Search

Drawing substantially on epistemologies developed in the context of vulnerable populations and responding to calls for greater epistemic justice in marketing research, an intersectional framework involving positionality, partiality, reflexivity, and situated knowledges is proposed to reflect on undertaking market research with Muslim minority populations in non-Muslim majority countries. This population is often highly vulnerable due to stigmatisation, Islamophobia and processes of othering that affect Muslim consumer behaviour, practices and identity. The framework is derived from reflexive experiences of market research undertaken by the authors on and with Islamic consumers both on an individual and collective basis and from relevant literature. The framework highlights the relational nature of the research experience and the situatedness and positionality of both the researcher and researched. In the case of research with Muslim populations we also draw out the significance of religious identity, ideology and religiosity; intersectionalities, including gender; and religious and cultural power as framed by cultural and institutional practices and which affect notions of class and attitudes to the other. We propose an approach that helps overcome Muslim/non-Muslim binaries that flatten the lived notions of the Muslim experience and consumption practices and instead provide for a richer and more representative account of Muslim identity. However, this approach also heightens researcher sensitivity to the situatedness of Muslims within social norms and the implications that this has for anonymity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This roundtable discusses the future of research in critical Kashmir studies through a close consideration of questions of power, ethics, and positionality that have come to the fore in recent years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Government developers have put up yet another portion of Harlem’s 125th Street for redevelopment. After a 2012 government-sponsored call for development proposals, state developers selected the National Urban League (NUL), a civil rights and urban advocacy organization that serves African Americans and other underserved communities, and Hudson Companies, Inc. for a $242 million development project—the Urban League Empowerment Center (ULEC), which will include the NUL as the lead tenant and will be accompanied by various retailers, other nonprofit organizations, and housing units. In this student showcase essay, I reflect on my experience writing an opinion piece in an urban sociology course about the construction of the ULEC and the story of cross-sector urban development behind it. By bringing primary source documents and relevant course readings into conversation with each other, I was able to revise my understanding of the hidden layers of urban development and the actors that were involved in these processes. Additionally, writing an op-ed that put these sources into conversation allowed me to reflect on my own positionality and relationship to the processes of neighborhood development under study.

This article questions the absence of clear reflexivity and positionality in EU migration law research and it explores how they could be integrated through the real-life example of its author. While they are not usually part of the methodological tools of researchers in EU migration law, this article intends to show that they might be crucial to better understand its underlying processes. As EU migration law has a major influence on the lives of both migrants and those who research it, reflexivity and positionality could be a way for a dialogue to be acknowledged between them as part of the research itself. This article is presented as an ‘exploration’ rather than a theoretical contribution strictly following regular academic structures. As such, it is mostly articulated as a narrative using extended metaphors to convey the entanglement between the state of mind of the researcher and the evolution of her research process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This text is a personal essay written by Dana Lloyd, reflecting on her experiences and struggles as an academic writer. She explores the concept of positionality and the challenges of finding her own voice in her academic work. Lloyd also discusses the controversial figure of anthropologist Alfred Kroeber and his treatment of Indigenous peoples. She contemplates the importance of imagination and the need to transcend boundaries in academic writing. Ultimately, Lloyd reflects on her own journey to find her voice and the impact of her father's absence on her identity. [Extracted from the article]

The article is my ASHE Presidential Address from 2013 – it has not been substantially revised or updated. It is a reflective piece on my journey in academia, with a particular focus on the role of personal identity in research. The piece begins by discussing my initial belief in the importance of maintaining objectivity in research by distancing personal identity from my work. This belief was rooted in the traditional academic notion that research should be "objective" and "distanced." My position, however, evolved as I came to realize that my positionality was not objective but was instead problematic. This realization was not immediate but was the result of years of reading, studying, and being influenced by other scholars. In this piece I share an "aha moment" that greatly influenced my professional and personal life. This moment led to a significant shift in my approach to research, making privilege and awareness central to my work. The essay includes not only my perspectives on this matter, but also those of my colleagues in the field in the form of data as well as vignettes. The paper concludes by encouraging other academics to acknowledge their personal identities and experiences as fundamental parts of academic discourse – to engage in me-search. This perspective challenges traditional notions of objectivity and distance in research, suggesting a more inclusive and self-aware approach to academia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous literature has shown that generative artificial intelligence (GAI) software, including large language model (LLM) chatbots, might contribute to qualitative research studies. However, there is still a need to examine the relationships between researchers, GAI technologies, data, and