Can Action Research Methods Help Address the Digital Social sustainability Gap?: An Evaluation and Refinement of the ENRICHER Methodology using PAR

Abstract

The digital social sustainability gap narrative (O'Neill, and Stapleton 2022) endeavours to address the digital social sustainability gap by using digital technology for social benefit i.e. opening up dark archives in the digital cultural heritage area. It raises issues of the interoperability between institutions for knowledge sharing, thereby breaking the disciplinary silos and also breaking the data silos within institutions. It argues for multidisciplinary collaborations, the valorisation of tacit knowledge of co-researchers so that technology does not replace the work of the human but forms a beneficial human machine symbiosis. Further it provides an insight into the ethos-centric perspective of the ENRICHER method developed by the INSYTE-Cooley Research Lab (I-CRL). This study uses an experimental technique within the Participation Action Research (PAR) methodology to valorise human tacit knowledge and intellectual capacity so that they are placed at the heart of the development process. Action research with a combination of the Human Centered Systems (HCS) approach to systems development are combined so that a multidisciplinary group with diverse world views can collaborate to create a new human centered framework for the digitisation of cultural heritage.