November 13, 2013

followthethings & research impact

There’s a new special issue of the online, open access Geography journal ACME on the impact of academic research. This has become one of the ways in which the value of academic research is assessed in UK Higher Education, through the Research Excellence Framework.

One of the papers is by Ian Cook et al (that’s me/us), about the longstanding ‘follow the things’ research and public pedagogy that led to the creation and opening of followthethings.com in October 2008. To give a flavour of its approach to impact, here’s an extract from the paper:

When you publish academic work and make it freely available online, people read it and get in touch with you asking if you’d like to take part in work they’re (thinking of) doing. So you end up doing all kinds of unexpected things. This way of working is a core principle of ‘organic public geographies’ (Fuller and Askins, 2010; Hawkins et al., 2012). And it involves writing critical, radical, scholarly papers that are both publishable in academic journals and books, and accessible to more than academic audiences – like school teachers, journalists, filmmakers and artists: the people who make and use the work you’re researching. This is not the kind of “unidirectional knowledge” transfer that aims to make clear interventions in public debates (Pain et al., 2010, 185). It’s the kind that has critical pedagogy at its heart, that treats knowledge as “emerg[ing] only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other” (Freire, 1996, 52-3). Here, as Rich Heyman (2010) argues, academic writing should not be treated as the end point of research. Instead, it should aim to encourage research and conversation to continue beyond publication by offering its readers, for example, catchy and surprising narratives to engage with, unheard voices to listen to, unfamiliar concepts to use, tricky problems to think through, new skills to learn, and intriguing detective work to do (Cook and Woodyer, 2012).

Cook et al (2014, 48).

If you want to read the rest of the argument, download it here.

If you have any comments or questions, please submit them below.

Thanks

Ian

November 12, 2013

Fashion Revolution Day: the first Trump card game

Yesterday at the Department of Geography at the University of Exeter, we heard Carry Somers talking about Fashion Revolution Day at our ‘What (not) to wear?’ conference. There was mention of an Ethical Trade Trump card game invented by students taking ‘Geographies of Material Culture’ in 2012 – using data from free2work.org – being adapted as followthethings.com’s contribution to this campaign.

A new Fashion pack will soon be designed, but today we tested out the idea in class. Students each made a card based on something they were wearing, sketched it, added the grades from free2work and – for extra information at the bottom of each card – added whether that company / brand had signed the Accord on Fire & Building Safety in Bangladesh.

The match report

6 teams of 8 students each made one or more cards in the first 15 minutes. One student was elected from each group as their player, and we staged a 6 player tournament at the front of the classroom. The cards were shuffled and dealt. The game began with player one calling out a brand (Cheap Monday!), a category (policies!), a grade (A+!), and then slamming the card on the table (drama!). The other players then took the card at the top of their pack, one after the other, called out its brand (Calvin Klein! or Adidas!), and its policy grade (C-! or A+), and slammed their cards on the table. The audience gathered round, watching their cards being played, helping their players to win and lose each round.

In each round, the player who called out the highest grade took all of the cards, and started the next round. If there was a draw – like between Cheap Monday and Adidas, both with A+ grades for their policies – the ‘key fact’ could be played: had the brand / company signed the Accord? In this case, only Adidas had (only very recently, the referee had to say), so that was the winning card.

The game went on with rounds in which, for example, only ‘worker rights’ scores could be played. It ended with a ‘winner takes all’ round, with the 3 remaining contestants. This was dramatic: a draw that was resolved by the key fact. The Accord-signatory won. Well done Adidas! Good job you signed the accord. Nobody wants a losing card. Whoops all around.

After the game ended, we discussed what had happened, why some cards were worse to play that others, why – with one exception – the policy grades were higher than the ‘workers’ rights’ grades, and how to find out why by looking at brands’ detailed free2work ‘score cards’. So, 40 minutes into class, we were talking about, asking informed questions about, and having a good idea how to find out more about the relations between ethical trade policies, transparency, monitoring, workers’ rights and the Accord.

This game can be made and played by any group of people trying to learn the basics and/or intricacies of Ethical Trade and Corporate Social Responsibility.

