{"id":24286,"date":"2019-10-14T11:30:43","date_gmt":"2019-10-14T18:30:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=24286"},"modified":"2019-10-14T11:30:43","modified_gmt":"2019-10-14T18:30:43","slug":"visual-ethnography-building-blocks-for-an-innovative-field","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/visual-ethnography-building-blocks-for-an-innovative-field\/","title":{"rendered":"Visual Ethnography: Building Blocks for an Innovative Field"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sarah Pink, in her textbook <\/span>Doing Visual Ethnography<\/span><\/i>, inadvertently lays out reasons why the field of visual ethnography is itself innovative, and why the potential for future innovation in the field remains bright. As a surprising unintended consequence, she offers insights into how others might approach research more innovatively. Pink goes so far to boldly say, \u201c[Visual ethnography] is itself a process of continuous innovation\u201d (34). Allow me to extract the Top 10 Innovative Principles borrowed from Visual Ethnography:<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

    \n
  1. A Deep Sense of Empathy<\/span><\/li>\n
  2. A Bias towards Action<\/span><\/li>\n
  3. An Openness to the Unexpected<\/span><\/li>\n
  4. The Ability to Co-create with the End User<\/span><\/li>\n
  5. Interdisciplinary Involvement<\/span><\/li>\n
  6. An Awareness of Building on the Past<\/span><\/li>\n
  7. Openness to New Ideas and Mediums<\/span><\/li>\n
  8. A Recognition and Celebration of Innovators in the Field<\/span><\/li>\n
  9. Freedom to Pursue Unique Solutions<\/span><\/li>\n
  10. ???<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

     <\/p>\n

      \n
    1. One of the core tenants of both ethnography and design thinking innovation theory is <\/span>empathy<\/b>. Pink presents (and critiques) the definition of ethnography given by Martin Hammersley and Paul Atkinson as a set of methods that:<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      …involves the ethnographer participating, overtly or covertly, in people\u2019s daily lives for an extended period of time, watching what happens, listening to what is said, asking questions – in fact, collecting whatever data are available to throw light on the issues that are the focus of the research. (34)<\/span><\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Ethnography is marked with an active participation in the daily lives of people over an extended period of time. While Pink critiques Hammersley\u2019s and Atkinson\u2019s definition of ethnography due restricting the range of activities ethnographers may actually do, she affirms the \u201cincarnational\u201d – active participation – of the ethnographer. I would argue that the most helpful innovation and highest added value come when there is a deap, almost personal, understanding of the needs of the \u201cend user.\u201d When these are void of that experience, one points to multi-million dollar waste facilities that lay unused in developing countries because the cost to run them far exceed the community\u2019s capacity. This shared value of empathy is a prime indicator of whether a field will innovate or not.<\/span><\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Another shared value among visual ethnographers and innovators is a <\/span>bias towards action<\/b>. Pink devotes an entire section to the concept of image-makers as practitioners (43-46). The learning is in the doing. Visual ethnography, at least the kind presented by Pink, minimizes the time between this learn-do-assess virtuous cycle.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

         <\/p>\n

          \n
        1. An <\/span>openness to the unexpected<\/b> further underscores innovation. There\u2019s a deep-seated drive in every ego to be right, to foresee answers, and to be the source of these answers. This ego-driven posture is counterproductive to innovation. It takes a larger-than-average amount of humility to be open to surprise and unexpected insights and solutions. Pink embodies this posture as she points out, \u201cIndeed some of the most thought provoking and exciting instances of visual research have emerged unexpectedly during field work\u201d (55).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

           <\/p>\n

            \n
          1. Innovative fields rely on the end-user to <\/span>co-create.<\/b> Nehemiah wisely employs this principle when he has each priest rebuild the wall in front of their own homes (Nehemiah 3:28). He knows that when the end-user has buy in, they are motivated to solve their own problems and gain unique insights. Visual ethnography also \u201ccan become a product in with both informants and ethnographer invest\u201d (67, and elaborated on in 86-87). This is particularly helpful and effective in contexts where power relations are complex (117).\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

             <\/p>\n

              \n
            1. Yet another indicator of continuous innovation is the openness to<\/span> interdisciplinary involvement<\/b>. Often innovation is applying an existing idea to a new field. Galileo knew there were mountains on the moon, not because his telescope was powerful enough to see them, but because his study of painting allowed him to recognize the shadows cast by the mountains. In the same way, visual ethnography consciously pulls from \u201cconsumer research, health studies, education studies, media studies, organisation studies, design research, buildings research and schools of art\u201d (2).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

               <\/p>\n

                \n
              1. When one admits they are <\/span>building on something from the past <\/b>to create something new, they are far more likely to continue in that trajectory. There are no \u201cex nihilo\u201d innovators, and this awareness puts someone in the posture to ask, \u201cHow else might I build on this?\u201d and \u201cWhere else might I glean a building block?\u201d Pink displays this mode of thinking as she situates visual ethnography in the broader concepts and history of anthropology and various approaches to ethnography (71-73).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

                 <\/p>\n

                  \n
                1. As visual ethnography advances along with technology, there exists an <\/span>openness to new ideas and mediums<\/b>. Even the overall flow of the book follows the advancement of visual technology, from photography (chapter 4), video (chapter 5), and then finally the Internet (chapter 6).\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

                   <\/p>\n

                    \n
                  1. Pink generously <\/span>recognizes and celebrates innovators<\/b> in her field. People move towards the stories we share and the exemplars we crown. Pink highlights the work and advancements of Lyon (76-78), Lammer (117-119), O\u2019Neil (25, 86) and Coover (210-211) and even uses the word \u201cinnovative\u201d when describing these colleagues.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

                     <\/p>\n

                      \n
                    1. A culture and history of <\/span>freedom<\/b> in solving problems is crucial to innovation. Pink points out how the 1990s \u201cset the ground for further innovation and freedom in the ways ethnographers might use photography in their written work\u201d (173). Without a safe-to-try and safe-to-fail culture, it\u2019s impossible to risk and pursue solutions that are out of the norm.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

                       <\/p>\n

                        \n
                      1. Last, I was unable to thoughtfully identify a tenth innovative principle, so instead of fabricating (there\u2019s another term one might use) one, I thought I would embody a few of these practices and have an openness to the unexpected by offering a place to co-create this list. What might you add to fill out the final place on my Top 10 list?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                        Sarah Pink, in her textbook Doing Visual Ethnography, inadvertently lays out reasons why the field of visual ethnography is itself innovative, and why the potential for future innovation in the field remains bright. As a surprising unintended consequence, she offers insights into how others might approach research more innovatively. Pink goes so far to boldly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":131,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1579,279],"class_list":["post-24286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-innovation","tag-pink","cohort-lgp10"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/131"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24286"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24286\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24287,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24286\/revisions\/24287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}