Experiencing and Situating Data

Data walks as an explorative method in ethnographic reserach

Abstract

The article takes various approaches and experiences with data walking as a starting point to systematically discuss current proposals for experimentally combining walking, observation and data/knowledge production. It addresses both historical precursors of methodological walking in urban research (e.g. perceptual walk, strolling, dérive) and their updated and expanded use in the course of digital mass data. The potential of data walks is explored, on the one hand, as an explorative instrument in (participatory) ethnographic research, and on the other hand, as a possibility - which can also be used in teaching - to examine what data is, how it is produced and experienced, and how it captures and co-produces social worlds. This allows to foreground the materiality and situatedness of data (its production as well as its consequences) in life worlds. A basic recipe for a data walk and possible variations as well as an example complete the article.