4th International Diaconia Webinar: Blurring the Boundaries: New Research in Practice for Diaconia and Social Ministry

Friday 17th November 2023 at 9-12 Central European time / 10-13 Eastern European (Finnish) time

Welcome to join us in mutual learning and discussions on how research can be embedded in and contribute to the everyday practice of diaconal workers. In their engagement with people, diaconal and social workers are challenged by the need to develop relevant responses to rapid and often disruptive contextual changes. Daily they gather a lot of information from their grass-root presence with people, but they tend not to analyse it to inform practice.

In this webinar we will focus on exploring how we can develop ‘research in practice’ and ‘research on practice’. We will create an open space for discussion and invite contributions from innovative developments in the field of practice research. This will include participatory action research, the ways in which research can support strategies for transformation and emancipation and new developments in the field, where ethnographic research becomes a form of practice.

The webinar organisers invite practitioners, researchers, students, and others interested in the field. It will be in English.

Programme

9.00 – 10.30. Welcome, introductions, input & discussion

Keynote input ‘Blurring the Boundaries’ Tony Addy (Austria, UK), Advisor: interdiac

Discussion in small groups

10.30 – 10.45. Coffee break

10.45 – 11.30. Presenting ‘local cases’ and perspectives:

• The relevance of research in practice – the experience of the FBO ‘Living Hope (Odessa, Ukraine)

Nicole Borisuk (Ukraine), the director of FBO ‘Living Hope’, Odessa, Ukraine

• Voicing the people in least powerful positions. An example from research in drop-in centers in the Netherlands

Thijs Tromp (the Netherlands), endowed Professor of Diakonia at the Protestant Theological University in Amsterdam

• Pedagogy for research in practice

Oksana Prosvirnina (Ukraine, UK), Program Leader, interdiac, Czech Rep

Short discussion after each presentation

11.30 – 11.50. Panel discussion with Q&A to the speakers

11.50 – 12.00. Conclusions and closing of the event

For more information, please get in touch with Oksana Prosvirnina, Programme Leader in the International Academy for Christian and Social Action, Central and Eastern Europe.
Email: seniorlecturerop@interdiac.eu

The webinar programme is jointly organised by Diaconia University of Applied Science and the Finnish Church Council (Finland), VID Specialized University (Norway), the Protestant Theological University (The Netherlands) and the International Academy for Christian and Social Action in Eastern and Central Europe (interdiac). It is an activity of the CODE Forum.