Abstract

In this presentation I introduce a mapping device we have been using in our work to think about how knowledge, narrative, and work are framed at emerging institutional interfaces, in this case between patient involvement and animal research. This specific interface involves both networking and what we have called fretworking. The rise of formal practices of Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) can be seen as an interdisciplinary networking activity that develops new connections between patient groups and laboratory animal research, with the promise to address gaps in research systems, from translational relevance to public understanding. However, these interfaces also inherit the absences and ambiguities of earlier conversations around animal research, such that encounters are structured as much by affective negotiation with these gaps – what we call fretwork – as they are by the construction of new research relations. Patients struggle with complex ethical roles and responsibilities; practitioners are apprehensive about how to manage potential public and lay members concerns; researchers are unsure about how to translate lay-knowledge into research practices. We have used a mix of interviews, participant observation, and workshops to map the fretted structure of patient involvement with animal research and make these visible for all participants with the aim of enhancing reflexivity and the capacity for more meaningful and equitable encounters. In conclusion, I reflect on how geographers more broadly might operationalise methodologies that engage the patterns between knowledge control regimes (Hilgartner, 2017) and the politics of exclusion within entanglements (Giraud, 2019).