Mending the New: A Framework for Reconciliation Through Testimonial Digital Textiles in the Transition to Post-Conflict Rural Colombia

Lead Research Organisation: University of Nottingham
Department Name: Sch of Sociology & Social Policy

Abstract

Despite the importance of reconciliation in Colombia as a process that is actively practised by citizens in their everyday lives, most research so far has deployed an institutional, top-down approach to this process. The need for a bottom-up understanding of reconciliation in the post-agreement phase can help establish practices of reconciliation as long lasting and collective acts of communication, of doing and learning, which allow communities to negotiate the violent past, and situate themselves in the transitional present and a hopeful future.

The proposed project will develop a framework for reconciliation with communities which have been crafting textiles and have been severely affected by the armed conflict. Textile crafting in Colombia is a widespread activity that incorporates traditional techniques of knitting and sewing and is organised primarily by groups of women within rural areas. Rather than just documenting memories of war, textile crafting generates spaces of common reflection and has a healing, restorative and constructive potential that negotiates memory and reconciliation. It is specifically this novel dimension of textile crafting that this project will illuminate. In 2015 the group Mujeres Tejiendo Sueños y Sabores de Paz from Mampuján won the National Peace Prize and has one of their memory tapestries displayed in the National Museum of Colombia. Many textile crafting groups--including all groups that will participate in this project--are members of the national "Network of Knitters for Memory and Life" launched in 2016.

Research on textile crafting offers the unique and exceptional opportunity to investigate reconciliation in a context that brings together everyday practice, the realities of the conflict, the possibility of healing and the rebuilding of the social fabric towards a post-conflict society. However, textile crafting is often considered as a representational activity producing "visual metaphors of collective memory". Rather than conceiving textile pieces as products, the proposed project will implement an original approach, seeing textile crafting as a making process which is collectively realised within the context of war.

The project will deploy a ground-breaking methodological design in order to elucidate reconciliation through the practice of textile crafting that (1) includes an intensive ten-month-long ethnographic study of the processes of crafting (2) a series of public participation events for disseminating the findings and promoting reconciliation and post-conflict (3) the development of a set of original technologies that add digital components to the handcrafted textiles with the ability to digitally record and reproduce reconciliation stories. Specifically, the project will design a compositional material-digital object, a testimonial digital textile, as a novel method for conducting research in the context of conflict and reconciliation that can open fresh avenues for research practice within the arts, humanities, and social sciences.

The final outcomes of the project will be:
-a framework for reconciliation narratives and practices that are achieved through community building and community crafting
-a unique documentation of textile crafting as a practice of memory and reconciliation
-the design of a novel technological object, a testimonial digital textile, that records stories and experiences of the armed conflict
-the implementation of an innovative methodological research design for investigating textile crafting
-the creation of spaces that foster trans-local dialogues and exchange between different communities in Colombia, and between Colombia and the UK
-the design of an open publicly accessible digital archive of testimonial textiles that capture oral histories of the war and of reconciliation
-a series of academic conferences, publications and publicly accessible reports
-a major public exhibition and presentation of the project's results

Planned Impact

As we explained in the pathways to impact and in the case of support (9C), the impact of the project is designed to be a core and inseparable component of the whole research process from its beginning until completion.

The impact of the project will focus and will be measured across three lines of intervention:

1. Community involvement, social impact and social appropriation

The impact of the project will benefit, in the first place, the eight local communities that will be part of it. They will gain social recognition and their social ties will be strengthened by the different activities of the project. Community exchange and community building will be the focus of these activities.