findings. To address this need, our team conducted a thematic analysis of our reflexive journals from an LLM chatbot-assisted research project. We identified four roles that researchers adopted: managers closely monitored the LLM's work, teachers instructed the LLM on theories and methods, colleagues openly discussed the data with the LLM, and advocates worked with the LLM to improve user experiences. Planning for and playing with multiple roles also helped to enrich the research process. This study underscores the potential for using conversational roles as a framework to support reflexivity when working with GAI technologies on qualitative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While advocates and urbanites regard the housing crisis as a major challenge, federal and city officials seldom act with the urgency demanded of them by their constituency, of which a growing number is either unhoused or housing insecure. The aim of this paper is to study this crisis from the perspective of those most affected and contribute to a debate mostly dominated by economic and policy-oriented approaches. My use of testimonios collected in Washington, DC, between 2019 and 2022 reworks how knowledge on the housing crisis is constituted and highlights both the relational and collective knowledge production by those most affected by changes in the real estate economy. The goal of this paper is to stress the political potential and agency of people who tell their stories as they fight to (re)claim lost and threatened places and battle to protect their homes and neighbourhoods. On a broader scope, this paper sees value in everyday experiential knowledge and questions whose narratives of place are valued, in an effort to bring forth a new methodology in geographic housing research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

AbstractThe paper highlights the crucial role of positionality and reflexivity in understanding knowledge creation and research processes, drawing on my experience as a pregnant woman conducting semi-structured interviews with policy elites. Previous literature has acknowledged the impact of appearance and gender on the research process. By employing an adapted self-presentation technique during the interviews, observable effects on the research process were noted. This paper shares my observations as a researcher before and after disclosing my pregnancy. Participant reactions revealed clashes in expectations, worldviews, and meanings within the interviews’ initial moments. The positive experience demonstrated that pregnancy facilitated access to policy elites, recruitment of additional interviewees, and initiated meaningful dialogues, shedding light on the role of positionality and reflexivity in fieldwork. My open vulnerability, transparency in disclosing personal information, and accessibility enhanced participant reciprocity and diminished perceived threats, fostering engaging and profound conversations. These findings underscore how the distinctive attributes of the pregnant body—consciousness, vulnerability, power, and fluidity—significantly influence key methodological aspects, shaping the epistemological process of knowledge creation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the ongoing 'reflexive turn' in migration studies, intimacy continues to be cropped out of methodologies. This article explores how intimacy can enable us to produce knowledge in a way that is grounded in and sensitive to our participants' lives. We reflect on our experiences of building intimacy during our two respective ethnographic projects. While one project analyses the solidarity practices of citizens and migrants at the Franco–Italian border, the other explores the experiences of a Romanian family in London. Although researching seemingly divergent topics, we find methodological convergences and come together to propose the concept of 'intimacy as method'. Positionality is central to intimacy, as who we are as early-career female researchers shaped how we built intimate and caring relationships with our participants. Cultivating intimacy, however, also presented challenges, including ethical considerations in how we conduct research, and how we represent our interlocutors and engage them in knowledge production. In sitting with the discomfort which is central to intimacy, we found its analytical potential as it granted us novel insights into our participants' lives. By reflecting on both the potential and challenges of intimacy, we argue that migration researchers can use 'intimacy as method' to conduct more equitable research in migration studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article attempts to further develop the positionality of place through aggregated effects of vision construction by different positioned actants. We attempt to integrate two concepts: the feminist positionality that stresses the subjects' situatedness in networks and their relational power of vision constructions in host places and the networking behavior of brokers with their exclusive connections to small world clusters, as argued by international relations network analysis. Our attempts at the bodily level of situated and subjective vision construction aim to address two challenges: first, how to address the entanglement of geopolitics and biopolitics, and second, how do encounters account for the power of a place premised on its areal resources through the behavior of brokers. The institutionalization of special economic zone development in Cambodia, from the introduction of new norms to law-making and planning, is chosen as a case for its dynamic process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Canadian universities have pledged to Indigenize education and hired Indigenous Curriculum Specialists to implement this commitment. These new higher education employees, however, face limited resources for, and resistance to, their work. To move forward, Indigenous Curriculum Specialists are calling for fruitful dialogues between them and their interlocutors at all levels of decision and policy making. This article exemplifies and promotes such dialogues, by presenting a written version of the sharing circle the authors had about their experiences with implementing an Indigenous Curriculum Specialist-led Indigenization initiative. Readers are then invited to draw on the circle's main themes—positionality, responsibility, and Indigenized practices—to reflect on the differentiated responsibilities