ID: 2144 / 29 SES 08 A JS: 2
29. Research on Arts Education
Paper (Copy for Joint Session)
Alternative EERA Network: 15.
Research Partnerships in Education
Keywords: refugees,
arts-based, social inclusion, place-making
The Art of Belonging: Exploring the Potential of
Cultural Place-Making for Social Inclusion of Young Forced Migrants in Europe
- JS2
Joanna
McIntyre1, Katarina Blennow2,
Sinikka Neuhaus2
1University of Nottingham, United Kingdom; 2Lund
University, Sweden
Presenting Author: McIntyre, Joanna; Blennow, Katarina
With
31 million refugees and asylum seekers recorded mid-2021 (UNHCR, 2021),
forced migration is a global issue with European significance with many young
migrants arriving in cities across Europe. This presentation reports findings
from the Art of Belonging project bringing together city leaders, artists,
and those working with refugee and asylum-seeking young people in schools and
communities in Sweden and England.
The
project aimed to explore how place-making through arts and culture
potentially fosters a sense of engagement, supports inclusion and challenges
dominant discourses of ‘othering’ (Jensen 2011) of the new arrival in their
new context. In part, this comes about through national and local initiatives
to realise young refugees’ rights ‘to participate fully in cultural and
artistic life’ (Tillborg and Ellefsen 2021) along with their peers in their
new context. Thus, in 2015, Culture Ministers across Europe agreed that
culture and the arts have a role to play in the process of integrating
refugees into host societies (McGregor and Ragab 2016).
Our
main research question was ‘How can place-specific arts and cultural
initiatives in our cities help young refugees to develop a sense of
belonging, and increase participation in the civic, social and cultural life
of their new cities.’ In the presentation we also address questions about
enabling factors and barriers to social and cultural participation for young
new arrivals.
We
argue that working with cultural organizations offers opportunities for
examining the potential of the arts for inclusion and social integration of
disenfranchised and ‘othered’ groups such as forced migrants. Art provides a
connection to place, but also provides opportunities for social connections
that enable the formation of a sense of community in a place. In so doing,
participation in arts and cultural activities which acknowledge and build on
the experiences and skills of the new arrivals acknowledges that through the
arts, integration can become a two-way process between the incomer and the
‘host’ community.
Our
conceptual thinking was influenced by Kraftl’s (2020) provocation to focus on
developing inclusive spaces for young people in cities through practices that
enhance recognition, participation, support, and collaboration in order to
develop the social and cultural value of these spaces for those who are
marginalised. Two theoretical framings are central: art as place-making
activity, and cultural capabilities. First, people engage in place-making
through arts and cultural activity, and this brings about increased ‘points
of connection’ (Lankshear and Knobel 2011) to communities and places. Second,
a capabilities approach enables us to focus on ‘What … people really (are)
able to do and what kind of person are they able to be’ in a place (Robeyns
2017, 9). Our intention is to foreground a process of recognition (Honneth
1992) that enhances individuals’ capability and capacity to aspire on an
individual as well as collective level, leading to enhanced experiences of
cultural citizenship for new arrivals and their new communities.
In
each case study city, we draw on the concept of the Cultural Rucksack (CR), a
programme for arts and culture for young people (Christophersen et al 2015)
intended to develop cultural citizenship (UNESCO 2012). Young people are
invited to participate in a variety of activities and metaphorically ‘fill’
the rucksack with place-significant cultural experiences. In our presentation
we explore how we have sought to extend conceptual understanding and
application of the CR concept to support the integration of young forced
migrants within their new urban spaces and create opportunities for dialogue
with local residents. We wanted to explore the extent to which interaction
with the CR led to reciprocal change for the young person, the community and
the arts institutional base of our cities.
Methodology, Methods, Research Instruments or Sources Used
The research uses a two site case-study design.
Each urban context is taken as a single case which explores the problem of
how the municipality, and social actors within the municipality, can develop
means, through art activity, of enabling young migrants and refugees to build
connections with their new place such that they can go on to lead lives of
meaningful engagement in their city. We draw on different methods to answer
the research questions and meet the objectives. These include:
• Desk-based review of research literature and
documents.
• Interviews with municipality leaders (2),
representatives from arts and cultural institutions (4), those supporting new
arrivals within the communities (7) and the refugee participants on the CR programmes
(25).
• Ethnographic study of engagement with the
arts/cultural intervention.
