The Role of Images

This chapter introduces the role of images, their power, and agency. Starting with the anthropological and powerful character of images, focus shifts to a historical specification of potential uses of images. As a case study, discussion refers to the transition from Hellenistic to early imperial Italy, a period when the frequency of images massively increased, and new media, materials, and production techniques came into play. This entailed not only the creation of new visual formulas and styles but also new image contexts and perceptual situations. Examination of this historical process allows for a reflection on the agents involved, as well as their specific interests and forms of (inter-)action. This, in turn, will allow for some insights into the historically specific interests invested in images, as well as some general reflections on the role of images.

Menginpehn lien Pohnpei: A poetic ethnography of urohs (Pohnpeian skirts)

<p>This thesis perpetuates a legacy of menginpehn lien Pohnpei (the handiwork of Pohnpeian women) through a poetic ethnography of urohs, Pohnpeian appliquéd and machine embroidered skirts. I trace the “social life” of these valuable textiles and their relationships to the women who make, sell, wear, gift and love them on two Micronesian islands, Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), and the U.S. Territory of Guam where there is a small Pohnpeian migrant community. As a lien Pohnpei poet, this reflexive multi-sited research project is rooted in an “oceanic imaginary.” It is indigenously framed within the scholarship and creativity of Pacific Studies and critical ethnography that responds to the creative, which is so important to urohs and the lives of Pohnpeian women. I explore a genealogy and evolution of women’s nting (writing) from pelipel, tattoos, that marked Pohnpeian bodies to cloth production, including dohr, likoutei (wraparounds), as well as contemporary urohs, to my poetry, another kind of dynamic, textual and textured “writing.” Pacific Literature evolved from the visual, and in Pohnpei this included various forms of menginpehn lih, which this thesis seeks to continue through experimental ethnographic and poetic practice on the sensual textile art of urohs. Thus, it made sense not only to take photographs to “capture” these stunning textiles, but to visualize my thesis as an urohs—the central design or mwahi are my poems, essential to the making of an urohs kaselel (beautiful urohs), appliquéd or embroidered to the scholarly, academic writing or likou, the fabric, that forms the larger skirt, all sewn together with a misihn en deidei (sewing machine), the theory and methodology, on which this thesis runs. My seven months of ethnographic “homework” consisted of oral history interviews, koasoai (conversations), and time spent experiencing urohs with the women whose lives are so entangled in them. The voices of lien Pohnpei are privileged in this Pohnpei-centric study written bilingually in English and Pohnpeian to best reflect our worldviews and the skirts that often function as our “second skins,” threading us in complex ways to other lien Pohnpei at home and in our homes away from home, such as Guam. Lastly, this thesis-skirt reveals what our urohs do for us as lien Pohnpei, how they create meaning in our lives, as opposed to having an essentialist “meaning”—urohs are an unacknowledged force in Pohnpei’s and FSM’s economy; these textiles are “women’s wealth,” dipwisou kesempwal (valuable goods) that give women power and agency within Pohnpeian culture, tiahk, and allow them to support their families; urohs are one of the most expressive ways for women today to display their identities as lien Pohnpei at home and in the diaspora. The poetry I write in response to these innovative, colorful textiles reflects the multilayered ways women articulate our relationships with urohs within the social fabric of Pohnpeian lives, which perpetuates our creativity through the labour of our “fine-hands” and minds.</p>

Menginpehn lien Pohnpei: A poetic ethnography of urohs (Pohnpeian skirts)