This is our 46 card pack, scanned after the game. What would your pack be like?

If you want to have a go:

download the pack template, research and playing instructions here
find the grades for your cards here www.free2work.org
find out who has signed the Accord here www.bangladeshaccord.org/signatories/

Let us know about your game, send us your packs and match reports!

Thanks

Ian

Credits

This game was devised in 2012 as coursework ‘Geographies of Material Culture’ at the University of Exeter by Joe Thorogood, Michael Franklin, Sophie Angell, Florence Flint, Bryony Board, Toby Swadling, Jack Saxton, Jake Pincock, Emma Hargreaves & Joe Harrison. This pack was re–designed by Ian Cook, in consultation with the #followtheteachers ‘user crew’ Alan Parkinson, Oprah Whipp, Victoria Salt, Charlotte Wild, Jenny Thomas, Natalie Batten, Heather Taylor & Mary Biddulph for use in schools and universities.

Update

This pack was revised in 2014 as followthethings.com’s contribution to Fashion Revolution Day, an Ethical Fashion Trump Card Game is part of its Education Pack (download link to be added when this this is live).

November 10, 2013

‘What (not) to wear’ event: an introduction

Click for the facebook event page

Date: 11 November 2013, 4-6pm

Venue: University of Exeter, Streatham Campus, Streatham Court, Lecture Room C.

.

Our sponsor

A taster event for 1st year University of Exeter students: click for details

.

Setting the scene: journalism, activism & ‘Primark on the rack’

Click for the flickr set with explanations

.

Our audience: curious & expert students

Click to read more about this module

A draft followthethings.com page published last week: click to read

A draft followthethings.com page, published last week: click to read

New student work: e.g. Ethical Trade Trumps game

.

Our hashtag

Ask questions using this. They'll appear here. Click!

Tweet photos of your ‘Made in…’ labels & ask questions with this.

Tweets by @followthethings

.

Our speakers

James Christie-Miller

Click for our Grand Challenge Events page

& Carry Somers

Click here for our Grand Challenge events page

October 21, 2013

Halloween specials

We have decorated our website’s header for the season. It’s all gone a bit Scooby Doo. Our site is a mystery machine full of pesky kids.

‘Tis the season to be haunted. So here are a couple of followthethings examples with a Halloween theme.

Letter from a labour camp worker found in Halloween decorations

[click here and you can read our page on this letter – who made it, how it was discussed, and the impacts it had]

Film of workers injured making Mickey Mouse’s ‘Haunted Halloween’ book

[click here and you can read our page on this film – who made it, how it was discussed and the impacts it had].

October 19, 2013

Quite literally ‘following the thing’

Talking about our site with students at Bath Spa University this week, I wanted to show the most literal (and chilling) example of the ‘follow the things’ genre. It’s the only example we have come across which follows something as it’s being made, shipped, and used: telling the story of a thing’s life from the perspective of the thing itself, from its ‘point of view’, like a ‘shoot-em-up’ video game. It’s the ‘Life of a bullet’, the opening scene from the 2005 movie ‘Lord of War’.

Life of a bullet

Lego re-creation

Revisiting this opening scene, we made a new Lego re-creation today using the decommissioned AK47 bullet that we bought as a necklace from an E-Bay seller in Canada. We initially bought it to take the product photo on this example’s followthethings.com page, but it’s still sitting in our office, with our Lego, so…

followthethings.com page

Our page about the making, discussion and impacts of this opening scene is here. To see all of our Lego re-creations, check this ‘Made in Lego’ set on flickr.

October 18, 2013

Playing cards: ftt’s Ethical Trade Trump game

It’s a game

Students at the University of Exeter designed an Ethical Trade Trumps card game in November last year using data from free2work.org. This summer, we worked this up into a ftt-‘branded’ game, complete with rules, and templates so that groups of people could make and play cards with their stuff. You can download its templates here. This was designed with advice from the secondary school teachers involved in our ＃followtheteachers project. Natalie is using them with her A-level class to help with Globalisation revision: look!