they are themselves called upon to assume in Indigenizing post-secondary education from their own position. It is only through engaging all beings in this conversation that we will contribute to shared understandings and responsibility for the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We draw on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Brussels (Belgium) on the health care experiences of undocumented migrants. We explore the implications of the double position of the ethnographer, who is both a researcher and a practicing doctor. We describe how the intimate knowledge the ethnographer-cum-clinician holds about the health care system influenced and shaped the data collection, analysis and subsequent policy recommendations. We examine the ethical dilemmas in conducting research from an engaged position about care practices toward vulnerable populations in one's own professional field. We conclude with recommendations on how to challenge and interrupt complexities faced by multi-positioned ethnographers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivated by the leadership, scholarship, and activism of Indigenous Peoples, there are growing calls to transform and decolonize Canadian institutions that govern fisheries research in Canada. As a predominantly non-Indigenous group that works at the intersection of fisheries and justice, we encounter questions daily about how to act as allies in these efforts and take up this urgent call in our own work. Our goal with this perspective is to synthesize and share some of what we have learned about encountering and combatting colonialism in the hope that it may offer something to other non-Indigenous and settler fisheries researchers who are grappling with colonization in their own work. This synthesis is based on both Indigenous scholarship and our own experiential learning. We look to actions fisheries researchers may take to advance Indigenous sovereignty in fisheries research. We offer this to our fellow non-Indigenous researchers who likely also struggle with similar questions, and hope that in doing so, we can help move towards decolonial fisheries futures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For many disabled people, violence can become an unwanted, yet ordinary part of everyday life. Often, these crimes are attributed to understandings of disabled people as vulnerable and largely, passive victims. Attending to the aims of this special issue, this paper aims to dismantle these stereotypes and attend to the unique ways that disabled people can resist and respond to hate crime through creative and collaborative research practices. Building upon this, I argue that there is a pressing need for hate studies researchers to work "with" and not "on" those who have experienced targeted violence. Working in this way builds upon long-standing efforts of disabled activists and disabilities studies researchers to challenge reductive research practices by working in more collective and inclusive ways. To demonstrate this, I reflect upon a project working in partnership with disabled people to create a disability hate crime toolkit. The toolkit, now published, shares accessible and informative resources that can be used to raise awareness about disability hate crime. While the focus of this paper is disability, I consider methods of collaboration, co-production and participation that can be drawn upon by researchers to respond to hate crime and interpersonal violence more broadly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article starts from two observations about archival description. First, creating finding aids requires significant judgment and interpretation, and is therefore inevitably influenced by the positionalities—the perspectives, personal histories, and social identities—of the archivists. Second, finding aids occasionally call for revision, sometimes to fit a new data standard or reflect an evolving collection, but also to correct errors, reduce bias, and remove harmful language. In light of these observations, this article has two aims. First, it develops and presents a theoretical rationale for recording metadata about finding aids, including revision history and authorship, arguing for transparency about positionality as a response to recognizing the infeasibility of impartiality. Second, it presents the results of a survey of state archivists in the US, who were asked about their descriptive practices and their attitudes regarding disclosing their authorship of finding aids. Results of the survey reveal diverse practices, as well as some hesitation to embrace expressions of positionality in the context of description. The article closes with a discussion of options for conceptualizing metadata about finding aids and the professional role of archivists, concluding with two general recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arguments about risk and uncertainty are prevalent in marine decision making. Different, often invisible, starting positions of those involved - regarding world views, academic disciplines and positionality - are often responsible. Broadly agreed collective outcomes depend on uncovering these influences. In this article we prioritise navigating multiplicity and plurality rather than constraining them. An iterative cycle of reflection and an openness to make changes are central. However, such a cycle must consider how risk assessment tools open or close possible futures, how evidence is best presented to decision makers, and how mātauranga Māori is reshaping risk perceptions and is the decisive intervention in creating improved decision-making spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Decolonization as a term and concept gained prominence in the 20th century as new nations emerged from the cessation of the global colonial project which primarily saw European countries occupying different parts of the world. In modern times, interests in decolonization have taken different forms, particularly in learning design and digital learning spaces. In the digital space, researchers mainly suggest introducing indigenous perspectives and cultural lenses in the design of digital learning environments and the design of emerging technologies that embed indigenous perspectives). This reflexive essay discusses the importance of positionality in digital learning spaces and learning/instructional design. While acknowledging that existing approaches are critical, and often