Researching Experiences: Exploring Processual and Experimental Methods in Cultural Analysis

In the beginning was - not the word - but the experience. This phenomenological approach provides the basis for this book, which focuses on how a person-in-situation experiences and constructs meaning from a variety of cultural visual events. This book presents video-based processual methods for researching experiences in a variety of settings ranging from the museum, to news photography, and interactive media. The research led to the development of a set of methodological tools and approaches we term the reflexivity lab. The interaction in the experimental situation between the media and body, dialogue, moods, values and narratives have been investigated qualitatively with more than sixty informants in a range of projects. The processual methodological insights are put into a theoretical perspective and also presented as pragmatic dilemmas. Researching Experiences is relevant not only for students and researchers in media and communication studies but also for practitioners within the fields of media, communication and experience design.