2024: A year of transition and closure of Eastern Cape Teen Advisory Group

In 2023, young research advisors from Eastern Cape Teen Advisory Group (EC TAG) were invited to co-develop methodology with our research team towards ethical closure and conclusion of four years (2019-2023) of collaborative participatory research focused on health, development, resilience and well-being. An invited book chapter formed the foundation for participatory engagement and TAG group closure, and will be published in 2024. EC TAG was established in 2019 as a participatory sub-study of HEY BABY, with three objectives:

(1) co-generate empirical data;

(2) build methods “co-laboratories”, where participatory and arts-based methods are developed and tested in partnership with adolescents and young people; and, most importantly,

(3) shift power during the research process.

During this period of transition and closure, participatory methods were explored and applied with the group of 13 young research advisors aged 20-24 years, providing and utilising creative materials in multiple youth-friendly settings. Choice of method; data co-generation, analysis and interpretation; and writing of the collaborative book chapter were co-directed by TAG young advisors, and took place across four iterative gatherings. The gatherings varied from 1-day focused workshops to a 3-day residential analysis and writing retreat and concluded with small working group gatherings guided by themes identified in the analysis.

In this book-chapter process, the role that advisors previously played shifted from participants and advisors to researchers: undertaking each step in the research process themselves, with continuous support and mentorship from our research team. The research team’s researcher-facilitators also became participants, aiming for their experiences to complement those of TAG advisors in the final chapter. Throughout 2023, participatory work engaged with patchwork ethnography as both a method and a theory and included slow and reflective processes of co‑research and continuous informed consent.

A closing ceremony took place in December 2023: a gathering of all young advisors who participated in EC TAG and their close relatives. Guests participated in creative activities as well as a visual exhibition, commemorating and celebrating EC TAG’s outputs and achievements since its founding in 2019.

The book chapter “Reflecting on a Teen Advisory Group in participatory adolescent health research in South Africa” will be published in an edited collection by A/Prof Caroline Lennette entitled Anti-Colonial Research Praxis: Methods for Knowledge Justice will be published by Manchester University Press in 2024.