Co-creative methods for practicing care-full scholarship (Sergio Ruiz Cayuela)

Speaker: Dr Sergio Ruiz Cayuela

In this featured publication from the 'co-creativity and engaged scholarship collection' Ruiz Cayuela and Armiero emphasise the significance of positionality in research and the need for conducting research in a way which directly challenges, rather than reinforces, imbalances in power. They consider their own positionality as militant researchers and the foundation that ‘all knowledge production is partisan’. Having explained why it is essential that academic research challenges the homogenising discourses of the elite, they then proceed to focus on the power of narrative and its potential for supporting more inclusive, transformative, and counter-hegemonic practices of research and knowledge exchange. They dedicate the remainder of the chapter to introducing and reviewing the use of guerrilla narrative as a mechanism for undermining the grip of capitalism by spreading ‘commoning subjectivities’ within marginalised communities. In doing so they offer a range of illustrations from their work with Co-operation Birmingham, a mutual aid organisation located in the West Midlands of the UK.