center marginalized groups or voices in decolonization, we also argue that the current landscape may resemble a free-for-all regarding who can engage in decolonization. We further contend that positionality and the implications of these positions need to be discussed more in the emerging literature on decolonizing digital learning spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores diverse ethical considerations related to the study of vulnerable population groups to produce meaningful project outcomes that avoid harm to the involved communities. In the specific context of the intersex community, previous analyses have encountered various challenges, including the medicalization of intersex people's bodies, the use of pathologizing language, and misrepresentation of the population's needs. The article explores some of the beliefs, experiences, and tools that experts in research ethics, researchers, and intersex research participants consider most important regarding research ethics in intersex-related studies. The article is based on original empirical research; semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 participants, recruited through email and snowball sampling methods, and the data were examined using thematic analysis. It moves from issues related to the research design (positionality, researcher preparation, framing intersex within the LGBT acronym) to experiences related to the research development (ethical approval, informed consent process, language use, relationship of trust). The article describes some of the major concerns and raises discussions that could be relevant for the development of future research under human rights-based perspectives. The findings are aimed to be useful beyond the field of intersex-related studies, as they can be relevant to research about other communities that have endured violations of their human rights during research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1869, the year the Suez Canal was completed, visits to Egypt and, therefore voyages to the Orient were increased. Crowned royals such as Prince and Princess of Wales, French Empress, Prince of Prussia, Austrian Emperor, Prince and Princess of Holland, and Duke of Aosta went on these voyages, which included cities like Alexandria, Cairo, Istanbul, and Athens. What makes these crowned royal's travels to the Orient in 1869 distinguishing and worth investigating is the presence of women. Examining on the Istanbul part of the voyages, this research accepts women as historical actors. It aims to interpret European women's gaze on both Ottoman Istanbul and their 'other', local Muslim women, through their time-space experiences. This paper focuses on travel narratives produced by the women in the suite of British and French crowned royals in the 1869 travels to decipher women's real time-space experiences. Levant Herald (LH), a local newspaper published daily in Istanbul, was also examined to grasp locals' perspectives simultaneously. While emphasizing the [un]met expectations of both counterparts' (guest/local), this paper discovers diversifying positionalities of women towards their other and reveals their heterogeneous gaze. Although women's gaze -and thus narratives- contain many orientalist codifications, their gender privileged time-space experiences challenge and disrupt some of the stereotypes and prejudices prevalent in the male-dominated literature of the period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent environmental events in land, coastal and ocean domains in Aotearoa have raised serious questions about risks and uncertainties connected with natural resource decision‐making at all levels and in all places. Evidence from consenting processes associated with proposed investments in seabed mining of Chatham Rock Phosphate and sub‐division development at Okura, Auckland City, illustrate the presence and nature of three key but often invisible influences – personal positionalities, discipline assumptions and worldviews – affecting decision processes. Readers are invited to go on a 'risk journey', of discovery, to help develop their capabilities to engage in investment decision‐making processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical epistemologies and methodologies have over time challenged the static and mono-dimensional approaches to fieldwork, allowing researchers to contemplate and conduct their research in spaces of in-betweenness. Despite this important shift, the essentialist idea that both 'the field' and 'home' in a fieldwork setting must be actual places persists. In this article, we challenge the conceptualization and operationalization of 'home' not only as the juxtaposition to 'the field', but also as the embodiment of a place in a specific temporality. We argue that the postulation of 'home' as a constant disregards the non-predetermined and unpredictable nature of fieldwork relationships that are often complicated by implicit and explicit power dynamics, especially in places researchers identify as 'home'. We demonstrate that unequal power relations, especially (1) between the Global North and Global South, (2) between majority and minoritized groups, (3) among genders, and (4) between elites and non-elites, require us to envisage 'the field' and 'home' in relative terms. We propose the reconceptualization of fieldwork place as a hybridized space that conjoins 'the field' and 'home' as 'field-home', particularly at a time when research mobility is restricted by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this way, we extend the literature on issues related to power, positionality and reflexivity in qualitative research, and provide practical insights for those preparing for fieldwork. