Simone O'Callaghan

The business of digital storytelling Augmenting information systems with QR codes

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to present case study findings that explore the implementation and use of a low-cost digital technology platform to collect, process and disseminate information in business-to-consumer practices. Design/methodology/approach – The research is interdisciplinary, drawing from a range of backgrounds, the epistemological approach is that of mixed methods, combining both qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis techniques. Insights are drawn from what emerges from observations arising from the data, rather than starting with a hypothesis and designing the research to test this. The over arching research approach was “action research”. Action research has at its basis the premise of conducting research “in practice”. The “practice” on this occasion was a business practice, implemented in high street estate agents. Findings – This approach to accessing information aids important decision-making in the buying and selling of homes. It allows for mobile augmentatio...

Reading boyishly - Roland Barthes, J. M. Barrie, Jacques Henri Lartigue, Marcel Proust and D. W. Winnicott

Visual Interventions makes a particularly strong case for the implementation of applied visual anthropology methods to post-crisis situations. The contributions by Jhala and Flores in particular demonstrate the power of film to both represent and manage social suffering. Jhala details the use of indigenous video to assess the social meanings of the material and human losses that occurred in the wake of a devastating earthquake in 2001 in Gujarat, India. Using insight from the work of David and Judith MacDougall (1979), Jhala constructs locally guided visual narratives, detailing the impact of the damage from individual and communal perspectives. These perspectives complement the information derived from official damage surveys and television accounts. Flores’ work with Maya Q’eqchi’ communities in Guatemala ten years after the height of the civil war demonstrates how indigenous film-makers can contribute to the production of shared knowledge and can use the medium to reassert their political and cultural identity after genocide. The film-making process – likened by Flores to Rouch’s participatory cinema projects – became the crucial space for the Maya Q’eqchi’ to define their social roles and identities in post-war communities.