Materials relating to a participatory evaluation of the Some Cities project, conducted as part of the AHRC-funded Cultural Intermediation project (culturaintermediation.org.uk)

1. Dr. Dave O’Brien
Thinking about Some Cities

2.  ‘ultimately at times you delude yourself
about working collaboratively, you’re the
one selecting which images they take or
whatever, put into a sequence and you’re
still the main photographer and taking
the credit for that….’

3. What is evaluation?
 Evaluation uses a range of research methods to systematically
investigate the effectiveness of policy interventions, implementation and
processes, and to determine their merit, worth, or value in terms of
improving the social and economic conditions of different stakeholders.
Policy evaluation uses quantitative and qualitative methods, experimental
and non-experimental designs, descriptive and experiential methods,
theory based approaches, research synthesis methods, and economic
evaluation methods. Policy evaluation for government privileges no
single method of inquiry and acknowledges the complementary
potential of different research methods. (Magenta Book
http://www.nationalschool.gov.uk/policyhub/evaluating_policy/magenta
_book/chapter1.asp)

4. What is Some Cities?
 Website
 Archive
 Talks/events
 Training courses
 Commissions
 Project leader’s practice
 ‘the unforeseeable and imagined activities’

5. What is Some Cities?
 Role of the University
 As researcher
 As funder
 Role of the Council
 Funder
 Contact and support
 Role of ACE
 Similar to BCC, but more distant relationship
 Role of local media
 Crucial to publicising the project
 Role of local arts organisations

6. The evaluation
 Influence of wider Connected Communities
programme…
 ….along with critiques of evaluation methods for
community and participatory projects…
 …and use of innovative methods e.g. walking and
visual methods in the overall project

7. The process
 Stage one: recruitment and introduction to
evaluation (N= 10, final N=4)
 Stage two: gathering data and work with Some
Cities
 Stage three: follow up interviews (N=5)
 Stage four: Cultural Intermediation commissions

8. What we hoped for
 Collect people’s stories about Some Cities
 Based on questions you’re interested in
 DO play around with the recorder
 DO think of your own questions
 DO email and talk to us and each other
 DON’T do lots of work! You’ve been kind enough
to volunteer as part of Some Cities

9. Some suggested questions
 Can you tell me about the project you’re involved
in?
 How did you get involved in the project?
 What sorts of activities have you been doing?
 What has happened to you as part of the project?

10. Initial comments: a successful
project!
 ‘I find it really enjoyable, the whole journey, the
lectures that we had were quite cool as I learnt
some new stuff, even though I did an A-Level in
photography’.
 ‘its been really fun’
 ‘im really happy with everything that its taught
me so far, I’m over the moon with the media
response, the way people across Birmingham
have taken to the project have got behind it and
understood it.’

11. Social impact
 All participants stressed social aspects of the courses
 ‘its been great to meet everybody….its the social aspect of
it…it seems a shame as we’ve just come to the end and you’re
comfortable now and you want to carry on’
 ‘it created a bit of a bond with me and one of the other
students who was going through the same process, so
afterwards we went for a drink to celebrate….there’s a lot to
it’
 ‘the sharing, the understanding of the basics, the being
confident, that all came with the course and I tried to apply
that, that came through the sharing, it came through the
listening and learning, and I tried to apply that to my own
project….and I still do’

12. The idea of confidence
 Common to arts projects and reflected in Some Cities
 ‘I’ve learned to trust my camera more, I've given it a
name…and I feel more confident going out, composing
shots and understanding the basics of digital
photography’.
 ‘if it wasn’t for my camera, and getting to know the
community and getting involved in the community here
as a committee member I probably would have had
another celebration where id stayed in my flat and kept
away from it all. Its sort of given me confidence getting
involved in the community and getting my camera to get
out and about’

13. Technical expertise
 ‘I tried to haggle, a flea market in Paris….and it
sounded alright but when I asked him how much
he wanted, he wanted 80 euros, and I just said to
him no and I don’t think he realised that I knew
what I was trying to look for’
 ‘it’s a humbling experience and quite an eye
opener, because of, really made me realise
there's a lot of technical ability , probably sounds
a bit arrogant, but I thought photography was
quite easy!’

14. Birmingham
 ‘I found some cities was all of a sudden lots of people
being interested in Birmingham and I wanted to be
part of it’
 ‘I’m proud of what they (some cities) are doing. They
are making Birmingham start to stand out, we need
that, We get a lot of stuck us brummies do, especially
for our accent’
 ‘the project has civic pride running through its blood’
 ‘so many things I’ve missed in the city I’ve lived in all
my life and even now keep noticing new things,
thinking oh god I’ve never seen that before’

15. Balsall Heath
 Secondary site as compared to ‘Birmingham’
 But all of the participants experienced a
relationship to it
 ‘I used to think it was a bit of a dump….it was
only until I got out of my car and started going
there that I thought what a fascinating place,
place where we’re doing the course, that building’
 Impact of the archive and website

16. Identity work
 Participants’ assignments were all personal
 One based on journey to work
 One based on walking and making connections
by talking
 ‘showing how everyone's united in the
community…I thought that was quite important
to show how different cultures and diversities of
people are all coming together’.

17. What is evaluation: A personal
narrative
 Diary keeping
 Self interviews
 Importance of identity work and social isolation
 ‘it created a bit of a bond with me and one of the
other students who was going through the same
process, so afterwards we went for a drink to
celebrate….there’s a lot to it’
 Gender important here too (esp. introspection
and its relationship to taste and cultural activity)

18. What is evaluation: A research
project
 Evaluation asked research questions…
 …of both self, other participants and the project
managers
 ‘are you saying that there’s some trust that’s
been built up with the some cities project…some
trust and actually you are inspiring people in the
way that you wanted to inspire them?’

19. What is evaluation: A record
 Evaluation recorded the practice of developing
film
 Place crucial as the project was the darkroom
 Stress on project as the process of attendence
and learning
 ‘that’s the only problem with learning is the cost,
especially when there’s waste’
 ‘I think we need to put the kettle back on really’

20. Everyday participation
 Everyday cultural practices key to understanding
social world
 Sociological aspects to the narratives: Gender,
Ethnicity, Class and Age all important
 Photography as both an elite, a ‘middlebrow’ and
a democratic medium
 Forms of cultural competence in the interviews
and recordings- all very different for each
participant

21. Some Cities and Cultural
Intermediation
 For Bourdieu Cultural Intermediaries were about
connecting and transmitting ‘legitimate’ forms of culture
 In Some Cities we find a different role
 Challenge to aesthetic hierarchy….but a controlled one
 Intermediation focused on connecting idea of Birmingham
to the cultural practices of the city
 Aesthetics
 Archives
 Personal narratives
 Civic pride

22. Limitations and next steps
 Cultural Intermediation commissions in Salford
and Birmingham
 ‘you’ve not to tell people what to take, but to give
them some direction’
 Importance of age and technology
 Power and the limits of participation
 Expertise and validation
 Evaluation vs. recording and the need for
numbers

23.  Academic Partnerships: what are the benefits?
What are the risks? How do they emerge and
develop and how can they be sustained?
 Evaluation: are there circumstances where we
would never evaluate practice? Is it possible to
balance the needs of funders and practice within
existing approaches to evaluation? What does
this tell us about the appropriateness of different
measures to capture the value of the work
undertaken?