Dear Chinatown, DC: Exploring New Ways of Public Engagement

Abstract

Today, Chinatown's role as a place of cultural heritage, belonging, and identity is at risk of being erased. Past and present residents in Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown experience increased alienation from their own neighborhood.. Through this design-based research project, Dear Chinatown, I connect the neighborhood's assets and cultural activities to inform place-keeping strategies in Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown. As capital, privatized interests, and speculative real estate development continues to shape neighborhoods across D.C., the design of participatory planning models led by governing agencies becomes critical. Through principles in place-based education (PBE), participatory action research (PAR) and research through design (RtD) methodologies, this investigation tested and evaluated an approach to public engagement that: 1) generates a proactive versus reactive process model; 2) forms new networks and collaborations and builds capacity; 3) generates a process that is adaptable and flexible; and 4) meets where people are already at and leverages existing assets and resources. The key findings and outcomes of the project revealed the value of new networks and collaborators and intergenerational convening, as well as both the need for improvements and reduction of obstacles in accessibility and data quality. Social groups within D.C. Chinatown's longtime community are diverse, dynamic, overlapping, and sometimes at conflict with one another. As such, a one-size-fits-all approach to engagement does not work. This project affirms that design for engagement has a role to play in cultivating people's complex ties to place.