<p>This thesis perpetuates a legacy of menginpehn lien Pohnpei (the handiwork of Pohnpeian women) through a poetic ethnography of urohs, Pohnpeian appliquéd and machine embroidered skirts. I trace the “social life” of these valuable textiles and their relationships to the women who make, sell, wear, gift and love them on two Micronesian islands, Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), and the U.S. Territory of Guam where there is a small Pohnpeian migrant community. As a lien Pohnpei poet, this reflexive multi-sited research project is rooted in an “oceanic imaginary.” It is indigenously framed within the scholarship and creativity of Pacific Studies and critical ethnography that responds to the creative, which is so important to urohs and the lives of Pohnpeian women. I explore a genealogy and evolution of women’s nting (writing) from pelipel, tattoos, that marked Pohnpeian bodies to cloth production, including dohr, likoutei (wraparounds), as well as contemporary urohs, to my poetry, another kind of dynamic, textual and textured “writing.” Pacific Literature evolved from the visual, and in Pohnpei this included various forms of menginpehn lih, which this thesis seeks to continue through experimental ethnographic and poetic practice on the sensual textile art of urohs. Thus, it made sense not only to take photographs to “capture” these stunning textiles, but to visualize my thesis as an urohs—the central design or mwahi are my poems, essential to the making of an urohs kaselel (beautiful urohs), appliquéd or embroidered to the scholarly, academic writing or likou, the fabric, that forms the larger skirt, all sewn together with a misihn en deidei (sewing machine), the theory and methodology, on which this thesis runs. My seven months of ethnographic “homework” consisted of oral history interviews, koasoai (conversations), and time spent experiencing urohs with the women whose lives are so entangled in them. The voices of lien Pohnpei are privileged in this Pohnpei-centric study written bilingually in English and Pohnpeian to best reflect our worldviews and the skirts that often function as our “second skins,” threading us in complex ways to other lien Pohnpei at home and in our homes away from home, such as Guam. Lastly, this thesis-skirt reveals what our urohs do for us as lien Pohnpei, how they create meaning in our lives, as opposed to having an essentialist “meaning”—urohs are an unacknowledged force in Pohnpei’s and FSM’s economy; these textiles are “women’s wealth,” dipwisou kesempwal (valuable goods) that give women power and agency within Pohnpeian culture, tiahk, and allow them to support their families; urohs are one of the most expressive ways for women today to display their identities as lien Pohnpei at home and in the diaspora. The poetry I write in response to these innovative, colorful textiles reflects the multilayered ways women articulate our relationships with urohs within the social fabric of Pohnpeian lives, which perpetuates our creativity through the labour of our “fine-hands” and minds.</p>

normalising power and engaged narrative methodology: refugee women, the forgotten category in the public discourse

Since the beginning of the 21st century, the discourse of othering of non-Western migrants has been growing in many European societies. And since 2015, refugees have become a quite visible component in this discourse. Although, for decades, the dominant image of refugees has been constructed as people ‘at risk’, new competing images of refugee men ‘as risk’ have recently gained ground. For refugee women, however, the image of being victims and ‘at risk’ still prevails. This shows a strong underlying gendered logic of feminine vulnerability and masculine threat. In this article, I show how these images are situated within the dominant Dutch discourse of migration with taken-for-granted taxonomies of the self and the other. Specific in this normalised discourse for refugee women is that their agency is either ignored or their possible position as activists is not acknowledged to exist. Using examples from two studies in which my research team engaged with the method of narrative engaged research, I show the importance of this particular narrative method in unsettling the normalising power of othering. The theoretical argument of this article engages with ongoing discussions on power and agency. It argues that, when the power of exclusion works through repetition and is manifested in the daily normalisation of actions, agency needs to provide an alternative in the same fluid manner. Narratives in dialogue provide an illuminating angle for discussing this specific kind of agency, as I will show through some examples from research.

‘Why didn’t they see my scars?’ Critical thematic analysis of simulated participants’ perceived tensions surrounding objective structured clinical examinations

