Negotiating Researcher Identity and Positionality in Research With Immigrant Students: Casting a Reflective Gaze

• In Event: 61.070 - Sheraton Roundtable 10 - Osgoode Ballroom
  In Roundtable Session: 61.070-7 - (Re)Thinking Auto-Ethnography and Biography

Abstract

The purpose of this auto-ethnographic study is for two qualitative researchers to cast a reflective gaze on their researcher identity negotiation during their individual research projects investigating immigrant students’ identity development and learning experiences. The analysis shows that during the research process, the two researchers’ identities were contingent, constructed, and complicated by their negotiation of racial identities; their relationships with the research participants; and the power relations that were embedded in the research context. This study underscores the need for researchers to recognize the complex work of identity negotiation and positioning between researchers and their study participants, and how this negotiation shapes the research in process.

Authors

• Don McClure, St. John's University

• Kongji Qin, New York University