Aesthetic Experiencing: The Sandtray as Qualitative Method

• In Event: Sunday Roundtable 9:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Qualitative Inquiry Through the Senses (Table 40)

Abstract

Drawing on Dewey's theory of aesthetics, in this paper, I discuss the potentialities of adapting the experiential therapy, sandtray, for qualitative data generation. During interviews, the sandtray process invites participants to create microcosms of their worlds using figurines placed in trays of sand to re/describe, re/member, and re/orient to their experiences. Through an exploration of participants' and my own reflections of a recent sandtray project, I provide ethical, relational, and practical implications for future research. The concepts discussed in this paper include holding a playful attitude, creative sensing, aesthetic imagining, intersubjective withness, and blurring divides. I conclude by discussing how sandtray research asks inquirers to disrupt transdisciplinary boundaries, complicate supposed art and science divides, and engage collective ways of knowing.

Author

• Lorien S. Jordan, University of South Florida