Understanding everyday participation
articulating cultural values
Dr Lisanne Gibson
School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester
Understanding Everyday Participation:
What is it?
• AHRC ‘Connected Communities in the Creative Economy’ Large
Grant, 2012 to 2017
• £1.5 million total funding from AHRC
• Team of academics x 7, 2 ‘sector facing’ consultants, 2 full-time
Research Associates, 3 PhD projects, numerous casual
researchers
• Further funding:
• Creative Scotland
• AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award with Glasgow Life
What are we trying to do?
• discover what is the focus of individuals everyday culture
and leisure activities and what this participation means to
them
• understand how communities are formed and connected
through participation
• explore the relationship between different participation
contexts – institutional, voluntary, informal
In order to:
• develop new articulations and measures of cultural value
• reconnect policy and practice with everyday participation
Our approach
• not defining ‘culture’ in advance – painting a picture from the
bottom-up through qualitative research
• viewing participation as a social process, not just individual
behaviour
• participation practices are situated – they shape and are
shaped by place
• mixed methods combining historical, quantitative and
qualitative work
• collaboration with communities, voluntary organisations,
cultural professionals and policymakers
Five work packages
1. Histories of participation and value; cultural policy and place
2. Reanalysis of survey data – how does participation vary by
place and throughout people’s lives?
3. Ecosystems – local histories, mapping, in-depth interviews,
ethnography and social network analysis in six contrasting
locations
4. Application projects – working with communities and
partners to develop projects in response to findings
5. Research-policy-practice nexus – reflecting on the
partnership and developing new models of collaboration
WP3 Case Study locations
Western Isles
Aberdeen
Gateshead
Manchester/Salford
Peterborough
Dartmoor
Active People & Taking Part Surveys
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Taking Part is “The National Survey of Culture, Leisure
and Sport”
Active People is “the largest survey of sport and activity
ever carried out in Europe”
Broadly: Taking Part Survey has more detailed
questions; Active People Survey surveys more people
(500 per LA)
It can be used for a number of things. For example:
Arts attendance
Percentages represent fractions
of respondents in each local
authority responding “yes” to
“Have you attended any
creative, artistic, theatrical or
musical events in the last 12
months?
Source: Active People Survey
4, data collected 2009-2010
Library visits
Percentages represent fractions
of respondents in each local
authority responding “yes” to
“During the last 12 months,
have you used a public library
service at least once?”
Source: Active People Survey
4, data collected 2009-2010
Taking Part and segmentation
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much Taking Part analysis is sector-based: exploring
participation in sports/arts/heritage
some may be familiar:
 Sport England’s market segmentation reveals sporting
“types” within the adult population
 Arts Audiences: Insight (ACE) breaks the population
into groups based on participation in, and attitudes to,
the arts
but can we organise people into meaningful groups
based on participation across the board: formal culture,
sport, and also other free time activities?
Taking Part segmentation: why?
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How significant are “formal” culture and sport activities to
the wider context of participation?
How far are people “omnivorous” across sectors?
Are there groups of people who opt out of “formal
culture” but have busy everyday lives?
What are the characteristics of different groups, including
those with low levels of participation across the board?
Some initial reflections
• there is evidence of ‘omnivorousness’ – 8% of people who are
‘Highly Active’ have high levels of participation in a range of
activities, from informal leisure to cultural events; a group with
privilege and power
• ‘Fitness Fans’ (4%), ‘Sociable Sporty’ (9%) and ‘Intellectual
Pursuits’ (7%) are active too but have more specialised
interests
• over half the population (54%) have fairly low levels of
engagement with ‘formal’ culture but are busy with everyday
activities – cinema, pubs, internet, shopping, football, darts,
pool, fishing, gardening, knitting
• the least educated, least affluent people’s participation consists
mainly of TV watching (17%), this group seem detached from
even the most mainstream pastimes and social events
The cultural signature of
participation and value
Gateshead Methods:
Understanding Participation in Gateshead:
• History of socially informed cultural practice
• Socio-demographic analysis
• Culture and leisure policy and programmes survey
• Walkabout, driving tours, local stakeholder engagement
• Cultural and community asset mapping
• Participation data survey (using local and national data)
• Household Interviews- 2 waves of 30; probing for participation
‘life story’, narratives, life stage, gender/age/class/ethnicity,
relationships, situated
Local focus- ‘facilitated participation’:
• Young people and young people in care
• Community participant engagement activities, focus groups,
meetings, ethnography, social network analysis
The cultural ecosystem

3 axes to reveal the geography:
 of social demography
 of cultural/ community assets
 of participation data
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Questions:
 What is the nature of the ‘situatedness’ of people’s
different types of participation?
