I took advantage of some increasingly rare downtime this afternoon to continue writing up the results of the Makerspace study. While I hope that we can get shape this into a fully submittable form at some point before my sabbatical in July, my project for today was to massage the results from the naturalistic observations into a narratively digestible format.
I remember doing this observations, almost a year ago now, and honestly thinking that these weren’t much, these tiny thoughts. Part of the goal of having me carry out this exercise, of course, was to fumble towards the futility of objective research. I’m not connected to the space; I don’t have a preconceived picture of it on any scale. I don’t have built relationships with the users there. I’m almost surprised when I find patterns in my own notes, the same words used over and again in disperate sessions.
A note from my very first session reads, “I can see that being unobtrusive will be difficult. People want to talk to me.” And then, in talking through the observations with the staff, hearing their thoughts about their influences on the space culture. It’s the same for the library as a whole of course, not to mention the university, but in these larger spaces we lose sight of it: there is no firm line between users and staff, and for a productive pedagogical culture, we don’t really want there to be. Learning is playing, discussing, and collaborating, and the way that works best is when no one is truly separate.