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers' reflexivity usually focuses on the spatiality and sociality of their ethnographic fieldwork. As a result, the temporal context of their positionality, whereby their various identities interact with one another at different research phases, is often overlooked. This paper adopts an agentic intersectional approach and draws from our separate studies of Thai migrant women in Belgium and Hong Kong to unpack the temporality of the power dynamics between study participants and us (the researchers). Through this reflexive exercise, we identify three salient aspects: first, different identities of the researchers intersect at each phase of the study; second, researchers are dependent on gatekeepers and study participants, notably during the data-gathering phase; and third, the changing researcher–participant dynamics throughout the research process are embedded in broader relations of power that encompass social institutions and migrant/ethnic networks. Hence, researchers' self-discipline and constant awareness of positionality are of utmost importance for achieving well-situated knowledge (re)production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qualitative research is, oftentimes, an emotional, relational, political and intellectual rollercoaster ride. This heightens the risk of methodological, ethical and relational fallouts. Constructivist grounded theory enables researchers to confront the multiple ways in which deeply embedded aspects of identity, personal values, biases and emergent research relationships impact the research process. In this article, we demonstrate how a reflexive stance in constructivist grounded theory enhances bracketing and loosens the grip of both positionality and methodolatry. The discussion draws on the lived experiences of conducting and supervising autobiographically inclined doctoral research. The article underscores the need for a strong reflexive stance, not just during fieldwork, but right from the onset, at the conceptualisation stage. A reflexive stance, on the part of both students and supervisors stands to benefit the decolonisation project and can help guard against epistemic violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Positionality statements have become increasingly popular in research articles, particularly in qualitative studies. While these statements aid readers in situating the researcher's perspective in their lived experience, we do not often extend the same level of thought to the location where the research occurs. This Perspectives piece aims to provoke human resource development (HRD) researchers to consider including a Positionality of Place statement in their studies to describe the situatedness and intersectional aspects of the research site. We contend that this will bring appropriate attention to the complex, entangled position of research sites as part of local, regional, and global systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is based on the 2022 Earle F. Zeigler Lecture Award that I presented in Atlanta, Georgia. For this paper, I reflect upon my career as a qualitative sport management researcher, with a specific focus on the mistakes I have made. I have two objectives with this paper. One objective is to advocate for continued learning about and rethinking how we conduct qualitative research. The second objective is to highlight ways in which we, as a field, can improve our qualitative research literacy. In the paper, I discuss eight learnings on the topics of ontologies and epistemologies, research designs, themes, pseudonyms, rigor, generalizability, positionality, and the publisher SAGE. In learning from my mistakes, we can be better consumers, producers, and evaluators of qualitative research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Background An array of evidence shows how the presence of implicit bias in clinical encounters can negatively impact provider-patient communication, quality of care and ultimately contribute to health inequities. Reflexive practice has been explored as an approach to identify and address implicit bias in healthcare providers, including medical students. At the Lausanne School of Medicine, a clinically integrated module was introduced in 2019 to raise students’ awareness of gender bias in medical practice using a reflexivity and positionality approach. The purpose of this study is to describe the gender bias that were identified by medical students, analysing their types, places and modes of emergence during a clinical encounter. It further explores how positionality supported students’ reflection on the way in which social position modulates their relationship to patients. Methods As part of the teaching activity, medical students individually reflected on gender bias in a specific clinical encounter by answering questions in their electronic portfolio. The questionnaire included a section on positionality. We qualitatively analysed the students’ assignments (n=76), applying a thematic analysis framework. Results Medical students identified and described gender biases occurring at different moments of the clinical encounter (anamnesis (i.e. patient history), physical exam, differential diagnosis, final management). They causally associated these biases with wider social phenomena such as the gendered division of labour or stereotypes around sexuality and gender. Analysing students' reflections on how their position influenced their relationship with patients, we found that the suggested exercise revealed a major contradiction in the process of medical enculturation: the injunction to be neutral and objective erases the social and cultural context of patients and impedes an understanding of gender bias. Conclusion Gender biases are present in the different steps of a clinical consultation and are rooted in broader gendered social representations. We further conclude that the tension between a quest for objectivity and the reality of social encounters should be made explicit to students, because it is constitutive of medical practice.

Abstract The purpose of this exploratory study is to present a discussion on new developmental perspectives for international social work (ISW) theory. In order to examine the various aspects of this theory, the author first discusses different theoretical social work frameworks. Since some aspects cannot be discussed according to these frameworks, three main perspectives are applied to examine these ISW theoretical assumptions: (1) the roots of ISW; (2) ISW actors, practitioners, and scholars; and (3) the future of ISW. A new ISW definition is then introduced, after which several proposals are presented to revitalize the discussions on future ISW theory that moves beyond the dominant ISW discourses largely based on Western-rooted professional social work, and related aspects such as positionality and language issues. In this regard, using new ISW viewpoints and recognizing the importance of emotional experiences in such perspectives will not only allow academics and practitioners to move forward, but will also help overcome the dichotomies between ISW theory and practice as well as between the West and the rest.

