Performance as Research Working Group 

D  R  A  F  T

Notes from the Performance as Research working group meeting (closing session) in Hyderabad on Wednesday 8th July 2015

Questions for the group – final session (by Emma)

How sub groups worked this year? How time dedicated to papers worked?

Any other ideas of developing the group for next year?

How to become more inclusive of those members who can’t be there for various reasons at the same time as valuing the physical meeting each year e.g. can the group can work year round? Ongoing exchanges, reflecting on research through website etc.

Call for Stockholm – will we develop our own call arising from issues explored in the WG in Hyderabad? Or respond to the Stockholm conference call? (the panel must respond to the call next year but I think the WG meeting do not have to)

Themes of interest discussed by Jonny and I – sustainable knowledge, pedagogies of PaR – also supporting the alternative conference dinner!

Points brought up during the closing session and previous sessions

(compiled by AA):

- Emma’s suggestions of topics for discussion was read (see above) and the strong presence of Emma at the meeting was mentioned, “she always had a voice when some people present did not always have that”

- The need to have at least two of the conveners present at each conference was voiced

- “Why did we not utilize the last time slot available?” A planning mistake, the conveners thought that it would not be needed. Something to remember for next time: there is never too much time for discussion

- “Why did we not have a shared dinner this time?” A planning mistake to be remedied next time in Stockholm (Myer and Jonmichael will form a dinner planning sub-group)

- Importance of the practical work was emphasized, and the need for enough time for that. The wide range of possible ways of giving instructions or guiding a workshop was mentioned.

- Preparing for the workshops in the subgroups was important and could be developed even further, perhaps extended over a longer period. 

- Possibility to express interest and choose subgroup based on the papers was an improvement

- The discussion of papers should be developed, for instance by connecting the discussion in pairs to the relationship between the paper and the workshop

- Important to discuss both a) how to share and articulate PAR in the moment, in action and b) how to write about par and in other ways document and reflect it 

- The experiment from Lissabon was brought up, with the assignment of three different roles for each exercise or workshop – a) participant, b) observer, c) documenter – and then the possibility of shifting these roles or ways of engaging in the next exercise.

- It would be interesting to hear and read stories about how the subgroups approached the task of creating workshops based on the papers

- Besides the pre-conference work some form of post-conference discussion could take place on icohere. (AA will create a discussion on icohere for post-conference reflections)

- The role of the open panel was discussed and a need to avoid the dichotomy into a traditional “serious” panel, as opposed to the rest of the sessions was brought up. The decision was to treat the open panel as a subgroup next time, so the panelists could share their papers and plan together how to create the session.

- The possibility to propose joint papers was mentioned, as another form of possible collaboration.

- The possibility of using a google hangout screen or wiki-conferencing or the like to enable participation from a distance was discussed and various views on this expressed.

- The possibility of being included in the preproduction phase even if one cannot participate in the conference was discussed (based on the good experience with Emma in one of the subgroups)

- Laurelann Porter showed a documentation of the first half of the workshop on Monday. The various uses of documentation were mentioned (as notes for ourselves, as presentation to the public and so on). Documentation related to publications, documentation as a practice was discussed (also in previous sessions) including the critique of excess documentation. Ideally documentation produced by several people from the same event could show the diversity of experiences and interpretations.

- The need for proceedings was mentioned, since E & I will explicitly not be proceedings, and will in any case not be published each year. AA will compile the proceedings from this year together with Manola.

- The importance of having one site connecting all working group sites and publications was noted. The working group page on the IFTR site is used for that, with links to icohere, I& E publications, the proceedings and so on.

- The possibility of organizing a preconference meeting for one day in Stockholm was mentioned.

- The possibility to discuss older ‘meta’-texts related to PAR, by the members of the working group to begin with, was mentioned during the previous meeting. AA started a discussion on icohere for this, uploading a paper (and Ben Spatz already joined in from a distance). 

- A possible theme for Stockholm was not discussed, yet…

- An extra meeting on Friday afternoon was agreed upon, to hear news from the conveners meeting and to explore the possibilities of using icohere more actively

Decisions and action points:

- Laureann Porter will join Juan in the digital group, since James Wilson wants to step down

- Manola K. Gayatri will join AA to create proceedings from the meeting in Hyderabad

- Myer Taub and Jonmichael Rossi will plan for an alternative dinner or a working group dinner in Stockholm

- The open panel will be treated as a subgroup next year, so it can be planned as a session including sharing the papers in advance 

- The IFTR site will be used as a page for links to other working group sites like E&I, icohere and possibly the RC

- Members will be encouraged to upload their ‘meta’-texts on PAR on icohere

- AA will create a discussion folder on icohere to include reflections on the Hyderabad experience

Reflecting on PaR Working Group in Hyderabade, India and Ways forward for the Working Group

(Johnmichael Rossi)

Re: Sub-Groups

The ability to have voice on the forming of sub-groups was a positive aspect of this year’s conference, and I would suggest that core/returning group members have even more agency in the forming of sub-groups for next year’s conference. For example, if there are group members who wish to collaborate together (due to overlaps in research and common interests), perhaps group abstracts can be submitted in advance of the call. These abstracts would help determine the strands of research/sub-topics for the open call, which would allow new members to be integrated into the group as their submissions would then be able to attach themselves to an established sub-group. 

