{"id":733,"date":"2013-10-23T14:41:36","date_gmt":"2013-10-23T14:41:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/?p=733"},"modified":"2013-11-13T17:31:28","modified_gmt":"2013-11-13T17:31:28","slug":"how-to-lose-publics-and-alienate-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/archives\/733","title":{"rendered":"How to lose publics and alienate people"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_736\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-736\" style=\"width: 99px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/weblab-data\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Emily_D-99x150.jpg\" alt=\"Dr Emily Dawson, King&#039;s College London\" width=\"99\" height=\"150\" class=\"size-thumbnail wp-image-736\" srcset=\"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/weblab-data\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Emily_D-99x150.jpg 99w, https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/weblab-data\/uploads\/2013\/10\/Emily_D.jpg 146w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 99px) 100vw, 99px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-736\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dr Emily Dawson, King's College London<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><strong>Social exclusion in public engagement with science<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>On Monday last week I gave a presentation as part of the \u2018Engaging Research\u2019 seminar series being run at the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\">Open University<\/a> (as you might have guessed since this is their blog!)\u00a0 The seminar series runs in conjunction with two RCUK-funded projects: '<a href=\"http:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/?page_id=173\" target=\"_blank\">An open research university<\/a>'; and '<a href=\"http:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/engaging-opportunities\" target=\"_blank\">Engaging opportunities<\/a>'.<\/p>\n<p>My <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kcl.ac.uk\/sspp\/departments\/education\/people\/academic\/Dawson,-Emily.aspx\" target=\"_blank\">research interests<\/a> are around who \u2018counts\u2019 as a public for so called \u2018public\u2019 engagement and how do engagement practices contribute to the exclusion of certain groups.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>My research asks questions like these:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Who is public engagement with science (PES) for?<\/li>\n<li>Whose stories, culture and communities are represented through public engagement with science?<\/li>\n<li>When we think about and write about understanding science as part of culture, or indeed, work towards mainstreaming science \u2018as culture\u2019 through our science engagement, communication, policy and education projects, whose culture is privileged?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Put another way, what might it feel like to be \u2018othered\u2019 by public engagement with science?\u00a0 For example, we know from an analysis of the UK <a href=\"http:\/\/www.wellcome.ac.uk\/stellent\/groups\/corporatesite\/@msh_peda\/documents\/web_document\/wtp040860.pdf \" target=\"_blank\">science education community<\/a>\u00a0that informal science learning opportunities tend to cluster around certain audiences, namely those who are already more socially advantaged. So what about everyone else?<\/p>\n<p>I used an analysis of some research I\u2019d carried out with community groups in London to try and explain how I thought exclusion manifested through engagement practices. I focused on the kinds of public engagement with science offered by science museums and science centres. I was trying to apply ideas from critical pedagogy (for example, the work of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.education.miami.edu\/ep\/contemporaryed\/bell_hooks\/bell_hooks.html\" target=\"_blank\">bell hooks<\/a>, which always reminds me to think beyond learning and take power into account) to learning and engagement.<\/p>\n<p>See what you think \u2013 the video is below. And if you haven\u2019t got time to watch the whole thing, the session abstract is below too.<\/p>\n<p>[youtube http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/WNX4JHdXPaw]<\/p>\n<p>Let me know what you think on Twitter at @emilyadawson<\/p>\n<p><strong>How to lose publics and alienate people: Social exclusion in public engagement with science<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Concerns about participation in science engagement, communication and education have typically been framed in terms of \u2018barriers\u2019 to participation. Such barriers include cost, location and interest in science. \u00a0Doubtless barriers affect participation, but by foregrounding a focus on single barriers, questions of complexity, power, dominance and domination recede into the background. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This paper explores the question of exclusion and non-participation in one area of science engagement; informal science learning. \u00a0Informal science learning environments (ISLEs) such as science museums, science centres, zoos, botanic gardens, aquaria and science festivals are significant features in the science communication and engagement landscape. \u00a0Not everyone, however, may perceive ISLEs as offering valuable experiences and not all visitors may experience the same benefits. \u00a0Instead, as I argue in this paper, attitudes towards and experiences of ISLES may differ in ways that are inequitable and, as this study suggests, marked by social positions such as ethnicity and class. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Drawing on research with four community groups and their visits to three different ISLEs, this paper uses theoretical concepts from Bourdieu to examine how social exclusion and non-participation happens in practice during ISLE visits.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Social exclusion in public engagement with science On Monday last week I gave a presentation as part of the \u2018Engaging Research\u2019 seminar series being run at the Open University (as you might have guessed since this is their blog!)\u00a0 The seminar series runs in conjunction with two RCUK-funded projects: 'An open research university'; and 'Engaging <a class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/archives\/733\">...continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[10,14,17,29,33,35],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=733"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1130,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733\/revisions\/1130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weblab.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/per\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}