Constitutions and antidiscrimination provisions tend to compartmentalise and operationalise ethnicity through religion, ethnic origin or country of origin, nationality, language and race. The growing focus on religion and race contributes to the entrenchment of ethnicity in religion and race, and this is not always fruitful. This article argues that antidiscrimination law should explicitly and robustly integrate ethnic identity as a protected (personal) characteristic in domestic law, independent of any other descriptors that may be recognised, and independent of existing group-based protections. Furthermore, this article argues that anti-discrimination infrastructure needs a provision of positionality and liminality. The concept of positionality facilitates the recognition of power dynamics present in the ascription of otherness, as well as the potential incongruences between identity ascription and actual self-identification. The concept of liminality enables the consideration of fluid and more flexible forms of self-identification across multiple public and private spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paradigm of modernity is associated with human detachment from soil as the agricultural and affective foundation of modern societies. The focus on soil as a resource has created increasingly exhausted landscapes. Soil science is well placed to (re)build the urgently needed connection between humans and nature by generating evidence for soil functioning and, perhaps most importantly, by establishing linkages with diverse types of soil knowledge and integrating them in collaborative solutions. Such transdisciplinary solutions can be achieved by transforming current ways of doing soil science, which begin with soil scientists. Anchored in feminist and critical thinking, we used the 'reflecting and doing' framework (Lopez et al., 2023) to demonstrate how reflexivity can help soil science to become a transformative space. By partially dissolving the mind–heart and human–soil dualisms, we can foster a way of generating soil knowledge that emerges from the relations within and beyond the human Self. Such an approach is relatively new in academic soil science, which relies heavily on the scientific method as a detached form of knowing that privileges mind over body, reason over emotion, culture over nature and production over reproduction. We argue that this journey starts with (re)positioning ourselves as soil scientists in relation to our research and advance a Transformative Soil Science that recognizes soil knowledge as situated and embodied and that identifies soil as the main ally for a sustainable world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: An array of evidence shows how the presence of implicit bias in clinical encounters can negatively impact provider-patient communication, quality of care and ultimately contribute to health inequities. Reflexive practice has been explored as an approach to identify and address implicit bias in healthcare providers, including medical students. At the Lausanne School of Medicine, a clinically integrated module was introduced in 2019 to raise students' awareness of gender bias in medical practice using a reflexivity and positionality approach. The purpose of this study is to describe the gender bias that were identified by medical students, analysing their types, places and modes of emergence during a clinical encounter. It further explores how positionality supported students' reflection on the way in which social position modulates their relationship to patients. Methods: As part of the teaching activity, medical students individually reflected on gender bias in a specific clinical encounter by answering questions in their electronic portfolio. The questionnaire included a section on positionality. We qualitatively analysed the students' assignments (n=76), applying a thematic analysis framework. Results: Medical students identified and described gender biases occurring at different moments of the clinical encounter (anamnesis (i.e. patient history), physical exam, differential diagnosis, final management). They causally associated these biases with wider social phenomena such as the gendered division of labour or stereotypes around sexuality and gender. Analysing students' reflections on how their position influenced their relationship with patients, we found that the suggested exercise revealed a major contradiction in the process of medical enculturation: the injunction to be neutral and objective erases the social and cultural context of patients and impedes an understanding of gender bias. Conclusion: Gender biases are present in the different steps of a clinical consultation and are rooted in broader gendered social representations. We further conclude that the tension between a quest for objectivity and the reality of social encounters should be made explicit to students, because it is constitutive of medical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Equity in action starts with a leader's critical consciousness in relation to their identities, ideologies, and positionalities. In this essay, the following factors: ideologies, identities, and positionalities are explained and emphasized as they are essential factors that impact equity work. Leaders who center equity must explore their own critical consciousness through an equity lens so that they prioritize equity at the forefront while leading, collaborating, and making decisions in their leadership positions. The positionality of leaders is also critical on how they use their power to influence their community and amplify the voices of the underrepresented. One subset of the findings, Equity in Action, from my dissertation, Asian American Community College Presidents: The Power of Identities, Ideologies, and Positionalities is included in this essay. To set the foundation of the dissertation, the SEL framework, also known as the shared equity leadership framework (Kezar et al., 2021) is used to analyze how leaders build their own capacity in equity work. In addition, my positionality and development as an equity leader are reflected in this essay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we, two transnational doctoral students and language educators of color, engage in a reflexive dialogic conversation focusing on the positionality of our identities. Utilizing duoethnography research methodology, we explored our academic and professional journeys in post-secondary education in our home countries and an Anglophone context. A discussion on negotiating our positionalities in our immediate academic, professional, and sociocultural contexts is provided. We argued that unveiling one’s positionality requires a prolonged reflexive engagement that assists in establishing quality in qualitative research and exploring fluidity in positionality. We closed with implications and invitations to use duoethnography as a path to self-exploration, solidarity, and allyship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this exploratory study is to present a discussion on new developmental perspectives for international social work (ISW) theory. In order to examine the various aspects of this theory, the author first discusses different theoretical social work frameworks. Since some aspects cannot be discussed according to these frameworks, three main perspectives are applied to examine these ISW theoretical assumptions: (1) the roots of ISW; (2) ISW actors, practitioners, and scholars; and (3) the future of ISW. A new ISW definition is then introduced, after which several proposals are presented to revitalize the discussions on future ISW theory that moves beyond the dominant ISW discourses largely based on Western-rooted professional social work, and related aspects such as positionality and language issues. In this regard, using new ISW viewpoints and recognizing the importance of emotional experiences in such perspectives will not only allow academics and practitioners to move forward, but will also help overcome the dichotomies between ISW theory and practice as well as between the West and the rest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a cyclical nature to the dilemmas confronting international donors willing to operate in Myanmar. Brief periods of relative openness led to rapid surges in development assistance, regularly interrupted by long phases of military rule and disengagement by donors. Amidst all this, many predicaments remain. This article engages with one of them: the inequality between regions. How have international donors reacted to the issue of domestic regional inequality? Recent studies suggest that official development assistance (ODA) does not target poor regions very well, but it is not always clear why this is the case. Myanmar's sudden, yet uneven and unequal liberalization from 2011 to 2021 catalyzed huge inflows of ODA, while it also confronted donors with new policy dilemmas. The article shows that aid providers struggle with the problem of rising regional inequality, especially for political reasons. Donor and recipient interests often do not align well on this issue. In the case of Myanmar, donors who press for regional inequality to sit prominently on the agenda might fare less successfully than those who address the issue indirectly. The article concludes that regional inequality and the politics of targeting deserve a more central role in the political economy of ODA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

African doctoral students studying abroad and returning to their home countries for fieldwork face multiple and complex challenges. This paper reflexively addresses the question of positionality from the experiences of conducting research on urban governance and the spatial politics of street traders in Harare, Zimbabwe. The paper discusses dilemmas associated with navigating insider and outsider identities, showcasing how these categories continually shift while conducting research on street traders within a distinct socio‐cultural and political context. Moreover, the author's background as a former street trader, now pursuing a PhD at the University of Western Ontario in Canada, adds a layer of complexity to the situation, offering valuable insights into how these 'multiple' positionalities can either facilitate or hinder data collection. The paper underscores the nuanced experiences of the researcher in the field, shedding light on the potential challenges, pitfalls and opportunities inherent in grappling with one's positionality. By foregrounding these complexities, the paper contributes to our understanding of the positionalities of researchers in the social sciences and adds to the growing body of literature on methodologies for conducting urban studies, particularly with vulnerable populations. The paper discusses dilemmas of being insider and outsider and how these categories are shifted constantly while researching street traders in a unique socio‐cultural and political context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research note is a contribution to the growing body of literature discussing the methodological, ethical and personal questions of researching queer issues in Central Asia. Through reflective engagement with my own fieldwork experiences and participant interactions, I critically discuss how I have often found myself both a 'queer insider' and a 'national outsider' at different times and in different eyes. These simultaneous positions intersect to inform and influence my research on queer migration in Kazakhstan. While, so far, my queer insider position has often helped build relationships and trust, for some participants my national outsider position proved more complex: on occasion marking me out as a potential problem, and on occasion as a likely non-judgemental or open listener. By examining these shifting dynamics I hope to contribute to deeper understandings of the ethical considerations of cross-cultural queer research in Kazakhstan, Central Asia and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research involving young people is a challenging process that requires managing relationships with diverse individuals and groups, including the young participants and their various gatekeepers. While it is normally assumed that the researcher is in overall control of their research, by using a Foucauldian conception of 'power as effects' that operate in the form of relations and through discourse as the articulation of norms, this paper discusses how, in practice, the researcher can lose control over their research and so be forced into making substantial compromises concerning the nature and extent of the data they can collect. I do this by reflecting on my experience of conducting research involving UK secondary school students using online data collection methods during the Covid-19 pandemic. I identify several factors that generated power effects which influenced the conduct of the research, including: an ethics review that relied on a simplistic discourse concerning young participants' (in)competence; my own self-regulation of my conduct in respect of 'ethical' research; my 'positionality' in the field; and a researcher's general dependence on participants and gatekeepers to complete their research. I conclude by reflecting on how these factors may impact upon the conditions for viable social research involving young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on my experiences as a doctoral student undertaking a project to examine the professional adaptation of Asian immigrant teachers in Australia. Using a reflexive narrative approach, I examine how my position influenced my access to participants, the understanding of their contexts, and the nature of my relationship and interaction with the participants. The paper discusses the tensions that resulted from my insider-outsider positions and how they shaped my qualitative study's research process and outcomes. I conclude with recommendations for researchers to carefully consider the possible influence of their positionality in any research setting and its implications for informing future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses the implications of qualitative research on migration in terms of reflexivity and positionality. In particular, it presents research as care, revolved around three main critical nodes of reflection: the epistemological importance of emotions, intersectional positionality and the ethics of care. Drawing upon the insights concerning a qualitative research on migration in Italian shrinking areas, the contribution underlines the importance of conceiving research as a process of negotiation. Moreover, it shows how positionality in qualitative migration research is not static but flexible, and is conditioned by different emotionalities emerging during the fieldwork. In this sense, the continuous negotiation that exists between researchers and participants can imply affectivities and kinship that valorises the