Presentation Schedule
Curate My Life (106432)
Session Chair: Velina Hasu Houston
Tuesday, 12 May 2026 10:20
Session: Session 1
Room: Room G409 (4F)
Presentation Type: Oral Presentation
This practice-based autoethnographic thesis investigates how identity and cultural integration are lived and negotiated within the UK Cantonese diaspora. Moving beyond treating identity as static, it positions artistic practice as the primary method for generating and sharing knowledge.
As a Cantonese woman from Guangzhou living in the UK, I use autoethnography as my core methodology. Here, artistic practice including exhibitions, performances, workshops, photography, and video, is the research process itself. It transforms lived experience and emotional memory into sites of ethnographic inquiry.
The project is structured around a series of interventions titled Curate My Life | 揾揾自己. These events create spaces where identity is performed and co-produced with participants, generating "living archives." Knowledge emerges through hospitality, participation, and direct encounter, not detached observation.
The research follows a geographic trajectory from London to Guangzhou and back. Work in London established initial inquiries, while the Guangzhou exhibition provided a comparative foundation. The final London iteration synthesizes these, focusing on diasporic everyday life. Using practice-based methods like shared meals, singing, and ritualized performance, it captures the sensory and emotional dimensions of belonging.
Conceptually organized around Love, Life, Death, and the Unknown, the thesis demonstrates how art can function as rigorous ethnographic research. It proposes a "practice-based autoethnography" model where exhibitions act as structures for gathering and analyzing data. Ultimately, it argues that identity is not simply possessed, but actively produced through creative practice.
Authors:
Yuran Lin, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, United Kingdom
About the Presenter(s)
Miss Yuran Lin is a University Doctoral Student at University of Wals Trinity Sanit David in United Kingdom
See this presentation on the full schedule – Tuesday Schedule
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