On/offline visual ethnography image and text - Ancoats, Manchester 2016

Abstract

The contemporary visual analysis of urban space reveals a great deal, specifically when the process is repeated over time. Longitudinal studies carried out in particular sites or with specific communities for example, help to better frame our understanding of an environment. These long-term investments enable researchers to collect data, which might not be immediately noticed. This process allows for connections in spatial, social and cultural practices to be drawn out, becoming visible over weeks, months or years depending on the scale of the project.

Ancoats, Miles Platting and New Islington:

The images below are ‘researcher-produced images’ (Pauwels, 2008) that form part of a bigger and more extensive photographic survey (Krase and Shortell, 2014). The photographic images presented represent just one aspect of an informal ethnographic undertaking within the inner city residential areas of Miles Platting and Ancoats. Located on the north-eastern edge of Manchester, in the North West of England. The survey (of which there are more than 600 images to date) presents a visual record of the physical and social streetscapes within a 1.5 mile radius and a maximum 0.8 mile distance from the Manchester city centre boundary.