relationships created during the research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the current trends in conducting ethnographies, with time and funding limitations and the need to reflect on the researcher's positionality, this article explores the implications of conducting ethnographic fieldwork in a mixed team (in terms of gender, race and nationality) with highly vulnerable populations in a context of crisis. To that end, the article analyses the experience of conducting a team ethnography with African migrants in Tijuana, Mexico. While the study did not start with a self-awareness of what a team ethnography implied, as fieldwork developed the gender, race and nationality of both interviewees and researchers became crucial elements to produce a meaningful multi-layered, multiply-positioned ethnography. This article argues that methodological flexibility and the researchers' relationship with themselves and the respondents are vital elements that require further experimentation in ethnographic research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Engaging in 'reflexive practice' throughout the research process (Benson and O'Reilly, 2022) and a 'reflexivity of discomfort' (Hamdan, 2009) through an intersectional lens, this article presents a reflective account of accessing and conducting observations and interviews at a South Asian women's organisation, in North England, to explore Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslim (PBM) lone motherhood. It critically explores how researchers' own subjectivities and intersecting identities – in this case, my intersecting identities and positionalities as a young British Pakistani Muslim women, researcher and volunteer – impact interactions in different circumstances with different groups of participants and the importance of having continuous critical self-awareness. Moving beyond simplistic insider–outsider debates, the paper contributes towards further developing reflexivity debates taking an 'intersectional reflexivity' approach. It argues for thinking about the research process and engagements in the field as socially constructed, changing, adapting and negotiated overtime and to utilise intersectionality to unpick broader categories. Finally, it encourages researchers to adopt reflexivity in their research practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to the growing literature on researcher reflexivity by broaching the often-ignored issue of religious positionalities within political science, as well as speaking to the methodological implications of researching religion more broadly. We present and compare two autoethnographic case studies of research on politico-religious conflict in Vietnam and Lebanon, exploring how a researcher's religiosity presents unique fieldwork challenges, opportunities and insights. We then discuss the ambivalence faced by religious researchers within the highly secularised academic environment, thus blurring the artificial dichotomy between 'the field' and the academy. Our reflections centre around three findings: (1) the importance of taking an intersectional approach which neither essentialises nor ignores religious aspects of positionality, whilst also being sensitive to spatial and temporal shifts in how they interact with a researcher's gender, ethnicity, class and other identifiers; (2) the opportunities and perils of a researcher's apparent religious common ground with participants (or lack thereof) in building rapport and negotiating a degree of insider status; and (3) the similarities and differences between suspicions of religious partialism during fieldwork and within academia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carrying out research in and on conflict-affected contexts requires entering and negotiating within local and global fields of power. Yet the tensions and wider geopolitical positioning of the field are often relegated to the sidelines in empirical texts. This editorial opens a special issue on reflexivity, relationships and complicity in education in emergencies (EiE) research. The issue straddles concern with the macro dynamics that shape EiE as a field; the micro dynamics at play within research teams, especially as these intersect with geographic, geopolitical and identity-based inequities; and the interpersonal, political and ethical dimensions of researcher reflexivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we scrutinise the importance of researchers' positionality vis-à-vis the 'Global South'/'North' binary in the field of international and comparative education. Accounting for the different places we speak from, we reflect on our past experiences as doctoral researchers examining teachers' role as agents of peace and/or conflict in divided and (post-) conflict societies. In doing so, we challenge the rigidity of the 'North'/'South' demarcation as a singular marker of insider/outsider status. Instead, we propose hybrid positions that are susceptible to change over time and in relation to socio-political contexts and structural power relations. To conclude, we situate our experiences along an intersecting insider-outsider and decoloniality continuum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using Philippians 1:27–2:4 as an example, this article will explore the role of positionality in biblical studies. Although the process of reflecting on one's positionality is more prevalent in empirical-based research, one's positionality is also relevant in text-based research, such as in biblical studies. This article will demonstrate this by observing the following: first, how some analyses of the collectivistic cultural context of Philippians have been inappropriately influenced by certain implicit individualistic perspectives; and second, how an interpretive lens derived from my positionality as a scholar from an explicitly collectivistic culture is able to highlight a mostly ignored intrinsic correlation between social relations and virtue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we consider the ethical obligations that LGBTQIA+ researchers have in researching LGBTQIA+ rights. First, we consider the potential impact of identity and positionality. Although people of all LGBTQIA+ identities share common experiences of marginalisation and persecution, there is much diversity among LGBTQIA+ people and their many intersections. We then propose that LGBTQIA+ researchers should act as 'internal allies' when undertaking work related to LGBTQIA+ communities. The familiar concept of allyship imposes obligations which are dynamic, appropriate for the research context and align with community expectations. These obligations include self-education, consultation and platforming marginalised voices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reads Anna Letitia Barbauld's affective encounter in 'The Caterpillar' (1825) in the light of her broader entomological writing for both adults and children. It investigates the recommendations for attention to the small and the particular in her didactic work alongside the narratives of insect subjectivity and insect metamorphosis in her occasional and lyric verse to assess the poet's contribution to an ecological mode of writing in this period. This uncovers a key tension in Barbauld's communication of insect worlds, reflected in the conclusion of 'The Caterpillar', where the affective encounter exposes the inescapable otherness of the human observer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]