Re: Devoting time to discussing the papers

The time devoted to the discussions of papers, was also a positive addition. I found this really helpful and effective. I would suggest that we keep this component, but rather than splitting the practice and the paper discussion, that they be joined. This year, Sub-Groups 1 and 2 presented practice on Monday and discussed the papers on Tuesday. I would suggest Sub-Group 1 presented practice and discussed papers on Monday, and then Sub-Group on Tuesday, or something of this kind.

Re: Structure of the Week 

Overall, we were crunched for time with both the practice presentations and paper discussions (as well as the General Panel). This was surprising because we were a significantly smaller group in comparison to previous years. We even collectively decided to add a session on Friday to debrief, and talk through end of conference logistics. 

The allotment of time for PaR needs to be reconsidered. I am aware that other Working Groups did not make use of all of the timetabled sessions, but perhaps this is where the nature of what we do in PaR is quite different from most other groups. Even the assigning of space, was something that needed to be adjusted at the last minute, as we were not initially scheduled to be in a Studio space, but rather a classroom with an unleveled floor and a clutter of desks (not conducive to what we do in our meetings). The conference was quite helpful and positive about relocating us and provided us with transportation. But in moving forward, how can we make the nature of our group more clear to the larger organizing body to avoid these hiccups?

It was suggested that we might gather at the site of the conference 1 or 2 days prior to the start of the conference to get started on things sooner. This would take some coordination, and may have funding implications for some members, but most were positive about the idea of gathering in Stockholm prior to the start of the conference.

Also, on the conference schedule, there was ambiguity around which sessions for our Working Group were open, and which were closed. Our first session on Monday, which was a business meeting to discuss logstics, plans, methods of communication, publications in progress, experienced a number of curious delegates slipping in throughout the meeting. Delegates also attended the paper discussions, but since the papers were distributed amongst the group, and not being read, this complicated attendees abilities to participate in the discussion. The General Panel was not as well attended as in previous years, and this would have been the most appropriate panel for general attendees. It was suggested that we might also identify a specific workshop session as open to the public, as again, it gets a bit confusing/overwhelming to have delegates coming and goung from a workshop environment. I recall presenting my workshop in Barcelona, which was open, and I was not prepared for the number of people who came to participate.

It was also discussed that perhaps a different format for the workshops be considered. That members are split in 3 roles for each workshop: Facilitator—Participant—Observer (and also documentation maybe a fourth role, or combine with Observer). These roles (for example if there were three groups) might be cycled through.

It was also discussed that the General Panel might be approached more non-traditionally; i.e. group papers, performance presentations, etc.

Re: Collaboration with other Working Groups

Since the Warwick conference, there has been ongoing discussion around the possibility of our group collaborating with another working group, particularly the Queer Futures (though I have also been told informally that the Intermediality Group, the Performance and Religion Group, amongst others has also expressed an interest in collaborating with us). None of this has come to fruition, and the crunch in scheduled Working Group time raises some concern. 

Annette has suggested that we would perhaps propose a an additional panel that would then allow for a collaboration of this sort to happen, as to not cut away from either group’s allotted time. 

For me, one of the interesting things about our group, is that we are bound together by methodology, moreso than content areas. There always other working groups that are of interest to me based on their content area, but I continue to commit my efforts to this working group because the spaces to discuss deeply the nature of practice-led research are quite limited; far and few between.

I think that it is flattering that several working groups want to work with us. However, I am a bit skeptical, as none of these other working groups have attended any of our open sessions or general panel (this may be due to scheduling). I think that as a group, we have difficulty in grappling with what it is we do, how and why to document it, how to articulate, how to validate it; to bring another set group of scholars who perhaps look at work from a specific or refined lens; and who are not privy to our ongoing discussion; will this be helpful to our progress. I am merely playing devil’s advocate here. I am quite fond of the folks who have expressed interest in collaborating, but as noted in earlier notes, collaboration requires an ongoing negotiation on how to proceed, and I think a working collaboration will take a great deal of nuance and thought.

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