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Navigating Positionalities in Social Justice Doctoral Research: Continua to Support Transparency in Academic Reportage

Sun, April 27, 8:00 to 9:30am MDT (8:00 to 9:30am MDT), The Colorado Convention Center, Floor: Meeting Room Level, Room 107

Abstract

This paper reports on a transatlantic research collaboration between two university-level schools of education and focuses on how positionality is experienced by doctoral scholars researching in the social justice arena. The investigation was situated in the qualitative sphere and over twenty doctoral students participated. The findings illustrate how doctoral scholars construed positionality as a binary and, in particular, how they problematised insider positionalities because of bias perceptions. This problematisation exposed tensions on the form that social justice research should take, given that it has historically been associated with insiders aiming to make familiar contexts more equitable. The paper concludes by presenting continua for navigating positionalities to support transparency and mitigate perceived problems associated with it in academic reportage.

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