• Action research methodology working with key
stakeholders to adapt the model of the Cultural Rucksack for the specific
needs of refugee and migrant youths.
• Co-creation of both the arts interventions
within the CR and the research instruments with representatives/advocates
from refugee community groups to ensure these are culturally sensitive in
order to engage the young new arrivals
• Comparative case study methods to compare the
experiences and learning across the two sites and identify commonalities,
differences and policy implications.
The data were analysed thematically firstly by
each specific country team and then the two teams came together to undertake
a cross-site comparison of the salient themes in response to the Project’s
main and subsidiary questions.
Conclusions, Expected Outcomes or Findings
We report on the development of a programme of
arts-based place-making activities for forced migrants in two cities in each
context. The specific articulation of the CR programme in terms of arts form,
types of cultural organization, and age of target group differed in each
location allowing for comparison of what is common and what is unique in the
extension of the CR programme for young refugees to inform further roll out
in urban spaces across European cities. Evaluations of the CR programme are
overwhelmingly positive, but there are a number of challenges and criticisms,
most notably the critique of its role as a means of ‘civilizing’ the
population (Bjørnsen 2012), with inherent notions of what counts as art and
what participation looks like (Chrisophersen et al 2015). We explore how in
the application of the CR in this project, city officials and cultural organisations
aimed to intentionally foster new arrivals’ participation in arts activities
as both critical consumer and as producer of arts reflecting elite and common
cultures.
We conclude that the project deepens conceptual
understanding of how arts-based place-making activities contribute to
enhanced social and relational connections between communities in urban
places. Second we found that the activity facilitates young migrants’
place-attachment and integration through cultural participation. Third we
found that across differing European city contexts barriers and enabling
factors to youth participation in arts and cultural activity have a high
degree of commonality such that shared policy solutions can be developed.
The findings from the project contribute to a
shared knowledge platform for cities across Europe to find sustainable
solutions to social integration through arts-based activities that enable all
citizens, including the newly arrived, to contribute to urban societies.
The Art of Belonging project was funded by JPI
Urban Europe, ESRC/AHRC and FORTE
References
Bjørnsen , E. 2012. Norwegian cultural policy—A
civilising mission? The Cultural Rucksack and abstract faith in the
transforming powers of the arts, Poetics, 40, 382-404.
Christophersen, C, Brevik, J. Homme, A.D. &
Rykkja L.H. 2015 The Cultural Rucksack: A National Programme for Arts and
Culture in Norwegian Schools. Norsk kulturråd/Arts Council Norway. Available
at https://www.kulturradet.no/documents/10157/a7464045-2cb6-4988-9948-ffd834508a5d
Habitat III. 2016. The United Nations Conference
on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development. Available at
http://habitat3.org/
Honneth A. 1992 Kampf um Anerkennung. Zur
moralischen Grammatik sozialer Konflikte.Suhrkamp: Frankfurt am Main.
Jensen, S. Q. (2011). Othering, identity formation
and agency. Qualitative Studies, 2(2), 63–78.
https://doi.org/10.7146/qs.v2i2.5510
Kraftl, P. 2020. Including children and young
people in building cities: A provocation paper. British Academy. Available at
https://medium.com/reframing-childhood-past-and-present/including-children-and-young-people-in-building-cities-3964f0c1c832
Lankshear, K., and M. Knobel. 2011. New
Literacies: Everyday Practices and Social Learning. 3rd ed. Maidenhead:
McGraw Hill/OUP.
Lefebvre, H. 1968. Le Droit à la ville [The right
to the city] (2nd ed.). Paris: Anthropos.
McGregor, E. & Ragab, N. 2016. The Role of
Culture and the Arts in the Integration of Refugees and Migrants. European
Expert Network on Culture and Audiovisual. Available at
https://migration.unu.edu/publications/reports/the-role-of-culture-and-the-arts-in-the-integration-of-refugees-and-migrants.html
Robeyns, I.2017. Wellbeing, freedom and social
justice: The capability approach re-examined. Cambridge: Open Book Publishers.
Tillborg, A. & Ellefsen,
L. 2021. Policy and leadership discourses in Sweden’s Art and
Music Schools: the inclusion of refugee children, Music Education Research,
23:3, 348-361.
UNHCR 2022. Refugee Data Finder. Available at
https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/
Intent of Publication
International Journal of Inclusive Education