Talk given to Pararchive Conference Leeds March 2015 on the the Participatory Curation model Aggregate then Curate and what we learnt about digital story telling using social media in the MOSI-ALONG Ambient Learning City Project

1. Aggregate then Curate
#Pararchive Leeds University 2015
Fred Garnett Drew Whitworth

2. Participatory Curation
a model for integrating curation and
the story-telling of communities
“MOSI-ALONG; personal narratives
about economic history in Manchester
during a recession using
#socialmedia”
@fredgarnett @drewwhitworth1
Pararchive Conference Leeds University
March 27 2015 #pararchive

3. Participatory Curation
Topics
Learner-Generated Contexts Group
Ambient Learning Cities
Emergent Learning Model
MOSI-ALONG project
Partnership Building in Manchester
Everything is a Metaphor
Digital Cabinets of Curiosity
Aggregate then Curate
Aggregate then Curate; full paper

4. Participatory Curation
Learner-Generated Contexts Group
Came together in 2006 to develop
post-Web 2.0 models of learning
Created Open Context Model of
Learning 2007; a multi-context open
pedagogy to help design learning in
new contexts like cities…
Ambient Learning Manchester; can
#socialmedia transform contexts so
learning can take place everywhere?
Open Context Model of Learning

5. Participatory Curation
What is a
Learner-Generated Context?
”A Coincidence of
Motivations leading to
Agile Configurations”
Or new open Partnerships leading
to new social Processes…

6. Participatory Curation
What is an Ambient Learning City?
A new layer of the City, not a property
An affordance of new, social media
Enabling post-institutional emergence
Supporting context-responsive learning
An open, adjacent platform that may allow
transformation to the network society
BUT Ambient Learning City was designed
to test multi-context learning so Mosi-Along
Social Cities of Tomorrow

7. Participatory Curation
Mosi-Along in Manchester
Partnership linking Manchester University,
MOSI (Museum of Science & Industry),
Community Centres (ArcSpace, MadLab),
Community Learning (LSEN, Libraries)
Social Media (People’s Voice Media)
Social Groups (Salford History Group)
Cultural Spaces (Cornerhouse) for…
Digital Storytelling about economic
histories creating possible futures

8. Participatory Curation
Learner-Generated Context
Research Group interested in;
”Problematising the
context space &
inventing new
solutions”
Creating Development Frameworks

9. Participatory Curation
#MosiAlong project Manchester
The project rethought cultural relationships
between community & institution with;
Participative curatorial strategies using
Social objects (Nina Simon);
“Social objects (owned by participants) are
transactional, facilitating exchanges among
those who encounter them” enabling an
“object-centred sociality” (Engestrom)
Allowing redefinition of storytelling tropes
The Participatory Museum

10. Participatory Curation
New metaphors / new relationships
The Participatory Curation problem is;
Cultural participation prescribed by experts
Promoting expertise-centred hierarchies
We needed new metaphors as well as
A cultural object-centred sociality
We needed to learn anew how to design for
city-centric emergent processes,
Using *new* metaphors such as…
Everything is a Metaphor

11. Participatory Curation
Digital / Cabinets of Curiosities

12. Participatory Curation
Why Digital Cabinets of Curiosities?
1. Cabinets of Curiosities predate Museums
2. Then; New Artefacts! New collections!
Promoting New futures! A mystical fascination
3. Now; museums curate & codify traditional
collections. Promoting old histories :-(
Let’s build Digital Cabinets of Curiosities
Rewrite our narrative relationships with cultural
objects that we own and choose to share…
1835 Museums Act 1870 Education Act

13. Participatory Curation
New Metaphors New Narratives;
Examples in Social Media Festival 9/2011
1. Films about Digital Cabinets of Curiosities
2. Manchester Ship Canal Artefacts on Facebook
3. A realtime History of Manchester in 100 Objects
(Google Doc celebrating Manchester positively
during riotous times)
More on MOSI-ALONG Blog

14. Participatory Curation
"The very act of
telling your story
possesses power
The end result is that...
we become courageous”
Do Stories – Bobbett Buster

15. Digital Cabinets of Curiosity 1
Julia’s personal Cabinet of Curiosities

16. Digital Cabinets of Curiosity 2
Daniel’s computer games Cabinet of Curiosities

17. Digital Cabinets of Curiosity 3
A (riotous) history of Manchester in 100 objects

18. Digital Cabinets of Curiosity 4
Betty’s Bits n Bobs Cabinet of Curiosities

19. Participatory Curation
Using inclusive #socialmedia processes designed
to capture emergent behaviour such as
Aggregate then Curate
A social media participation model derived from
object-centred sociality
Enabling public narratives based on
Users aggregation of their own objects…
Curated around personal narratives
Capturing city histories to share…
Aggregate then Curate

20. Aggregate then Curate; Emergence
Integrating the Physical & the Digital with Social Media

21. Aggregate then Curate; Final version
As applied to Mosi-Along, ascribing roles, responsibilities & values

22. Aggregate then Curate; Final version
This is the point at which learning pathways are embedded:
a point of tension between the informal and formal
Analysis of critical issues in moving informal interest-driven
activities into formal structured processes

23. Participatory Curation
Mosi-Along Project learnt that;
Learning can be context-responsive BUT you
have to create new processes for new contexts
Culture is based on old narrative histories
Social media allow new narratives
People relate through networks/communities,
Cities are built on institutional public spaces
We need networks that allow personal stories
to be re-written in new digital public spaces

24. Participatory Curation
a model for integrating curation and
the story-telling of communities;
We developed;
New social, media partnerships
New context-responsive metaphors
New social media training
New processes for capturing participation
Understood
How to apply andragogy & heutagogy
The need for a Digital Public Space
The utility of Social Scrapbooking

25. Participatory Curation
a model for integrating curation and
the story-telling of communities
But, as Terry Gilliam says in Brazil;
“Information Retrieval is
Expensive”

26. Ambient Learning City; Resources
Links
Aggregate then Curate Research Paper
Mosi-along Blog
Emergent Learning Model
Participatory Museum; Social Objects
RunCoCo Community Collections
Aggregate then Curate
Digital Cabinets of Curiosities
Social scrapbooking; Bibblio & xtlearn.net

27. Aggregate then Curate
Contact; fred.garnett@gmail.com
drew.whitworth@manchester.ac.uk

28. Ambient Learning City; Networks
Smart Cities / Networked Society / Participative
Democracy
So these require us to ask new questions of;
existing institutions, social relations & the
power structures of democracy & knowledge
We need to put context back into knowledge
Cities have multiple ambient contexts which
can both allow & support new answers;
If we design for appropriation by our citizens

29. Participatory Curation
Emergent Learning Model;
A new underpinning model of smart learning
Post-Bologna process for i2020 integrating;
Informal; self-organising smart mobs
Non-formal; content-curation as learning
Formal; post-hoc accreditation
OR
Smart Mobs + Everything is Miscellaneous =
Here Comes Everybody
Emergent Learning Model