Reflexivity in Participatory Research: Making games with young people 

Colleagues from ReMAP met to discuss opportunities and pitfalls in participatory research, and how a reflexive approach can support a more critical and less homogenising engagement with research practices and knowledge production. Organised by Hakan Ergul, the event was led by Bruno de Paula, who presented some of his recent work developing MissionMaker and facilitating game-making workshops with young people across London. 

In his presentation, Bruno reflected about the insider/outsider dichotomy in participatory research and on the different roles he played in that project – as one of the developers producing MissionMaker, but also as workshop leader and researcher – remarking how juggling these different roles often pose competing interests, requiring therefore a multifaceted and complex approach to reflexivity. Colleagues from ReMAP also shared their own experiences in their fieldworks, promoting a relevant and productive debate for those interested in participatory research and reflexivity.

The presentation talk, and the following discussion, can be seen here.

This is the first of a series of conversations with colleagues in the Media group at IOE. The next will be with Jelena Viskovic, on 11th November.

More on Bruno’s work can be found on his recent publications: 

de Paula, B. (2021a). Exploring game grammars: A sociosemiotic account of young people’s game-making practices. Visual Communication. https://doi.org/10.1177/14703572211027214. 

de Paula, B. (2021b). Korean Soap Operas, Telenovelas and Sci-fi Conspiracies: A Game-making Experience with Latin American Youth in London. Digital Culture & Education, 13(2), 111–128. Available at: https://www.digitalcultureandeducation.com/volume-13-2. 

de Paula, B. (2021c). Reflexivity, methodology and contexts in participatory digital media research: Making games with Latin American youth in London. Learning, Media and Technology. https://doi.org/10.1080/17439884.2021.1901114.