PERCEPTIONS

The PERCEPTIONS project is producing relevant and creative outputs: a web platform for policymakers and first-line practitioners, policy briefs that summarise key insights for policymakers, and creative awareness materials for first-line practitioners, local community activists, and migration organisations. To maximise the project’s impact, results are presented.

In January 2022, the PERCEPTIONS web platform was launched. This platform is directed to two target groups, namely policymakers as well as first-line practitioners working with migrants. It provides both groups with key outputs of the PERCEPTIONS project in the form of articles summarising main project findings, policy briefs, tools such as the PERCEPTIONS Handbook, and creative materials, as well as external resources which include a social media dashboard. Developed by SYNYO, the web platform is currently tested and validated with the end-user groups to identify further needs for development and improvement.

Creative awareness materials for first-line practitioners, local community activists and migration organisations

PERCEPTIONS partners have designed a creative framework for materials and services for first-line practitioners, civil society organisations, local community activists and migrant organisations. Within this framework, creative awareness materials are shaped, building on the findings of the baseline and empirical research conducted in the course of the project. These findings outline migrant perceptions of Europe, information channels used to transmit narratives, the role of media and technologies in shaping migrant perceptions and decision-making, and links between narratives and threats to both hosts and migrants. Bringing together creative approaches and existing good practices, the creative awareness materials offer potential solutions to addressing mismatches between migrants’ expectations and realities of journeying to the EU, as well as reconciling conflicting narratives about the effects (such as threats, insecurities) created by migration on host countries and itinerant people themselves.

In the form of case studies, partners have developed the following approaches under the umbrella of ‘re-energising good practices’, ‘Encouraging experimentation to avoid routinisation of approaches’, and ‘Re-envisaging the ‘narrative’ and ‘perception’ as key terms in the PERCEPTIONS project’:

• Expressing migration through dance;
• ‘Locked out of Lockdown’: COVID-19 and Its Effects on Migration Narratives, Migrant Realities and Institutional Responses;
• Visualising Migration Through Drawing & Collage;
• Developing Twitter bot to disseminate information, encourage debate and share research findings and resources;
• Imagining PERCEPTIONS findings through an engagement with film: DYSTOPIA
• E.D. (Reframing the European Dream) Carpet.

Translating research into action

PERCEPTIONS partners have conducted baseline and empirical research, as well as social media analyses, offering comprehensive and relevant insights into the effects of perceptions and narratives on migrants. With the aim of fostering knowledge exchange, sharing best practices, and building research and innovation partnerships between the participants of the project and beyond to develop academic and innovation capacity for long-term sustainable growth, PERCEPTIONS is producing policy briefs since March 2022.

To widen the impact, together with nine other EU-funded research projects, PERCEPTIONS has organised a joint policy roundtable to bring together researchers, practitioners, journalists, and policy-makers to discuss the potential of re-interpreting existing narratives, to present good practices resulting from the ongoing projects, and to inform political decision-making processes. This event offered a rare opportunity to engage with various researchers and practitioners from 34 countries including 21 EU countries, representing a total of 135 institutions.

A summary of the event, recordings and further information is provided online: https://inclusive-europe.com/

In addition, PERCEPTIONS partners will be presenting relevant insights at conferences such as IMISOCE Conference 2022 and St Andrews University 3rd International Conference on Migration and Mobilities. Furthermore, a black and white feature-length film, set in Valencia, Spain, is in progress. Directed by Samuel Sebastian in collaboration with the PERCEPTIONS team at Swansea University, the film draws on PERCEPTIONS research. The film focuses on SPAIN, a homeless migrant and the film’s main protagonist. “Spain is different”, reads the text on her t-shirt; however, she speaks a different language (Lingala), has uncertain legal status and precarious financial standing. During her encounters in Valencia, the feelings of invisibility, disorientation, and fear accompany her.

Links

https://www.perceptions.eu/

https://inclusive-europe.com/

Keywords

Perceptions, narratives, first-line practitioners, migration, platform