Community consultations through participatory practice: the ‘Evaluative Performance’

Description

Recent developments such as the global pandemic, gender violence, Black Lives Matter, and not least the climate crisis, have accelerated the search for participatory methods of engagement, participation, and impact across a number of research disciplines. Within these disciplines, citizen voice and lived experience are sought to deepen understanding behind behavioural change as a result of policy or project intervention strategies. Within this there are limitations, for example, the UK Civil Service in 2021 recognises that ‘most policymakers do not consistently have the skills, incentives, or infrastructure to find new evidence about citizens’. It is also argued that policy solutions are too often based on stakeholder opinion, and rarely are the voices and experiences of citizens used to evidence policymaking. In this talk, I will explore examples of ‘Evaluative Performance’, an innovative research approach that responds to these issues by combining headphone verbatim theatre (HVT) arts practice and social science evaluation frameworks. Evaluative Performance is a method of data gathering that involves a performance created solely from the words spoken by interview participants, combined with a post-performance contextual discussion. Through video examples, I will argue that the use of Evaluative Performance as an approach creates a much more direct, empathetic, connection between the audience and the contents of the citizen interviews. Audiences will gain insight into this method and approach, and its value to policymaking through four separate case studies, in contrasting sectors. First, exploring citizens expressions of civic pride during Coventry UK City of Culture 2021, second, a study into youth perspectives of Smart Local Energy Systems through community consultation, third, an exploration of Coventry Biennial, a visual art Biennial in the UK, and fourth, explorations of crime and anti-social behaviour policy interventions at Reading Festival 2000-2024.

Period	21 May 2025
Event title	Dialogues - Culture and Creativity Policy Network (CCPN)
Event type	Seminar
Conference number	1
Location	Southampton, United KingdomShow on map
Degree of Recognition	National