PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH
It seemed natural to me, as a designer, collaborator and educator, that my research needed to be active, productive and include participants. This is partly because I felt my intervention needed to be tested by, reflected on and rebuilt with the students and staff who might use it if it was to be effective. It turns out that this is Participatory Action Research
” an approach to research that prioritises the value of experiential knowledge for tackling problems caused by unequal and harmful social systems, and for envisioning and implementing alternatives. PAR involves the participation and leadership of those people experiencing issues, who take action to produce emancipatory social change” ( Cornish, F., Breton, N., Moreno-Tabarez, U. et al. 2023)
Having gone through this process I still feel very much a work in progress as a researcher, developing an understanding of the pitfalls around this way of working ( mainly by falling into them). As Caroline Lenette observes:
” there is no point in producing research that has no bearing whatsoever on the lives of people at the centre of the research, or that is not based on the perspectives and the needs that are identified by co-researchers, in my view. ” ( Lenette 2024)
This post describes and reflects on the methods I used throughout my process to gain insight and feedback from my generous and patient participants, who I owe a big debt of gratitude to.
INTERVIEW WITH ALEX BULMER : 14th November 2025
” yeah, the ..how hard it is to imagine yourself doing something in a role if you have never witnessed it, experienced it , you know, which is another reason why representation is so important.. its much easier to imagine becoming something if you have seen it exist already” (Bulmer 2025)
Alex is a writer, director and performer who is named one of the most influential disabled artists by UK’s Power Magazine.They have over thirty professional years’ experience across theatre, film, radio and education and I was lucky enough to work with them in a production of “Don’t Look Now” in 2025. You can find out more about them HERE. It was key for me that I would be able to consult with someone who had lived experience of disability in performance. I wanted to know whether Alex saw a need increased representation and therefore this kind of intervention, and had any thoughts on the ways that our students might best work with actors who are disabled.
We met on zoom after an email exchange which established consent and contained the information sheet and questions ( see blog post ARP – Participant facing Documents) . I invited them to add any questions, which they did. The intention was to have a collaborative,free-ranging discussion that allowed other thoughts and questions to arise without trespassing to much on Alex’s time. Zoom’s time limit helped with that and I could also record the meeting within the platform.
The interview itself proceeded well, though I realise on reflection that I had a preconceived sense of what I was hoping to hear. In fact, the conversation inspired thoughts about future sessions with Alex talking directly to the students about their experience with designers
” think about how clothing can impact a person’s mobility, how clothing can get caught in a wheel of a wheel chair, um, but I think asking and seeing if you can set up conversations.. early is the number one – I think that’s your number one best practice..” ( Bulmer 2025)
and the need for UAL to acknowledge potential barriers to training for people with disabilities.
” I can’t help but wonder why are there so few disabled people in the programme or in the discipline and can that question start to be asked and really seriously you know, dug into .. um ..because there’s probably a whole lot of reasons including hidden barriers, systemic barriers, maybe not so hidden” ( Bulmer 2025)
Ultimately, my questions led to an interesting conversation that we both enjoyed very much. However, they were not focussed enough on my research question to offer more than broad reassurance that my aim was worthwhile. I didn’t want to ask leading questions, but think I ended up over compensating! It did however, reinforce for me the need for better representation in general and at UAL and ongoing discussions with actors with disabilities for which our students should prepare. The resource could be a starting point for this process. Alex signed off with this email:
“I’d welcome an opportunity to come in, funding dependent, thank you. First step for better representation and inclusion of Disabled students/people is to lift the lid and start talking with us. You just did that! Bravo“ ( Bulmer 2025)
On starting to analyse the exchange in more detail, I realised that I had not recorded a transcription, despite trying to learn from my first workshop ( details below) . I ended up writing up the audio as I went. Although this was time consuming, it did mean that I listened very carefully! In future, it would be interesting to decode physical cue’s from the video, and I would consult more widely on the questions. It would also be interesting to contrast this experience with an in-person exchange. The timing of this interview wasn’t quite where I hoped it would be, earlier in the process, due to Alex’s availability
WORKSHOPS
My intention is to create a resource that can be used as part of any workshop or lesson, including those where inclusion is not necessarily the focus of the whole session. My ambition is that this kind if material becomes the default, normalising the use of diverse reference rather than limiting its use to lessons labelled inclusive. I planned to road test it within two scheduled sessions with 1st year BA students who I teach regularly on the Costume for Performance course, to gather feedback from the students. All participants signed consent forms after reading the information sheet and discussing the research and it’s purpose with me.
Iteration one – October 14th, 2025
In this workshop the aim of the session was to look at character creation, working with a garment of their own as a catalyst. After a process of personifying their garment in different ways (through peer interactions and free writing) the students made drawings of their garment as a character, firstly with no reference and then secondly using a fair figure reference library model as their performer. We then gathered together and we discussed the two interpretations, and I recorded audio of the conversation.
I felt that I was in danger of leading the discussion and it was difficult to know how far I could encourage response as they were initially reluctant to speak. I was particularly aware of the potential for participant bias ( Nikolopoulou 2022) ) to operate in this situation. I hoped to mitigate that to some degree as I am quite familiar with this group, and although clear about all aspects of data collection I tried to choose methods that felt low-key and reflected our normal exchanges.
- Audio feedback :
Using my phone, I recorded our discussion with the video function ( camera pointed at the ceiling) as in pressure of the classroom I forgot how to record voice memo’s! I would definitely use a different platform for recording next time that guaranteed a higher quality of audio. I might consider asking the student to speak into a microphone but at the time I felt that would make them self-conscious. I also had the some challenges around transcribing what was said. I played the piece through a TEAMS meeting with the live transcribe facility, but the accuracy of word capture was very patchy particularly on quieter parts of the recording .I reflected on a deaf or blind students experience relying on these tools and having similar struggles. Other apps like Speechify weren’t available on UAL machines so I decided to type it up myself.
While frustrating, this probably made for closer listening and a deeper familiarisation with the material, essential for thematic analysis ( Braun and Clarke 2006) I thought it would make them feel more self aware to video them, but it would have been interesting to record their physical reactions – nods etc.
- Photographing the session:
I initially wanted a basic record of the students interacting with the images but I think that given more time, it would be interesting to use this record to capture the physical interaction that students might have with the images for analysis. This might lead to thoughts on the images tactility or scale, the quality and layout. For example, I am planning to laminate the images which makes them more rigid and better able to be propped up.
- Photographing of the participant’s work:
As the student’s drawings are the main site of the intervention, these were key artefacts and I decided to record their initial drawings, their reference body and the second outcome so that they might be easily compared.
