NARRATIVE IDENTITIES OF INDIVIDUALS AND PLACES By taking further the findings of Article 3, I propose a theoretical viewpoint on

narrative identity and its role in approaching individuals and places in arts-based and community-based contexts in order to gain a deeper insight into their life worlds.

Narrative identity has been understood as a psychological process (Ricoeur, 2005; McAdams, 2013) of sense-making and defined in detail in Section 2.1. of this dissertation. Ricoeur (1992) explains narrative identity as a kind of constant balancing between an individual’s flexible and stable identities. He refers to this balance as “the pole of self-maintenance”, like the one that holds a playground swing in balance (p. 119). In the process of this balance and self-maintenance, flexible identities do not necessarily disappear irreversibly, as this process is cyclic: “the self returns just when the same slips away” (Ricoeur, 1992, p. 128). The effort behind this balancing and figuring oneself out is what has been referred to as narrative identity work in Section 2.1.

The use of narrative identities in narrative and community-based art and design practices was conceptualised in Article 3 and applied further in Article 4 as a participatory arts-based research tool, data collection approach, and an analytical tool later on. Specifically, the artistic practice implemented as a part of the case study Have you heard? operated as critical spatial practice by engaging with personal narratives and those of the space and collating them together. The project facilitated the sharing of spoken, written, visual and otherwise performed stories that were place-specific and identity-specific. Narrative identities, those stable and shifting identities, that are negotiated through internal narratives, revealed by the research participants through this sharing provided a frame of finding in Article 3: contextuality, intersectionality, authorship and power. That is to say that an individual doing narrative identity work makes sense, consciously or subconsciously, of the changing contexts of her self-identification and the multiplicity of identities she may assume for herself simultaneously. She also finds a balance, again consciously or subconsciously, between the narrative of her own making and socially constructed ones. The aspect of power becomes especially relevant in a participatory project setup and it is a responsibility of the researcher to ensure the sharing of narrative identities on an equal footing, for example, through the sharing of the researcher’s own perspectives and life experiences.

Acknowledging one’s own identity processes internally as well as explicitly to the

participants may act as a common denominator and help to “flatten” potential power structures and hierarchies.

The perspective of narrative identities applied for narrative analysis provided deeper understanding and opened up new meaningful ways for dialogue and participation. Storytelling and narrativity are inherent and determinant to social practices (Somers, 1994, p. 621). Making sense of the participants’ own sense-making of the shifting nature of their identities through storytelling was an empathic process for the researcher. At the same time, the stories that participants told assisted their processes of self-discovery, reminiscing and making connections between reality, memories and emotions.

When communicated in a place by its people, personal and collective narratives and narrative identities become embedded into this practised place, transforming it into a space.

Narrative identity of place

Personal identity (internal) and identity of place (external) are both dependent on signs and symbols (semiotics) and the latter can stimulate transformations of the former. In light of this, I propose to look at narrative identity applications in regards to places/spaces. Places themselves have narrative identities that can be examined and brought about through artistic practice. The narrative identity of place is manifested through symbolisms that narrate the multiple individual narrative identities present through visual culture, text, utterances, stories, and material culture. These symbolisms render the space “identified”—identity work is done to places by their social component, narratively or through symbolisms, thus practising them into spaces.

Then, of course, there are places in-between, marginal, “unidentified” ones. To this category I do not automatically attribute abandoned or under-used places. In fact, those often undergo active narrative identity processes, for example, through the groups of “urban explorers” that frequent them and leave their marks. The said in-betweenness relates mainly to the kind of places where a link between them and their community is missing, where individuals or communities struggle to belong, or where either the community or the place itself is “part of the whole but outside the main body” (hooks, 1989, p. 206). Examples would be places of involuntary exile, newly inhabited places or those that recently underwent reconstruction beyond their community’s recognition. Artistic practice and storytelling can help to make sense of such unidentified places, or any places for that matter, or to reclaim the “lost” narrative identities that used to be perceived as stable, but ended up being flexible and changeable. These practices can facilitate the said sense-making and reclaiming of personal narrative identities, too. This has been an ongoing process throughout the research encounters of this study linking together places, stories and identities.

The same way bell hooks (1989) looks back at her childhood, where the symbolic line of the railroad tracks created a tangible divide between the people

who lived on its both sides, the divide between the margin and the centre was perpetuated visually, physically and narratively for generations of people identifying with these stable identities imposed on them. Artistic and narrative practices offer means to deconstruct such imposed dividing narratives.

Narrative identity of place is not a psychological process conducted by places, since the self is not there, at least not in the same way as it is for people. As Daniel Miller (2008) inquired: “Objects surely don’t talk. Or do they?” (p. 2). In his later work, Miller (2010) reflects on material culture’s “unspoken form of communication that could actually speak volumes” through its symbolisms (p. 12).

In this study narrative identity of place refers to the role of tacit and explicit narratives and symbols of semiotics within places that contribute to psychological narrative identity processes in individuals, as the places contribute to the construction of individuals’ and communities’ fixed and fluctuating identities.

People weave stories of places into their own sense-making, simultaneously shaping those places into spaces by narrating them alongside their own identities.

This complex two-way process is how I understand narrative identity of place.

My research participant Shanzay from Edinburgh shared this insight about contemporary Indian culture in the city:

Here at the local cinema they usually play at least one Indian film. That just tells you how much community there is here. It’s very popular.

Cinema, she explained, is very important for the Indian community, regardless of their age and occupation, not to mention that it is on its own a medium full of identities. Rosarii’s memory narratives are situated within physical spaces, existing or long gone, symbolisms of the popular culture of her childhood, and embodied memories, such as dancing and doing sports:

[I remember] playing tennis in the car park that is now the building on 101, as a teenager with my cousin during the summer holidays…

[I remember] wanting to dance as the chimney sweepers did in “Mary Poppins”

on the domed roofs that were Brooks Haughton…

[I remember] being in love with the “Lassie” dog figurine in the antique store where Murphy’s pharmacy is and feeling delighted when I got it for Christmas…

As exemplified through participants’ narratives above, narrative identities of place can inform cognitive and psychological processes, such as memory, recognition, and belonging, in individuals and communities. In practice this perspective can be applied in arts-based and community-based contexts, for example, in order to achieve a deeper insight into participants’ life worlds, implementing place-making initiatives, bridging different stakeholders in a public space, although further exploration in this direction will be needed, as is suggested in the avenues for further research in the end of this chapter.

This section of findings allows me to finally unravel the thinking behind the title of the dissertation. I am grateful to the reader for patiently bearing with me.

Narrating about places and weaving place-bound narratives into individuals’ and communities’ own sense-making is a special kind of place-bound identity work. In doing it, individuals and communities practise places into spaces and contribute to the processes of narrative identity of place. Reflecting on these processes expands understanding of and relationships towards placeness and placelessness.

On the other hand, spaces of temporal empathic narrative sharing can be created purposefully, as has been exemplified throughout this study. Through those spaces and the sharing that occurs in them, narrative identity work is facilitated, too.

Thus, placeness and spatiality can be both realised through narrative practices, as well as identity work of individuals and communities. Arts-based practices added to the equation enhance the narrative expression and support identity work tacitly, beyond verbalisation. These hypotheses, turned statements through practical engagements and analysis, led to the formulation of this dissertation’s title: Narrative Spaces: On identity work and placeness through arts-based narrative practices.