Methods in Dialogue: Researching Place
Date: Wednesday 14 October 2009, University of Manchester
Workshop summary
In our Methods in Dialogue workshops, three speakers each introduce the different methodological approach they have taken to researching a particular topic, in this case, place. This is followed by by discussion and debate from participants, exploring the distinctive research questions, practices, insights and types of knowledge claim that different methodological approaches to researching a topic can offer.
In this workshop we had presentations from:
- Penny Harvey and Hannah Knox on an anthropological approach to the ethnography of place
- Dimitris Ballas on human area cartograms
- Andrew Karvonen on a sociotechnical approach to interpreting cities
'Delivering social change: an anthropological approach to the ethnography of place'
Penny Harvey and Hannah Knox (Social Anthropology/CRESC, University of Manchester)
This paper describes a collaborative research project which explored the promise of roads to deliver social change. The research team chose to focus ethnographically on two specific road building projects in Peru, looking in detail at what we termed 'the politics of knowledge' in the construction process and in the everyday relations along the roads in question.
To reference this presentation: Harvey, P. and Knox, H. (2009) Methods in Dialogue: Researching Place 'Delivering social change: an anthropological approach to the ethnography of place' 14 October 2009, University of Manchester. Available from: www.manchester.ac.uk/realities/events/dialogue/place/
About the speakers
Penny Harvey is a Professor in Social Anthropology at the University of Manchester. View Penny Harvey's web page (link opens in new window) for more details.
Hannah Knox is a Research Associate at the ESRC Centre Research for Socio-Cultural Change at the University of Manchester. View Hannah Knox's web page (link opens in new window) for more details.
'Innovative ways of mapping data about places'
Dimitris Ballas (Geography, University of Sheffield)
This presentation introduced the idea of visualising society using human area population cartograms. 
In particular, it discusses equal area cartogram methods (also known as density-equalising maps), which typically re-size each area according the variable being mapped. It also shows how such methods can be used to create maps of the world, with each country re-sized and re-shaped according to a particular variable (e.g. size of the population, number of people living on up to $1US per day, long term unemployment rates etc).
Dimitris gave some links to software for producing cartograms and other electronic resources as part of his presentation:
- Scapetoad (link opens in new window)
- Cartogram Generator (link opens in new window)
- Worldmapper (link opens in new window)
- People-powered maps (link opens in new window)
To reference this presentation: Ballas, D. (2009) Methods in Dialogue: Researching Place 'Mapping data about places' 14 October 2009, University of Manchester. Available from: www.manchester.ac.uk/realities/events/dialogue/place
About the speaker
Dimitris Ballas is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Geography at the University of Sheffield. View Dimitris Ballas' web page (link opens in new window) for more details.
'Urban Mess and the Relational City'
Andrew Karvonen (MARC, University of Manchester)
This presentation draws on recent scholarship in human geography, urban planning, architecture and the interdisciplinary field of Science and Technology Studies to describe an emerging methodological approach that interprets cities as sociotechnical ensembles.
This approach embraces the messiness of cities by focusing on the fluid interactions between humans, nature, and technology that ultimately produce the urban environments we experience on a daily basis. Studying the interwined character of social and material elements through a sociotechnical lens presents significant methodological challenges to qualitative researchers but also has the potential to reveal the vitality and realness of the contemporary urban condition and to imagine different future conditions.
Play presentation (presentation opens in new window)
To reference this presentation: Karvonen, A. (2009) Methods in Dialogue: Researching Place 'Urban Mess and the Relational City' 14 October 2009, University of Manchester. Available from: www.manchester.ac.uk/realities/events/dialogue/place/
About the speaker
Andrew Karvonen is the Walsingham Capper Research Associate in the Manchester Architecture Research Centre at the University of Manchester. View Andrew Karvonen's (link opens in new window)website for more details.