Background Simulated participants (SPs) play an important role in simulated assessments of clinical encounters between medical students and patients, most notably in objective structured clinical examinations (OSCEs). SP contributions to OSCEs are invaluable, taking the role of a patient or carer. While SPs in some settings/contexts may rate students, their role has been problematized in the literature for their lack of agency within a standardised format of OSCEs that promotes reliability, objectivity and accountability. In this study, we explored SP experiences for tensions that result from simulated assessments and their potential implications for education. Methods Semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven SPs who were also tasked with providing a global mark for students. They were purposively selected to include women and men of different ages, occupation, education and experience as an SP. The interviews were analysed using a critical thematic analysis using a phenomenological approach. Results SP experiences directly addressed tensions and contradictions around OSCEs. SP participants described their experiences under four themes: industrialising, reducing, performativity and patient safety. OSCEs were compared to an industrial process that promoted efficiency but which bore no resemblance to real-life doctor-patient encounters. They were perceived to have a power and agency that reduced SPs to verbalising scripts to ensure that students were exposed to a standardised simulated experience that also underlined the performative role of SPs as props. These performative and reductionist experiences extended to students, for whom the mark sheet acted as a checklist, promoting standardised responses that lacked genuineness. All of this created a tension for SPs in promoting patient safety by ensuring that those medical students who passed were clinically competent. Conclusions OSCEs often form part of high-stakes exams. As such, they are governed by processes of industrialisation, accountability and standardisation. OSCEs possess a power and agency that can have unintended negative consequences. These include ‘conditioning’ students to adopt behaviours that are not suited to real-life clinical encounters and are not person-centred.

Drone Power: Conservation, Humanitarianism, Policing and War

A convergence of four genealogies reveals drone power. Environmentality describes the contradictory uses of drones in conservation. Humanitarianism articulates how control is enacted and challenged in human crises. Securitization examines drones in surveillance and counter-surveillance. Militarization, the use of drones in war, explains domination from above and resistance from below. While theories of governmentality dominate, an emergent materialism within drone studies emphasizes the diffusion of power and agency. A synthesis of drone governmentality and drone materialism exposes four flightways or elemental trajectories. The drone is an existential technology – a tool for enlivenment and senescence. As such, drone power migrates between biopolitics and resistance. In doing so, drone performativity generates assemblages of human and nonhuman actants entangled at material-discursive and onto-epistemological levels. Entrapment designates the consequences of increasing dependency on technologies in sociotechnical systems of life and death.

(a) Rangatahi Project: an exploration of architects and rangatahi collaborating in the design of spaces in order to activate youth agency

<p>Today’s rangatahi (youth) have exhibited a great capacity to address social and environmental issues and propose solutions toward the future of people and the environments we live in. Although society claims to value the wellbeing of rangatahi, there seems to be very marginal space for the voices of youth to be heard. The aim of this project is to explore design processes that redistribute power and agency between architects and rangatahi in a manner that is not extractive, but mutually beneficial. It asks how we can do this in a democratic way; moreover, it explores how to do it in the midst of unprecedented global challenges. With my co-researcher Ellie Tuckey, we concurrently explore our research agendas through our individual conceptual frameworks. My focus is on the agency of rangatahi in the design process and the evolving role that architects have to play in the awhi (care) of this agency. With an emphasis on decolonisation and agency, this thesis takes a methodology inspired by generative design research and cooperative inquiry. This is applied to collaboration with rangatahi at the front end of design processes, fostering collaborative processes that lead to collaborative outcomes. We have undertaken three real-life community ‘incubator’ projects, which explore how spatial understanding can occur earlier in the design process with the aid of immersive tools. Our approach began by first acknowledging rangatahi as experts in their own right, just as architects are experts in spatial design. This thesis explores how communication can be enriched, with a particular focus on collaboration and co-opting emerging design tools such as computer game simulations, virtual reality and video media. This multimedia body of work culminates in an individual thesis, with a collaborative contribution of A Mana ki te Mana Process - one way of engaging with rangatahi through a decolonised lens.</p>

(a) Rangatahi Project: an exploration of architects and rangatahi collaborating in the design of spaces in order to activate youth agency

