1. Steppin’ in it: postcoloniality in northern Pakistan.
- Author
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Besio, Kathryn
- Subjects
- *
POSTCOLONIALISM , *CROSS-cultural studies , *RESEARCH - Abstract
This paper examines the transcultural relations between researchers and research subjects in a postcolonial research setting. I draw from my experience doing dissertation research in northern Pakistan to discuss how my research subjects’ effectively constructed me as a sahib, or what I saw as a colonial subject position. I examine the ways that my research subjects and I co-constructed, although unequally, my position and location as a researcher. The asymmetries of power relations in research are exacerbated by postcolonial relations in this contact zone. The contribution of those I researched is significant towards understanding our locations as postcolonial subjects in this research setting, and the location from which I produced the research. While it was difficult to do research as anyone other than a sahib during my research, the stories I tell and metaphors I employ in this paper attempt to destabilize my location as a colonial sahib, an authority. The scatological references that run throughout this paper are an attempt to write against the inherently colonial epistemologies that underpin geographic research more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2003
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