The project will also impact wider publics, through public engagement activities and social appropriation projects. These activities and projects will be directed to the eight participating municipalities and, additionally, to Bogota, Medellin and Soacha. Bogota is a city in which a general distrust of peace prevails as a result of the non-endorsement of the peace agreements in October 2016 and because of the limited influence of local public activities aimed at reconciliation and post-conflict. Medellin, is selected as a strategic city for this project, insofar as the national and international stereotypes that circulate about it are incompatible with the processes of reconciliation and peace that its inhabitants realise. Promoting post-conflict and reconciliation are urgent activities in Bogota and Medellin, as a way to engage wider publics and combat disinterest towards the peace process. Soacha, a municipality adjacent to Bogota, was selected as a place of intervention because it has attracted one of the largest numbers victimised, displaced and impoverished people in the country. Finally, the impact of the project will reach Colombian communities in the UK and some relevant parts of the UK public.

The intervention of the project will be also carried out consistently through local and national media as well as social media as a way to gain wider social impact and promote post-conflict and reconciliation.

2. Education and capacity building

One of the important aims of the project is to contribute to capacity building in Higher Education in Colombia:

Several students will complete their degrees on topics that arise from the research of the project. In addition, we anticipate that there will dozens of students involved in other activities such as the make-a-thons, the creation of the digital archive, or the design of the closing events of the project.

Based on the framework for reconciliation, community building and community crafting and the findings of the research, we will develop a set of educational materials that will enhance teaching capability in the field of peace and conflict studies across various disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. The innovative methodological tool that the project will create, the testimonial digital textile, will be registered as free and open access so that it can be replicated in educational contexts by higher education teachers and students as well as the wider public.

3. Theoretical and methodological impact

The project will provide a framework for reconciliation through community building and a definite repertoire of practices that support reconciliation within the context of community organised textile crafting. This is a primary contribution to debates about reparation and reconciliation in Colombia as well as broader interdisciplinary debates on an ethics of care and sustainable social organisation. Methodologically, the project will generate innovative knowledge on the participatory construction of compositional objects that fuse material and digital practices with the social. This knowledge will contribute to questions about experimental practices, sociotechnical objects, and practice based design.
 
Title 'La Puerta de la...Reconciliacion' (The door of...Reconciliation) 
Description 'La Puerta de la...Reconciliacion' (The door of...Reconciliation) is a an embrodeired textile piece, which represents the meaning of reconciliation for the Sonson's sewing group (Sonson Antioquia, Colombia). The artwork was co-designed by the women together with Colombian and UK researchers, during the fieldwork visit in the community in June 2019. The main embroidered figure on the textile is the 'door of reconciliation', with a faithful representation of the women of the Sonson's group and other members of the community while they are crossing it. The artistic composition represents the idea that, although reconciliation is not yet there and they still do not understand it, they have just started walking towards it. From June 2019 until September 2019, women of the Sonson's group embroidered the piece, which was then exposed during the closing event in Quibdo in September 2019 (see Engagement Activities section 'Mending Peace - Imagining Reconciliation'). 
Type Of Art Artefact (including digital) 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact The co-design of the artwork enabled collective conversations around the meanings of reconciliation for the women of the Sonson's sewing group. During the closing event in Quibdo (Choco, Colombia) in September 2019 (see Engagement Activities section 'Mending Peace - Imagining Reconciliation'), three representatives of the Sonson's collective exposed the textile to members of other sewing collectives, aid organisations, Colombian and UK researchers and people of the local community. They also explained how the co-designed helped them to think about reconciliation from novel different perspectives, which have empowered them individually and collectively. 
 