<p>Today’s rangatahi (youth) have exhibited a great capacity to address social and environmental issues and propose solutions toward the future of people and the environments we live in. Although society claims to value the wellbeing of rangatahi, there seems to be very marginal space for the voices of youth to be heard. The aim of this project is to explore design processes that redistribute power and agency between architects and rangatahi in a manner that is not extractive, but mutually beneficial. It asks how we can do this in a democratic way; moreover, it explores how to do it in the midst of unprecedented global challenges. With my co-researcher Ellie Tuckey, we concurrently explore our research agendas through our individual conceptual frameworks. My focus is on the agency of rangatahi in the design process and the evolving role that architects have to play in the awhi (care) of this agency. With an emphasis on decolonisation and agency, this thesis takes a methodology inspired by generative design research and cooperative inquiry. This is applied to collaboration with rangatahi at the front end of design processes, fostering collaborative processes that lead to collaborative outcomes. We have undertaken three real-life community ‘incubator’ projects, which explore how spatial understanding can occur earlier in the design process with the aid of immersive tools. Our approach began by first acknowledging rangatahi as experts in their own right, just as architects are experts in spatial design. This thesis explores how communication can be enriched, with a particular focus on collaboration and co-opting emerging design tools such as computer game simulations, virtual reality and video media. This multimedia body of work culminates in an individual thesis, with a collaborative contribution of A Mana ki te Mana Process - one way of engaging with rangatahi through a decolonised lens.</p>

A Third Space: Architecture Through a Lens of Decolonisation

<p><b>In Aotearoa New Zealand our history of colonisation means that Western structures imbue all areas of our lives and the world in which we live is based upon Western ideologies. In its many states – buildings, space, process and theory – architecture holds an important role in society as a physical and abstract framework that structures the ways in which we live. Architects have the agency and power to represent identity in built form and this places responsibility on them to ensure that the values and worldviews of others are represented genuinely.</b></p> <p>This thesis explores how architects (particularly Pākehā) can enable Third Space in the design process. Third Space is the culmination of a theoretical framework that examines decolonisation, architecture and identity, and design process. It is a figurative environment in which contributors from different backgrounds can bring forth ideas, values and opinions to be meaningfully discussed and valued. A flexible strategy – informed by ‘a kind of Kaupapa Pākehā way’ and participatory action research methodologies – utilises immersive tools such as PC games, virtual and augmented realities to explore the catalysation of Third Space in three projects. The first two projects resulted in the development of two different PC games that aimed to aid the architect’s collaboration with Christchurch and Kiribati youth respectively. The lessons learnt from these two incubator projects were brought into the third project which explored decolonising education with Ngāti Toa rangatahi.</p> <p>This research found that for meaningful discussion and negotiation to occur in this conceptual Third Space, there needs to be a balance of power and agency between designers and community end-users. It found that high-quality relationships based on the concept of Third Space can be enabled through greater spatial understanding, something that can be supported by visuospatial languages such as computer games and immersive virtual and augmented reality experiences. This is represented in a collaboratively developed process with fellow student Mitra Homolja and called A Mana ki te Mana Process.</p>

A Third Space: Architecture Through a Lens of Decolonisation

<p><b>In Aotearoa New Zealand our history of colonisation means that Western structures imbue all areas of our lives and the world in which we live is based upon Western ideologies. In its many states – buildings, space, process and theory – architecture holds an important role in society as a physical and abstract framework that structures the ways in which we live. Architects have the agency and power to represent identity in built form and this places responsibility on them to ensure that the values and worldviews of others are represented genuinely.</b></p> <p>This thesis explores how architects (particularly Pākehā) can enable Third Space in the design process. Third Space is the culmination of a theoretical framework that examines decolonisation, architecture and identity, and design process. It is a figurative environment in which contributors from different backgrounds can bring forth ideas, values and opinions to be meaningfully discussed and valued. A flexible strategy – informed by ‘a kind of Kaupapa Pākehā way’ and participatory action research methodologies – utilises immersive tools such as PC games, virtual and augmented realities to explore the catalysation of Third Space in three projects. The first two projects resulted in the development of two different PC games that aimed to aid the architect’s collaboration with Christchurch and Kiribati youth respectively. The lessons learnt from these two incubator projects were brought into the third project which explored decolonising education with Ngāti Toa rangatahi.</p> <p>This research found that for meaningful discussion and negotiation to occur in this conceptual Third Space, there needs to be a balance of power and agency between designers and community end-users. It found that high-quality relationships based on the concept of Third Space can be enabled through greater spatial understanding, something that can be supported by visuospatial languages such as computer games and immersive virtual and augmented reality experiences. This is represented in a collaboratively developed process with fellow student Mitra Homolja and called A Mana ki te Mana Process.</p>