 How do socio-demographic factors interact with the
geography of assets to frame participation?
 Is there a ‘cultural signature’ to cultural values and
participation within particular ‘ecosystems’?
The geography of cultural and community
assets
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“cultural” is a broad term:
 museums, galleries, concert halls, theatres
 pubs, bars, working men’s clubs
 libraries, archives, community/leisure centres
 places of worship, scout huts, conservation areas
The distributions of cultural and community assets helps
us to understand the kinds of facilities available to people
in different places
The geography of socio-demographics
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Some information at Local Authority level, some at Super
Output Area level, some at Output Area level
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Contextualizes participation and assets
 age distribution
 indices of deprivation
 educational indicators
 ethnic and religious diversity
Gateshead Jewish
Residents
The Jewish population is very
precisely bounded in a small
area in and around Bensham,
with the exception of a handful
of areas with small Jewish
populations (<6%) dotted
around Gateshead.
The geography of participation
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Participation in different activities
 Civic, cultural, charitable, commercial, digital, private
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Captured by:
- membership, ticketing, registration, enrollment,
audience/ marketing/ residents survey, etc
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Supplemented by qualitative data from walking/driving
tours, community interviews/ interactions, household
interviews, and, ethnography.
A ‘cultural signature’ of local cultural
participation and value?
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Location and place are an important coordinate for
understanding everyday participation in cultural and
leisure practices
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What can the combination of this data- assets, sociodemography, broadly defined participation- its
combination and representation in space allow us to
understand about the specificity of participation and
value in place?
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Policy applications: e.g. how much of this specificity is
reliant on public investment?
Arts council funding / adult learning
Less than £20
£20-£70
£71-120
£121-240
More than £240
<4.6%
4.7%-6.0%
6.1%-7.9%
8.0-8.9%
9%+
Sources: Arts Council England,
Skills Funding Agency (part of
BIS)
Funded cultural participation
Less than 0.19
0.20-0.65
0.66-1.29
1.30-2.23
2.24 or more
Source: Sage Gateshead
What Next?
Working towards the creation of a dynamic model:
Layer 1- socio-demographic information
Layer 2- cultural and community assets
Layer 3- cultural and leisure participation- ‘formal’
Layer 4- cultural and leisure participation- voluntary/
amateur/ associational
Gateshead Household Interviews:
Themes from Wave One
Wave 1 & 2 Household Interviews
Wave one: 26; Wave two: 20 (male and female) = 46
Age: 28–74
Where people live: Saltwell, Bensham, Low Fell, Chowdene
Ethnicity: English, British, mixed race, white British, white, African,
Eastern European, “Geordie and Northumbrian”, “not Mackem”,
Jew
Socioeconomic group: “Working class management”, working class,
middle class
Religion: Orthodox Jewish, Atheist, Christian, Methodist, “spiritual”
Participation
Some activities mentioned over and over again
At Home
Special/ Occasional Activities
kayaking
watching TV and DVDs
playing video games
comedy club in Newcastle
visiting relatives in the Midlands
cooking and baking/cake decorating, exercise and sport (gym,
cycling, running, playing basketball, golf, walking, playing
football)
gardening (home or allotment), housework
barbecue
reading (alone and in groups)
listening to music
yoga
antenatal classes
Great North Nun
Race for Life
Blaydon race
playing bass guitar at church
camping
DIY in the house
sitting and chatting with wife/husband
pottering around the house…
Out and about
going to the pub (pub quiz every Wednesday)
cinema
eating out
shopping
walking (with and without the dog)
attending church (in Gateshead and Newcastle)
volunteering
knitting
going for a coffee…
relatives from Canada visiting so shopping trips to the
Metrocentre,
21st birthday celebrations
“wetting the head” of a friend’s new baby
sailing
beer Festival
Late Shows
dinner parties
Kylie Minogue concert
Joan Rivers live
Cumberland Show
Knitting and Stitching Show in Harrogate
Chelsea Flower Show
Glastonbury…
‘Everyday’ Places of
Participation
Places for special
Occasions
Metrocentre
Newcastle
Saltwell Park
Stirling House pub
the house/at home
Friend’s house
Coatsworth road
Tesco
allotment
leisure centre
Central Library
social club
IKEA
Low Fell
Greggs…
Hexham
Newburn
Discovery Museum
Beamish Museum
Hancock Museum
Blackpool
National Trust venues
English Heritage properties
Theatre Royal
Lake District
Hadrian's Wall
Durham
Glastonbury
Warwick Castle
Ouseburn
Little Theatre…
“Nice Indian up in Low Fell which we go to
all the time” (P17 Male 32, Bensham).