Title Documentation of emblematic textile pieces: Cartografía de Mampuján (Cartography of Mampuján) 
Description On Thursday 23rd of May, in the village of Mampuján, a public exhibition of 5 emblematic textile quilts made by the wavers of Mampujan took place in a public space with the aim of documenting the making of one of them. Researchers from the Colombian and UK research teams together with women wavers organised the the event, which was open to the public too. 5 emblematic textile tapestries were exposed: Mujer Pariendo ("woman giving birth", a woman-hearth figure giving birth to fruit and children called truth, justice, reparation, solidarity and guarantees of non-repetition), Diaspora (representing their African roots, with the figure of a boat of the Atlantic slave trade), Jovenes (youth in Mampuján), Humanizar y Resurgir (Humanize and Resurgence) and Cartografía de Mampuján (Cartography of Mampuján). Women weavers did a round of votes, and chose Cartography of Mampuján (Height: 1,45 cm; Width: 6.60 cm). Cartography of Mampuján is a croquis ("sketch") of Mampuján, in two senses. On the one hand, it represents the village of Old Mampuján; i.e. an accurate reproduction of the layout of the houses and the natural landscape. On the other hand, it represents the different people that lived there and their occupations of the time. 
Type Of Art Artistic/Creative Exhibition 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact The activity of collectively documenting the chosen textile piece facilitated spaces for common reflextion, discussion, empowerment and preservation of memory. The tapestry was made by the initial founders of group, for the second commemoration of the displacement of their village, Mampuján. Women did not want a piece about sadness and pain but a tribute to the old village of Mampuján, its beauty and happiness. Those that did not participate in the making of the tapestry reported that listening to the stories of the past whilst observing the quilt helped them reconnecting to their past, by recognizing the people who still live, discovering what they used to do and how life was in the old village. 
 
Title Documentation of emblematic textile pieces: Choibá atrateño & Fabric Dolls 
Description On the 09/05/2019 we documented two emblematic collective pieces chosen by the Choibá sewing group in a group meeting organised by researchers from Colombia and the UK. First, we talked about a large textile sheet ('Choibá atrateño', 81 x 118 cm) with an embroidered poem and images representing the forest, village and flowers of the Rio Atrato aimed at documenting how life by the river was before the forced displacement of people from their territory. On the panel, the Choibá tree, endemic by the Atrato river in the Chocó territory, is also embroidered, which was chosen as the symbol and name of their collective, for its resilience and strength. Then, we documented one of their first and one of their most recent black dolls. At the beginning of their sewing collective, women started making dolls for their children to have something to play with, during the forced displacement. With the time, they started selling dolls, which became their main subsistence strategy and a solidarity project. 
Type Of Art Artistic/Creative Exhibition 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact The conversations that emerged allowed a deep understanding of the Choiba group's history and of the impact that textile making has had on participants's lives. Texile work has enabled women to educate and economically sustain themseleves. It has also allowed them to heal from traumatic past, and explore issues of race and gender. The activity was well recieved by the Choiba group. It also allowed more recent members of the collective to learn about the past of their group and its founding members. 
 
Title El tiempo de la escucha (The Time of Listening) 
Description 'El tiempo de la escucha' (The Time of Listening) is a digital-textile prototype that merges the artisanal work of research participant women from the various sewing collectives with digital and design interventions by researchers in this project, other scholars, practitioners and students in craft, design, tech and reconciliation studies. The textile part of this prototype is a testimonial textile about the meanings of reconciliation made by participant women of the Artesanías Guayacán sewing collective (Bojayá, Quibdo, Colombia). The prototype also brings together the ideas and interventions made by the participants of the make-a-thon event in Nottingham in June 2019 (for more details look at engagement activties 'Minga Digital'). The prototype, with open hardware and software components, is activated by perceiving the proximity of a patch, which trigger the playing of a testimonial audio. 
Type Of Art Artefact (including digital) 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact During the closing event in Quibdo (for more details look at engagement activities Research Event: Remendar la paz - Imaginar la reconciliación), the prototype was presented and experienced in interaction with research participants from the various sewing collectives, visiting researchers from Colombia and the UK, members of local supporting groups and communities. The activity generated conversations around the testimonial audios played in interaction with the prototype and has helped to stimulate women to implement digital components in their textile work. 
 