The idea

When you make cards for your stuff and play them with others, you learn about the companies who make your stuff, their labour policies, transparency, monitoring and worker rights. In one sense, it’s a simple game of trumping – ‘Ha! My shoes’ worker rights score beats your Kitkat’s!’ – but making and playing the cards also raises questions about what you can find out about your stuff, what ‘monitoring’, ‘worker rights’ and a ‘living wage’ mean, how they are measured, and what to think about this.

Playing cards

Yesterday, we ran our first Top Trump workshop, at Bath Spa University, with Ranji Devadason and her students (a big thanks to them for giving this such a good go). Here we share the cards that were played at this first ever Ethical Trade Trump tournament!

The experience

The atmosphere was tense but fun. Poker faces were everywhere. Imagine being dealt some of these cards! How would you play them? What was it like for them to play with their stuff like this? We’re inviting them to say so, in comments on this post…

PS if you are unfamiliar Trump card games, check this Wikipedia page.

Credits

Update

October 11, 2013

‘Behind the screen’: now on demand

There are a lot of follow the thing films that we’re looking forward to watching. We’ve seen the trailers, checked the websites, read the facebook posts, and we wait…

We found out today that this one is now available on demand, although not (we then found out) in the UK. So we’re watching the trailer again, and asking anyone who can watch the whole film on demand, or who has seen it at a festival, to tell us about it! We’re looking forward to the DVD release. This looks awesome!

October 7, 2013

Fairphone: ‘an object to start conversations’.

Having become fascinated by the spoof ‘conflict free’ iPhone 4CF created by the Yes Men and students at the Parsons New School for Design in 2010, we have been following with fascination the creation of the Fairphone: a ‘real’ conflict free smartphone which will be out very soon.

Recently the Fairphone opened a ‘Pop-up Space’ in London, where they discussed this phone with people who dropped by. This short film about these pop-up discussions is well worth watching.

What was a ‘design fiction’ is now a reality… so what does that mean for the designers, makers, traders and users of smart phones?

October 4, 2013

Flo the Cat: shopping & sharing

How can we use images to tell the stories we want to tell – an avoid repeating the ones we don’t? (Platform 2012).

We were very happy to see that Set 11 of Lego’s Minifigures included a new Grandma figure with a cat and shopping bag. We purchased our Grandma at the Thomas Moore store in Exeter, where staff can tell you what’s in each packet just by feeling it.

We know that photos of Cats and Lego are among the most shared on social media. We want more people to know about our site and what it’s all about. ‘Flo the Cat’ is helping us to do this.

These are the first ‘What the cat brought home’ photos that we added to Flo’s flickr set today. They point towards our page on Anna Chen’s 2010 Radio 4 investigation China, Britain and the Nunzilla Conundrum. Let us know what you think and, maybe, buy yourself a cat and bag and take some other ‘Flo the cat’ photos for us to publish.

If you haven’t seen Nunzilla wound up and in action, watch this short video:

And here’s what this radio show did with her:

“[The Nunzilla Conundrum] takes the example of British designed, Chinese-made ironic novelty gifts … and expands it into an illuminating discussion of the cultural differences between the two nations, with Chinese production line workers hard-pressed to describe what it is they’re making while British designers are oh-so keen to deconstruct the joke” (Naughton 2010, np).

See our page for more.

September 18, 2013

Happy ‘shopping’: making & using followthethings.com bags

This post began as a contribution to a special issue of the journal ACME on the new ‘impact’ agenda in British Higher Education. Our shopping bags and ‘ladybugging’ activities seemed to fit this bill, although their ‘impact’ wasn’t measurable (and that was the point). In the end, another short piece on impact was written for the journal. We have revised that original paper to post here, and hope it may be interesting for readers who are keen to use our site and/or bags in their teaching and wider ‘shopping’ activities.

Update September 2016: sorry, we have no bags left to give away. They’ve all gone. If you have one, it’s a priceless collector’s item. If you see someone carrying one, please say hi.

——————————————————-

“We need to develop forms of critique that inspire hauntings, feed feelings, come alive, leap out and grab us, … that are not just about vital materiality but are themselves vitally material” (Cook & Woodyer 2012 p.238).

Continue reading →