Let’s Make it Home: What Critical Storytelling and Visual Arts-based Methodologies Offer

Emanating from the recently awarded Nordforsk research project entitled ‘Making it Home: An Aesthetic Methodological Contribution to the Study of Migrant HomeMaking and Politics of Integration (MaHoMe)’, the proposed workshop will present and discuss different critical storytelling (Bell 2018; Delgado og Stefancic 2017) and visual art methodologies that can contribute to the rewriting narratives of belonging, community and history from multi-disciplinary perspectives. The workshop will consist of two sessions of 3 to 4 presentations each. The first workshop will present and discuss methodologies developed in the MaHoMe project that, working with NGOs and migrants as co-researchers, include participatory aesthetic methods to directly engage with migrant expressions and experiences of home and home-making in the context of recent histories of migration and the politics and policies of integration in Denmark, Sweden and the UK. By focusing on migrant contemporary cultural expressions through visual imagery and soundscapes - in tandem with critical storytelling in analyses of integration policy-making - the project seeks to make a societal impact. The presentations will explore the methods and tools involved – from critical storytelling in policy analysis, multi-sited ethnography, visual ethnography, and participatory aesthetic workshops using the smart phone – and the proposed outcomes of a co-produced film and arts-based methodology toolkit. The second workshop is an open call for presentations, including film and performance, that exemplify different ways of using storytelling and the visual arts and their methodologies to rewrite migratory narratives of belonging, community and history within the Nordic countries and transnationally. Participants may include scholars, NGOs, community groups, museum curators and practitioners that specifically engage with storytelling and arts-based methods to unsettle current national histories and narratives in order to create new perspectives on migration and belonging.