Title Encomienda Sonora (Music Carrier Bag) 
Description Encomienda Sonora (Music Carrier Bag) is a digital-textile prototype that merges the artisanal work of research participant women from the various sewing collectives with digital and design interventions by researchers in this project, other scholars, practitioners and students in craft, design, tech and reconciliation studies. The prototype is made by sewing a spiral shape, using conductive thread, on a piece of fabric (stretched in an embroidery hoop). By connecting the conductive thread to a magnet and audio device, a testimonial audio will be played out the sewed spiral (so softly that it requires to place the prototype to the ear in order to listen to it). 
Type Of Art Artefact (including digital) 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact The prototype was developed collectively during the Minga Digital in Bogotá, which brought together students from different disciplines and universities with professionals in the areas of reconciliation, craft and tech. It was then presented and used in interaction with women participants during fieldwork visits. Participants made the prototype using conductive thread in order to play a testimonial message. The activity generated conversations around the importance of taking time for listening in relation to the theme of reconciliation in Colombia. It also enabled novel connections between the sewing groups and wider audiences and stimulated women participants to implement the prototype in their textile artwork. 
 
Title Quilt made by one research participant as appreciation to the research project 
Description In September 2019, members of the UK research group visited again Colombia in Quibdó, where the final event of the research project Mending the New was organized by the Colombian research team with representatives of all the sewing collectives (see Engagement Activities section 'Mending Peace - Imagining Reconciliation'). At the event, the UK team received a special gift made by one of the wavers of Mampuján: a quilt. The textile, which was exposed by the maker during the event, embodies shared memories of the fieldwork visits in the village of Mampuján in January and June 2019. In the quilt, the textile people, representing the artist, the visiting researchers and other women wavers of Mampuján, engage in various activities: the first meeting with the women of the group in an outdoor space of the community, the last meeting with the group in the Church of the village, a homemade meal at the maker's house and the departure of the visiting researchers under a thunderstorm. The textile summarizes many of the things we had learned in accompanying women participants in their daily lives, but especially the productive power of textile practices in creating relationships to continue supporting life in the midst of the death generated by centuries of conflict in their communities. 
Type Of Art Artefact (including digital) 
Year Produced 2019 
Impact The exposition of the textile piece during the closing event helped stimulating interest in the communities' work and the research project among the attendees of the event, which included invited representatives of three sewing collectives (i.e., from Sonson, Bojaya and Mampujan), all the members of the hosting sewing collective (Artesania Choiba, in Quibdo), Colombian researchers and visiting researchers from the UK, members of local aid organisations and communities. 
 
Description -The project has produced a unique documentation of crafting practices and textile artifacts of memory and reconciliation across four main women's sewing groups, in communities severely affected by the armed Conflict in Colombia.

-The project has also focused more broadly on processes of socio-ecological reparation in communities affected by conflict and has engaged academic researchers in diverse fields such as science and technology studies, sociology, anthropology, environmental humanities, design. These multiple outputs were achieved through the implementation of an innovative methodological research design for investigating textile crafting as a web of practices that sustain and are sustained by community building and community crafting.

-The project has contributed to the creation of spaces that have fostered trans-local dialogues and exchanges between different communities in Colombia, and between Colombia and the UK. For instance, during two make-a thon events, held at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá and the University of Nottingham/Nottingham Hackspace (UK), local stakeholders (such as members of the community, researchers, project managers etc) and expert makers (in our case textile crafters, software developers, interface designers, hardware technologists and audio experts) have worked together and collaborate intensively on the creation of novel testimonial textiles. The latter fuse artisanal textile artefacts with digital media to communicate, record and reproduce stories and experiences of the Armed Conflict and reconciliation. Women from the various sewing collectives have been engaged throughout the fieldwork visits to implement these new technologies in their textile work.

