37 research outputs found
Unveiling the layered structures of youth work
Get PDFThis article is based on a case study involving the youth work department in the City of Kemi and the artist-researchers from the University of Lapland in Rovaniemi in Northern Finland. During the project, activities related to youth work promoting youth’s wellbeing and preventing their marginalisation have revealed to be multi-layered and complex by nature. Layers in this context refer to the organizations and their physical spaces (e.g. street address) as well as virtual spaces (e.g. discord, social media channels), Kemi service providers (e.g. Detective youth work, Ohjaamo Kemi, Rehabilitative work) and youth workers as well as the young people themselves. By looking at the plurality contained in those layers, we aim at reposition agendas and actions related to youth work and collaboration with stakeholders therein towards a more systemic - rather than individualistic - orientation that seeks to understand the complexities of circumstances different youth live in.Three types of layers will be observed. Observation from the bird's eye view aims to identify the whole and its parts, as well as the different interactions between them. In the frog, or grass-root, perspective the overall picture will be formed from separately observed sub-views “as you go”. The rhizome perspective seeks to identify structures and/or functions that lie beneath the surface. Methodically, the layer-related observations will be made by applying the theory of space syntax (Hillier 1996, 2007) and the concept of rhizome (Deleuze & Guattari 1987). Research on youth work (e.g. Mertanen 2020) will add a critical perspective to these observations. In addition, art-/design-based methods are used to support the theoretical approach. Experimental prototypes (provotypes) are manufactured to look critically at, for example, the layers and the “traffic” between them, or to unveil functions hiding under the surface.This study describes the components and actors of stakeholder and youth interaction with a particular interest in visibilising different structures and power positions among pluriversal spaces and perspectives. The aim is to seek to respond to the following research questions: What are the underlying factors defining youth work and how to perceive complexity of the situations that the youth at different margins live in? The primary data of this case study is based on 20 semistructured thematic and reflective group discussions conducted in 2020–2021 with youth workers from different organisations. The data were analysed with inductive thematic qualitative analysis. Content analysis of the websites of the youth work services guided the observation of complexity. Three analysis perspectives—the bird’s eye, grassroots, rhizome—were outlined from the emerging themes from the interviews. The theory of space syntax brought together these perspectives. A matrix was formed to summarise the findings of the study. It shows how the layers and perspectives, as well as the actors and places, form the plurality of interactions and networks involved in youth work
Dialogues for plurality:art-based exchange for strengthening youth's role as agents of change
Get PDFThis chapter presents an interdisciplinary arts-based research with seven young people from asylum-seeking backgrounds as part of a wider research project: SEEYouth. This research is based on the dialogical process leading to the transformation experienced by the participants and authors. The chapter’s main research question is: How can interdisciplinary arts-based exchange with youth create pluralistic dialogue and strengthen youth’s roles as agents of change in their life contexts? The dialogue for plurality is discussed in the chapter through verbal, visual and embodied languages, which were the main analysis categories from the process. The chapter suggests that creative dialogue for plurality, including multiple forms of languages beyond conventional research knowledge production, can create a space for youth to express their concerns related to the obstacles they face regarding their inclusion and belonging. It also encourages shared reflections, creating new perspectives and strengthening youth’s role as agents of change in society and in their personal lives
Yli kulttuuri- ja oppiainerajojen: taidekasvatus ja sosiaalityö kaksisuuntaista kotoutumista tukemassa
No full textYli kulttuuri- ja oppiainerajojen : taidekasvatus ja sosiaalityö kaksisuuntaista kotoutumista tukemassa
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Introduction
Get PDFThis introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book presents the idea of the pluriverse as one that acknowledges non-humans and treats nature as an equal ‘coauthor’ in the artistic process. It describes arts-based methods as facilitating the mapping and understanding of the human experience and thus offering new materialities for the youth to participate in processes driving for social change. The book explores speculative scenarios of the future of artistic research through an autoethnographic analysis of several case studies from diverse contexts based on a pluriversal approach to research practice, including technology, nature, humans and non-humans. It discusses public art as a way of presenting, redefining and expressing Arctic pluralism in Finnish Lapland. The book argues that recognising and celebrating knowledge plurality is necessary for greater university—community permeability, reciprocity and transformation and that design may be especially well positioned to foster such epistemic plurality.</p
A critical retrospective on whiteness in Possible Worlds video artwork