“we’ve also been to live concerts at The
Sage, that might be two or three times a
year” (P22 Male 63, Low Fell).
Value of Participation
1. Physical and Mental Wellbeing
“Mentally and physically just feel great” (P15 Female 38 Saltwell)
2. Stress
“I know this sounds old and boring, but if you’re outside gardening it just takes your mind off all the stresses of
work and everything that’s going on in your head. It just clears your mind because you’re just outside and
you’re just busy” (P12 Male 32 Saltwell).
3. Fun and sociability
“Basketball is my main--, I do like my sport, and it’s not necessarily that I play--, It’s more the social side of it.
[…] I was more of a social--, it’s got to be fun” (P18 Male 42 Bensham).
“I’d say the music really ‘cause it’s such a social activity, you know, there’s nothing quite like that, you know,
when people are together and working together towards a common goal, and it produces something
aesthetically pleasing” (P28 Male 31 Bensham).
“And when I’m out I’ll go into a coffee shop ‘cause for me that’s a nice thing to do, a relaxing thing to do, it
breaks up the day and I get a chance to just think about things that are working okay for me” (P30 Male 56
Bensham).
Barriers to participation
1. Illness or injury
“I used to be part of a running club, I’m not now. […] I went into the army and knackered my knee, and
started smoking, so I can’t do it any more. ” (P27 Male 28 Bensham).
2. Time
“I work a lot of hours, you know, so you don’t really find much time” (P23 Male 50 Saltwell).
3. Social Networks
“no friends and she doesn’t want to do it” (P17 Male 32 Bensham) .
4. Lack of local facilities
“I can’t find any group I can join or anything like that […] there isn’t anywhere like a community centre
where we can all come together or that I’ve found anyway [laughs]” (P13 Female 30 Saltwell).
5. Distance and transport
“I don’t really do any activities, I used to dance like ballet and stuff but I haven’t done that for a few years
now, but I did enjoy it, it was just the distance and getting there was--, I had to get a bus and for a 45 minute
class it’s not really worth the hassle” (P19 female 28 Low Fell).
6. Money
“The more money I make the more extravagant my choices are” (P17 Male 32 Bensham).
Communications
• Website: www.everydayparticipation.org
• Twitter: @UEParticipation; #UEPcare; #UEPHistories;
#everydayparticipation
Project Team
Principal Investigator
Dr Andrew Miles, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester
Co Investigators
Dr Eleonora Belfiore, Centre for Cultural Policy Studies, University of Warwick
Dr Lisanne Gibson, School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester
Dr Abigail Gilmore, Institute for Cultural Practices, University of Manchester
Dr Felicity James, School of English, University of Leicester
Dr Jane Milling, Department of Drama, University of Exeter
Dr Kerrie Schaefer, Department of Drama, University of Exeter
Policy and Sector Researchers
Catherine Bunting, Arts Council England
Sarah Stannage, Clore Fellow, MLA Living Places
Full-Time Postdoctoral Researchers
Dr Delyth Edwards, School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester
Adrian Lagunas, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester
PhD Students
Sarah Hughes, School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester
Ruth Webber, School of Museum Studies, University of Leicester and Glasgow Life
Susan Oman, CRESC, University of Manchester
Project Funders and Partners (National)
Funded Through the AHRC’s Connected Community Programme
And Creative Scotland