persons were disproportionately targeted, exploiting intersecting vulnerabilities of race and ethno‐lingual identity, low socio‐economic status, gender (predominately women) and postpartum accessibility to healthcare facilities.…”

“…6 Approximately 300 000 persons, mainly women but also 21 000 men, were forcibly sterilised. 7 Rural indigenous Quechua-speaking persons were disproportionately targeted, exploiting intersecting vulnerabilities of race and ethno-lingual identity, low socioeconomic status, gender (predominately women) and postpartum accessibility to healthcare facilities. Such coercion included deceiving people by telling them that they would be breaching domestic child policy laws if they had more children and forcing illiterate patients to sign consent forms without an interpreter.…”

Animating the subjugated past: digital greeting cards as a form of counter-memory

“…past experiences that are silenced and marginalized (Foucault, 2003: 7) -amateur greeting cards can serve as a form of counter-memory. This potential for insurrection is enhanced by digital technologies which encourage participation in counter-memory projects by engaging their audience in novel ways (Brown and Tucker, 2017). By exploring how animated E-cards interact with the subjugated past, we strive to explicate the impact of digital technologies on war (counter-)remembrance.…”