-The results of these creative collaborative work have been disseminated through academic publications, social media and blogs of crafting and maker communities as well as of research communities in the arts, humanities and social sciences. The project has also designed and produced, in close cooperation with the communities, an open publicly accessible digital archive of emblematic testimonial textiles from the participating sewing groups.
Exploitation Route The collective design and making of novel compositional objects 'digital testimonial textiles' constitute an innovative method for conducting research in the context of conflict and reconciliation, which can open fresh avenues for research practice within the arts, humanities, and social sciences. An important outcome of the project is the novel approach to reconciliation as a practice of community building that rests on collective and individual acts of exchange, learning, recognition and mutual involvement that take place within women's communities of textile crafting. This approach sheds new light on women's contributions to the work of memory, resistance and reconciliation in their communities and can informe inclusive approaches to collective memory of the Armed Conflict as well as reconciliation, for scholars and policy makers working in transitional justice and post-conflict societies. The project has also develop a unique approach to socio-ecological reparation which has been disseminated through various channels across a range of academic disciplines.
Sectors Communities and Social Services/Policy,Environment,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections
 
Description The project enabled societal impact for the involved sewing and crafting collectives and their communities in various ways: -The ethnographic work with women from the involved communities produced novel insights in their everyday efforts of reconciliation and reparation through textile making and other community practices in post-conflict Colombia. The project shows the effects of the armed conflict on women and contributes to gender equality by highlighting the importance of designing reparations specifically for women's communities that have suffered violence and displacement. -The methodological participatory framework involved the communities in the co-organisation of and participation in workshops for the co-designing of (digital) textiles and in public events that aimed to make their textile work visible. These events opened-up communal spaces for debating key themes (such as the meanings of reconciliation and socio-ecological reparation), sharing (textile) experiences and knowledge, as well as connecting the communities with each other, with the Colombian and the UK research teams, local populations and aid organisations. -The collective encounters helped sensitizing the public to the process of reconciliation, making artistic textiles that represent the experiences of the armed conflict widely accesible, informing public perception about the communities that are affected by the conflict. -The project has also impacted the research communities involved, by engaging early career researchers and students in design, (digital) craft, and socio-ecological issues related to reconciliation, as well as by stimulating new connections and collaborations for joint projects and publications between Colombian and UK researchers. -The project has produced a widely circulated theorisation of processes of community reparation of spaces affected by social and environmental conclicts across a range of locations in the Global South. It has produced a comprehensive account of a multiplicty of practices that aim to restore and repair damages social and ecological spaces.
First Year Of Impact 2020
Sector Communities and Social Services/Policy,Environment,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections
Impact Types Cultural,Societal
 
Title Digital Archive 
Description Open digital space for the documentation, conservation and consultation of documentary textiles produced by different groups in the country to narrate life in the midst of the armed conflict. The digital archive of testimonial textiles in Colombia is a space for the documentation, conservation, consultation and enhancement of testimonial textile practices carried out by groups of women in different parts of the country who, for more than 20 years, have mended and embroidered life, resisted and created textile documents that give an account of their trajectories and struggles in the midst of the armed conflict. 
Type Of Technology Webtool/Application 
Year Produced 2020 
Impact Conceived as an archive of human rights and historical memory, specialising in handmade textiles, it offers a model of documentation that integrates the political and material dimensions, in which each textile is considered as a non-textual document, an artefact of memory and a repertoire of action and knowledge in which textile work is grammar and narrative for making memory, elaborating mourning, denouncing and demanding justice. 
URL http://www.textilestestimoniales.org/creadores/
 