Get PDFThe chapter examines the communally and interculturally constructed video work Possible worlds in terms of its arts-policy meanings related on whiteness, living environments and youth. The video art work consists of seven episodes relating to the living environments of young women residing in different parts of Europe. The aim is to consider what kinds of meanings these young women produce related on the places they inhabit, and how the critical perspective on whiteness could challenge the ways how the knowledge of the place has been produced in the video art work. The foundation of the chapter is arts-based research, where the artist-researcher is a participant in constructing the content of the art in collaboration with the human subjects of the study, and in which the production of the art intrinsically relates to both the research methodology and the presentation of results. The chapter draws on experiences of inhabiting a white world as a white, and explores how taking whiteness under a critical retrospective might produce new ways of understandings of living conditions produced in the video art.Keywords: art-based research; whiteness; communal art; ‘new’-materialism; young people; interculturalism; gender; social engagement; pluralityThe chapter examines the communally and interculturally constructed video work Possible worlds (Mäkiranta and Escudeiro 2017) in terms of its arts-policy meanings related on whiteness, living environments and youth. The video art work consists of seven episodes relating to the living environments of young women residing in different parts of Europe. The aim is to consider what kinds of meanings these young women produce related on the places they inhabit, and how the critical perspective on whiteness could challenge the ways how the knowledge of the place has been produced in the video art work. The foundation of the chapter is arts-based research, where the artist-researcher is a participant in constructing the content of the art in collaboration with the human subjects of the study, and in which the production of the art intrinsically relates to both the research methodology and the presentation of results. The chapter draws on experiences of inhabiting a white world as a white, and explores how taking whiteness under a critical retrospective might produce new ways of understandings of living conditions produced in the video art.Keywords: art-based research; whiteness; communal art; ‘new’-materialism; young people; interculturalism; gender; social engagement; plurality<br/
Varjoisilla kaduilla, vieraissa kodeissa : mahdollisuuksia nepalilaisten katu- ja lastenkotilasten oikeuksien edistämisessä
Get PDFTutkielman tavoite on tuoda nepalilaisten katu- ja lastenkotilasten arkea esiin. Tutkielmassa tarkastellaan, miten YK:n Lapsen oikeuksien sopimus toteutuu näiden lasten elämässä. Lisäksi tarkoituksena on etsiä mahdollisuuksia oikeuksien edistämiselle lasten elämästä löytyvistä vahvuuksista sekä syrjinnän ja sorron vastaisen sosiaalityön periaatteista. Tutkielma on osa globaalia kokonaisuutta, vaikka määrittyykin tiettyyn paikkaan liittyväksi laadulliseksi tutkimukseksi. Kansainvälisen sosiaalityön idea maailman lasten nälän ja kärsimyksen maailmanlaajuisesta tunnistamisesta lisää tämän tutkielman tarpeellisuutta. Tutkielma paikantuu tutkijalle vieraaseen kulttuuriin, mikä perustelee etnografisen lähestymisen. Aineisto on kerätty Nepalissa 16 kuukauden aikana osallistuvan havainnoinnin ja haastattelujen kautta. Tutkielmassa on käytetty tutkijan päiväkirjaotteita aineiston tavoin kuvaamaan tunnelmia ja kokemuksia tutkielman kannalta merkityksellisistä teemoista. Tutkielmassa nojataan lapsen subjektiivisuutta korostavaan uuteen lapsuustutkimukseen. Tähän pohjautuen aineistona toimivat myös neljän katupojan ja neljän lastenkotilapsen haastattelut. Haastattelumenetelmänä on käytetty teemahaastattelua, mikä on toiminut myös haastattelujen analyysin toteutuksessa. Etnografisen haastattelun tavoin myös kontekstin merkitys on pyritty huomioimaan analyysissa. Tutkimus osoittaa, että useat YK:n Lapsen oikeuksien sopimuksen teemat jäävät toteutumatta nepalilaisten katu- ja lastenkotilasten arjessa. Heidän oikeuttaan identiteettiin ja omanarvontuntoon, kotiin, vanhempiin ja huoltajiin, terveyteen ja ravintoon, turvallisuuteen ja vapauteen sekä kouluun ja vapaa-aikaan loukataan monella tavalla. He elävät moninkertaisessa marginaalissa niin maailmanlaajuisella kuin yhteiskunnallisella tasolla. He ovat rakenteellisen sorron uhreja ja joutuvat kohtaamaan väkivaltaa monessa muodossa. Samaan aikaan heidän elämästään on löydettävissä vahvuuksia, jotka luovat toivoa paremmasta tulevaisuudesta ja auttavat selviytymään päivä kerrallaan. Lasten yksilöllisen tason vahvuuksia ovat unelmat, ihmissuhteet ja erilaiset toiminnat. Syrjinnän ja sorron vastaisen sosiaalityön periaatteiden mukaiset yhteistyö, asianajo ja aktivismi ovat välineitä näihin vahvuuksiin tarttumiselle ja lasten oikeuksien edistämiselle
New genre Arctic art in the city of Rovaniemi:Promotion of de-Arctification and pluralism
Get PDFThe chapter examines the communally and interculturally constructed video work Possible worlds in terms of its arts-policy meanings related on whiteness, living environments and youth. The video art work consists of seven episodes relating to the living environments of young women residing in different parts of Europe. The aim is to consider what kinds of meanings these young women produce related on the places they inhabit, and how the critical perspective on whiteness could challenge the ways how the knowledge of the place has been produced in the video art work. The foundation of the chapter is arts-based research, where the artist-researcher is a participant in constructing the content of the art in collaboration with the human subjects of the study, and in which the production of the art intrinsically relates to both the research methodology and the presentation of results. The chapter draws on experiences of inhabiting a white world as a white, and explores how taking whiteness under a critical retrospective might produce new ways of understandings of living conditions produced in the video art.Keywords: art-based research; whiteness; communal art; ‘new’-materialism; young people; interculturalism; gender; social engagement; pluralityImaginaries of the Arctic cause so-called Arctification that does not resonate with experienced realities of the region as a multiethnic, multicultural and multilingual place. This chapter is based on long-term art-based action research aiming to influence contemporary art, art education, transculturalism and inclusion in the Arctic, especially in the city of Rovaniemi. The research is based on need to consider the richness and the variety of the circumpolar world and to the discussion on pluriverse, new genre public art, and new genre Arctic art. The chapter concludes that socially engaged art can promote the identification of minority cultures, encounters amongst members of different cultures and representations of multiculturalism and transculturalism in public space and visual arts. Public art as an identity symbol of locality can counteract Arctification. Arts can create an understanding of the pluriverse and promote openness to multiculturalism, as well as present the Arctic as home to a rich variety of cultures
