Board games for participatory research
Board games for participatory research
Board games for participatory research
By Pablo De La Cruz
March 10, 2021
Summary
In 2015 we carried out an experimental ethnography using a board game in a participatory research in Tarapacá in the Colombian Amazon.
With the board game, new variables of analysis emerged, such as intra-community redistribution, sufficiency, and seasonality of planting and harvesting, which transformed the initial hypothesis and explain the low level of sales of chagra products by indigenous peoples and the lack of a permanent marketplace.
The idea of carrying out an experimental ethnography using a board game as part of participatory research was a response to criticism by the indigenous peoples, that research results often do not have a significant positive impact on their territories.
As a research practice that involves embedded, embodied, sensorial, empathetic learning - through sensorial means such as games - that transcends a simple combination of participation and observation.
For us, the key to experimental ethnographies through board games is the ability of such games to represent the decisions of the actors and catalyse cultural performances which make evident the players' meaningful contexts.
Actions of cultivating and food processing are carried out on the game board of each player, and those regarding sales are carried out individually on a single collective game board, where purchase-sale prices are modified as the products are offered by each player in the various sales points.
The Game of Chagras allowed participants to compare and contrast different types of game strategies, and comprehending the pertinence of games in both experimental and participatory research methods.
If the game did not place any limit in UE on harvesting their entire crop and selling all products, what was establishing that limit? Analysis of dialogues during and after game sessions elucidated that seasonality of planting and harvesting different species, and the idea of sufficiency is closely related with chagra management.
The experimental nature of the game lay not only in the possibility of repeating controlled sessions, but also in allowing players to suggest changes to the game rules.
In Amazonia, he has integrated participatory research with the design and implementation of socioecological board games to promote local common agreements for the sustainable use of natural resources.
Reference
de la Cruz, P. (2021, May 10). Board games for participatory research. Retrieved June 18, 2021, from https://www.ludogogy.co.uk/article/board-games-for-participatory-research/