Moving Between Cultures Through Arts-Based Inquiry

"This book explores and develops critical and creative methods for coming to terms with and finding balance between identity formation and migration across root and adopted cultures."
-Geraldine Burke, Researcher and Teacher-Educator at Monash University, Australia.
"Dr Wang's book is emergent and of interest to therapists, researchers and those curious about how cultural identity may be affected by immigration, how using arts-based critical autoethnography may facilitate inquiry into subjective topics, and how such inquiries may themselves become healing experiences. Her book meaningfully contributes to explorations of cultural transition, hybridity and blending."

-Deborah Green, Head of School, Creative Arts Therapies, Whitecliffe, New Zealand.
This book is an exploration of the concept of in-betweenness, as it occurs within the process of moving between the author’s root culture and adopted culture, from her perspective as an immigrant arts therapist. Through the critical autoethnographic voice, she introduces a unique exploration site within the process of Guqin-making, an ancient Chinese art form. Through the creation of images and poetry, and through Guqin-making and music-making/playing, the book expands the discussion of in-betweenness by re-theorising ancient Chinese philosophical perspectives on harmonic space. This contribution to arts-based research provides a unique standpoint to explore research methods of moving, walking, making, resting and awakening. It showcases how other researchers can transfer the invisible and intangible embodied feelings, memories and emotions arising from moving between two or more cultures into visible and tangible images, narrative, poetry, craft and music-playing to conduct powerful, interdisciplinary arts-based research.

​Ying (Ingrid) Wang is a post-doctoral research fellow at the Centre for Arts and Social Transformation, University of Auckland, New Zealand. Her current research interests include arts-based research in arts therapy, education, wellbeing, community resilience and social transformation.