Description Make-a-Thon, Nottingham June 2019 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Study participants or study members
Results and Impact The 5-days make-a-thon event in Nottingham (Nottingham Hackspace, 6-10 June 2019) gathered together research members of the project from the Colombian and the UK research teams as well as other invited scholars and practicioners in related fields (such as arts, craft, design, and tech studies). The group worked collectively on the development of different digital-textile prototypes, which had been co-designed in the 'Minga Digital' event in Bogota in April 2019 and in conversation with research participants of the various sewing collectives. The digital-textile proptotypes developed during the make-a-thon in Nottingham were used in interaction with participants during a public event in Quibdo (September 2019, see the Engagement Activity 'Imaginar la reconciliación' for more details) with representatives of the various sewing groups, support organisations and local citizens.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description Minga Digital (Workshop to think about reconciliation with digital-textile technologies and work). 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach National
Primary Audience Undergraduate students
Results and Impact From March 27th to 30th 2019, the 'Digital Minga' workshop took place at the National University of Colombia in Bogota. The Digital Minga was specifically oriented to teaching/affecting the thinking and practice of a selected group of design students and researchers from a number of universities in Bogota (such as National University of Colombia and University of Los Andes); other students and researchers in reconciliation studies, politics and anthropology as well as from other Colombian universities (such as University of Antioquia in Medellin) participated too. Students and invited scholars in these fields collectively explored various meanings of reconciliation through the making of textile-digital pieces. The emerging discussions and material explorations informed the co-design and making of digital-textile prototypes for the next fieldwork visits in May and June 2020. Another outcome that the workshop brought was the creation of a community of design students/teachers in Bogota who have expressed their readiness to be called upon in any ways that would be helpful to the project going forward.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description Radio Interview (Quibdó) 
Form Of Engagement Activity A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press)
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Regional
Primary Audience Public/other audiences
Results and Impact Colombian and UK researchers were hosted live at Radio Universidad del Chocó 97.3, a local popular radio based at the University of Quibdó (Chocó, Colombia), to talk about the research project and particularly about the engagement with the research participant group based locally, in Quibdó and Bojaya (the artisanal group Artesania Choiba and Guayacan, respectively). The radio interview was organized by scholars of the anthropology department at Quibdó University, with longstanding relationships with the engaged communities and Colombian co-researchers. The interview, which was broadcasted live and streamed online on the radio's facebook page, enabled the dissemination of information about the project and the engaged sewing collectives to students and other members of the local community.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description Remendar lo Nuevo Evento Cierre (Mending the New Closing Event) 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Study participants or study members
Results and Impact The UK team was invited to participate in the zoom closing online event of the project, with scholars from Colombian and British institutions as part of the project, women participants from the four sewing collectives, representatives from supporters and charitable organisations as well as international postgraduate students and other invited academics. The event was organised by the Colombian research team to share the results of the project and opened up spaces of discussion for women participants to share their reflections on their participation in the project.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2020
 
Description Research Event: Remendar la paz - Imaginar la reconciliación (Mending Peace - Imagining Reconciliation) 
Form Of Engagement Activity Participation in an activity, workshop or similar
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach Local
Primary Audience Study participants or study members
Results and Impact The first stage of the project was closed with a 5-days gathering in the Colombian city of Quibdó (18-22 September 2019), which saw the participation of four representatives from each of the three visiting sewing groups and all the women members of "Artesanías Choibá" textile-collective, which hosted the event with the support of the dioceses of Quibdó. The event aimed at disseminating the project's results, and celebrating the artistic and resistence work of the women collectives, to broader audiences. The event took place in the convent of Quibdó, within the framework of the Quibdó's 'XV Alternative, Just and Solidarity Fair', a space for citizen participation. Women shared their processes and experiences of participation in the project and as women's organisations, through various activities: group discussions, interactions with the textile prototypes developed during the project (see the Artistic & Creative Products section) and textile workshops. Ultimately, the event opened up spaces for connecting the four sewing collectives among each other and with other members of the public and organisations that participated in the fair.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2019
 
Description YouTube Channel Ecological Reparation 
Form Of Engagement Activity Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel
Part Of Official Scheme? No
Geographic Reach International
Primary Audience Media (as a channel to the public)
Results and Impact This chnnael features more than 30 interviews with a diverse group of established and early career researchers addressing issues of reconciliation, restoration and reparation in places affected by social and environmental conflict. The researchers are located in different countries and their studies benefit primarily local communities in the Global South (such as Colombia, Chile). The audience includes researchers and postgraduate students, the general public and members of the communities involved in a multiplicty of studies discussed in the channel. The impact of the channel is towards increasing social resilience and strengthening local community initiatives for evnironmental sustainability.
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity 2022,2023
URL https://www.youtube.com/c/EcologicalReparation