Model making for sociolegal research Part 1

In 2016 Kent Law School purchased a Lego set. Curious?

It is commonly reported that we remember just 10 percent of what we hear and 20 percent of what we read, but 80 percent of what we see and do; and that over 80 percent of the information we absorb is visual. 

We intend to use Lego to press ourselves to use that 80 percent. 

Let’s say I am facing a problem in my current research/administration/teaching project, and I want to get the advice of my colleagues. I can build a model for my colleagues of where my project is now, explaining what each piece represents and how it relates to the other pieces. The building process, including the selection of the pieces and where to put them, will force me to think very precisely about my project, but in terms that are still accessible to others. I learn new things about how my project fits together, and I offer a shared point of reference or vocabulary to my colleagues. After some discussion I might be in a position build another model that is closer to where I want my project to be. I may or may not actually get there. But we will all have used more of that 80 percent.

We initiated our Lego set in early July with a drop in session based around this worksheet, which proved to productive, albeit imperfect. 

Comments from participants suggested that the process was 'very useful because it made me think about planning my work in a completely different way, ie 3d and thus it was easier to see the blockages'; and 'creative and fun and oddly comforting' causing me to 'stand back and look at my work more objectively (from outside?). Perhaps that's why I found it calming.'

The contribution of KLS researcher Joanne Permian resulted in this, the first of a series of short films I am making to  demonstrate how 3D model making can facilitate thinking though, and sharing, complex projects and ideas:

Sociolegal model making 1 Decisions from Amanda Perry-Kessaris on Vimeo.

Legal Treasure Tour 2016: an audiovisual essay

Exploring and explaining socio-legal research through pictograms

Material (as opposed to digital) pictograms can be extremely useful for helping a researcher to better understand their own project, and to explain it to someone else. 

In the above image each participant has grabbed a handful of cubes that have pictograms on each surface (here drawn from the games Story Cubes and Nada). They roll them, study them, adjust their location. When they are ready, they tell a story about their research and/or their research process using the pictograms. 

This method is especially powerful in a multidisciplinary context because it bypasses technical terminology, provokes transparency and forms a communal space for ideas. For example, in the video below, Allison Lindner, a Kent Law School PhD candidate, explores her socio-research in a way that has meaning to her, and to students from three other disciplines: management, tourism studies and psychology. The context was a 2016 workshop I ran on Visualising Social Science Research for the University of Kent Graduate School. See here for notes on the 2015 workshop.

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Exploring/explaining socio-legal research in pictograms from Amanda Perry-Kessaris on Vimeo.

Sketchbook as socio-legal research tool

An A3 blank page sketchbook is an excellent tool for organising anything that informs your legal research: typed notes, handwritten notes, images of book covers, sketches, photos of locations or workshops or experiments, ticket stubs, event programmes. Treat it as a living document in which you can capture multiple layers of snapshots of your thinking in time, and which you can use to explain your thinking to others.

Some examples of my own sketchbooks are below. My process is to type up notes, print them out, cut them up and then stick them in a sketchbook interwoven with other material. I often go back and annotate them by hand soon afterwards to note connections. When I later come to write up my research I use stickers (sometimes in coded colours) to indicate important themes or ideas.

 

 

 

  



For an insight into how design students use sketchbooks see this video
Sketchbook Development No2 from tonypritchard on Vimeo.

FATHOM

As part of my MA in Graphic Media Design at London College of Communication I was asked to explore how 'we formulate a critique and articulate a position through design' using the unfamiliar form of a visual essay, specifically by responding to one of three 'source materials' (articles). I chose Max Bruinsma's contribution, entitled 'Watching Formerly Reading', to the ireadwhereiam project.

We used visual tools to analyse the piece as a group. This lead us to focus on Bruinsma’s insight about growing overlap and flattening of hierarchy between watching/reading, and between oversight/insight.


Later I cut up the article, revealing further insights:
We read differently. We process more text. Image has become text.

This linked me back to earlier (2014) ideas I expressed in an article on 'The Case for a visualised economic sociology of legal development' about the fact that we need to explore images/objects, as well as text, if we are to understand econo-legal life. 

Meanwhile I faced Jan Van Toorn’s compelling demand that design ought be content-based, open and dialogic, establishing a conversation into which the audience is empowered to insert itself. So I began a dialogue with academic colleagues, asking them to send me their non-text sources. 

I experimented with them, trying visually to express ‘reading differently’ and ‘processing text’, and to practice semiotic techniques introduced in a lecture by Vanessa Price at London College of Communication. 

This highlighted that crucial marker of worthwhile reading/watching: critical engagement. I found this idea reflected in Bruinsma’s final words: ‘If you really want to fathom something, you will have to watch.’ 

Following a brief, total, loss of direction, I read and watched John Berger (1972/2008) on looking (p.9) and collecting (p. 30), and realised could better ‘fathom’ images I had consciously collected. I settled on images from my research into econo-legal aspects of Cyprus as a British protectorate (1878-1914), colony (1914-1960) and contemporary postcolony, conducted at and around the Centre for Visual Research and Arts (Nicosia).

I experimented with  i'mgoogle.com-inspired format (circular slideshow with sound). It was too closed to be dialogic.  A photo of Nicosia's ‘walk the walled city’ graphic provided the centre for a solution: I set type to reflect its circular path, other images fold out from it, each layout loosely organised by topic (e.g. occupation, development) and visual content. A dialogue opened between walker/reader and images.

The folded format allowed progressive disclosure and low-level interactive dialogue. But the Paris Salon/Warburg-style (Johnson, Undated) layouts were too closed.


My project was rescued when I followed advice to closely read visual relationships between my sources. I eventually fully integrated images within each layout. My visual language (layering, interlocking, echoing) hinted at possible connections and their inherent fragility, and was inspired by the commitment of the Association for Historic Dialogue and Research (Cyprus) to ‘dialogue and multiperspectivity’ in history.



I chose heavy, tactile paper-stock and bolted binding to evoke the impermanence of apparently rigid structures/perspectives. I aimed for Lee’s (2014) calm tone using quiet palette and generous white space. The typeface (Traveling_Typewriter, Carl Krull) echoes British Government papers.

Some elements of the final output are too small/faint, and I am in two minds about whether the images are still (differently) closed.

I plan to produce visual essays in future legal research despite hurdles of copyright costs and inflexible publisher guidelines. The first, 'Valuing collections/Collecting value' appears in the London International Law Review.

Critical statements on all of the projects produced in response to this brief, together with comments on them, can be found on the course blog.

References
Berger, J. (2008, 1972) Ways of Seeing. London: Penguin
Johnson, C. (Undated) Mnemosyne: Meanderings Through Aby Warburg’s Atlas (1924-1929) Available at http://warburg.library.cornell.edu (Accessed 15 December 2015)
Lee, D. (2014) ‘I can't give you an answer as matters stand’ Available at http://dongyounglee.com (Accessed 15 December 2015)
Perry-Kessaris, A. (2014) ‘The case for a visualized economic sociology of legal development’ 67 Current Legal Problems 169-98
Van Toorn, J. (2015) ‘Staging the Message’. Lecture. London College of Communication 25 November 2015