What community?

Notions of 'community' are still taken-for-granted in Participatory Design discourse, omitting critical examination of how people participate in projects to achieve and evaluate community-based participation and outcomes. This paper critically reflects on challenges and obstacles faced when using participatory design methods in engaging a 'community' on bushfire risk awareness. Bushfires are a critical and continuous threat to residents living in regional areas of Australia. Through this project, we identified a critical communication problem in bushfire awareness and preparation caused by 'fragmented' networks among a 'community of place'. This fragmentation contributes to significant communication obstacles in community-level preparation for bushfires. This research explored participatory design 'scaffolds' to capture, share and visualise locally relevant knowledge vital in mitigating bushfire risks. These methods facilitated awareness and revealed tacit knowledge on who and what community is. Critical reflection of the project examines how such methods have the potential to facilitate the creation of sub-groups gathered around a common cause. And has also built understanding to avoid 'imagined' notions of a community that can hide social heterogeneity.