Participatory Action Research - Feminist Trailblazers & Good Troublemakers

Our PARFEM team invites you to the last episode of Season Two. This 10th episode marks the end of a chapter for this podcast, as we are not only wrapping up Season 2, but also bidding farewell to our very own Patricia Maguire, as her journey with us comes to a fork in the road. Our production team, Vanessa and Shikha, interview Patricia Maguire and are co-hosts for this episode. Patricia is a long...

In this episode, co-hosts Jessica Oddy and Patricia Maguire speak with Elise Denis-Ramirez, Amparo Gonzalez, and Jana Vasil’eva about their FPAR as PhD students advancing gender and reproductive justice, public policy in gender, and agriculture, and the creation and support of grassroots organising with unpaid, long term care workers.  Elise Denis-Ramirez is a feminist researcher and consultant wh...

In this episode, we speak with Wardarina and Vernie Yocogan-Diano about their feminist participatory action research projects advancing women's rights and development justice through building autonomous feminist movements and organizations with the Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development. Wardarina is an activist, feminist, and feminist participatory action research enthusiast. She is...

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Honor Ford-Smith about her successes and her challenges in bringing feminist values and ways of being to participatory action research with black working-class women in Jamaica as well as communities affected by violence. Dr. Ford-Smith discusses reimagining participatory action research through collaborative or collective performance theater as an approach to kn...

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Wendy Frisby and Dr. Colleen Reid about their feminist participatory action research projects with community partners and people from marginalized groups who are often excluded from health and community recreation programs. Dr. Wendy Frisby is Professor Emeritus in the School of Kinesiology, Faculty of Education at the University of British Columbia, Canada, wher...

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Maggie O'Neill about her journey into the transformative possibilities of participatory research in working with female sex workers and migrants and re-imagining participatory action research through biographical, ethnographic methods, and performative arts.    Dr. Maggie O'Neill is Professor in Sociology and Criminology at University College Cork, where...

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Rauni Räsänen and Dr. Mervi Kaukko about their journey into the transformative potential of education and reforming teacher education through action research in Finland.   Dr. Rauni Räsänen is a Professor Emerita in the Faculty of Education at the University of Oulu University, Finland. In the 1960s, she started as a primary and secondary school teacher and a pro...

In this episode, we speak with our guests Dr. Carolette Norwood and Dr. Thembi Carr about putting Black Feminism into practice using community-based participatory research in a reproductive justice project with Black women in Cincinnati.   Carolette Norwood is professor and department head of sociology and criminology at Howard University. Dr. Norwood is a Black feminist sociologist whose research...

In this episode, we speak with our guests Dr. Mary Brydon-Miller and Dr. Miriam Raider-Roth about their successes and challenges bringing feminist values and ways of being to PAR and practitioner inquiry, with a focus on building relational “enclaves” for AR. Dr. Mary Brydon-Miller is a professor in the College of Education and Human Development at the University of Louisville. A participatory act...

In this episode, we speak with our guests Dr. Naomi Joy Godden, Trimita Chakma, and Kavita Naidu. Their EcoFeminist participatory action research (EcoFPAR) paradigm combines the worlds of climate justice, social activism, and Feminist Participatory Action Research for the interconnected planetary health and well-being of humans and more-than-humans. Dr. Naomi Joy Godden is the Vice Chancellor'...

In this episode, we speak with Global South Caribbean Feminists Peggy Antrobus, Norma Shorey, and Chris Ashton, and also discuss the contributions of their late colleague Pat Ellis. This episode showcases their commitments to feminist and participatory values and processes especially in reference to their work with the Women and Development Unit (WAND), University of the West Indies and its Rose H...

In this episode, we host Dr. Sujata Khandekar and Mumtaz Shaikh from the Committee of Resource Organizations for Literacy, now known as CORO India. CORO facilitates change through a community-based approach​​ within India's most marginalised and oppressed communities. Dr. Sujata Khandekar is one of the co-founders of CORO. She earned a Masters of Arts in Gender, Education and International Dev...

In this episode, we host action researcher Dr. Davydd Greenwood. During his 40-year history of action research in Spain, Norway, and New York, he explored issues as diverse as rural exodus, ethnic conflict, industrial cooperatives, participatory community development, and the role of governmental institutions in shaping and exacerbating identity politics and conflicts. He also examined the links b...

In this episode, we host activist, action researcher Marie Brennan. Dr. Brennan has been an important and persistent proponent of critical educational and teacher action research in the Australian action research movement. Now retired, Dr. Brennan is Extraordinary Professor, Stellenbosch University in South Africa, Professor of Education at the University of South Australia and Victoria University...

This is our first episode paying tribute to a feminist trailblazer who is no longer with us. Dr. Martha Farrell was Director of the International Academy of Lifelong Learning of the Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA). She is known for working to end gender violence and gender harassment in the Indian workplace. In 2015, Martha Farrell was killed alongside 13 others in a Taliban atta...

In this episode, we talk to three special guests: Michelle Fine, Cheryl Wilkins and María Elena Torre, all extensively involved in groundbreaking work combining participatory action research with social, gender, and racial justice work.  Michelle Fine is distinguished professor at the City University of New York. She's professor of critical psychology, women's studies, American studies, and U...

In this episode, our guest is activist teacher educator Alice McIntyre, known for her use of Photovoice in PAR.  She discusses the challenges of her first PAR project with white classroom teachers to make meaning of their white racial identity in a racist educational system. She talks about the power of photovoice in two long-term PAR projects, one with urban adolescents of colour to identify...

Our guest today is Dr. Andrea Cornwall. Dr. Cornwall is a political anthropologist who specializes in the anthropology of democracy in participatory research, gender justice and sexuality, and citizen participation. Her work focuses on what needs to change to give those affected by decisions, a voice in those very decisions, particularly focusing on the rights of women and sexual minorities. She c...

In this episode, Brinton Lykes and Brisna Caxaj discuss a long-term feminist participatory action research project supporting Mayan women’s agency in their search for redress for harm suffered during the genocidal violence perpetrated by the Guatemalan state at the height of the thirty-six-year armed conflict. They explain the use of Mayan cosmovision, creative arts, dramatic arts, and embodied pr...

In this episode Deborah Barndt and Margarita Antonio discuss their collaboration on a participatory arts-based research project called VIVA! in Nicaragua the early days of URACCAN - the University of the Autonomous Region of Nicaragua Caribbean Coast. They talk about how through that project and their collaborative relationship they brought together feminisms, participatory art-based research and...

Marjorie Mbilinyi talks with co-hosts Patricia Maguire and Jessica Oddy. Marjorie is one of the earliest feminist participatory action researchers. Since the early 1970’s Marjorie has fought for gender and class justice with transformative feminists in Tanzania and across the African continent. In this episode Marjorie discusses the gender discrimination she faced at University of Dar es Salem, th...

Renu Khanna talks with co-hosts Patricia Maguire and Jessica Oddy. Renu is a trailblazer in participatory action researcher, particularly in women’s health and human rights.  In the early 80s, she began using PAR as part of her broader work with the Social Action for Rural and Tribal Inhabitants of India or SARTHI. Its overall purpose was to give women a meaningful voice in their own health c...