"Are You Still Recording?" Considering Black Feminist Methodologies in Educational Narrative Research With Vulnerable Populations

• In Event: Pray You Catch Me: Dreaming Possibilities for Freedom Through Critical Feminist Epistemologies, Methodologies, and Pedagogies

Abstract

Qualitative educational research that seeks to humanize rather than dehumanize is based on a reciprocal relationship between the researcher and the people(s) being studied, requiring multiple considerations (Paris & Winn, 2013). Some of the most important considerations include the critical evaluation of the epistemologies that undergird the history of ethnographic research as a method - which is deeply tied to European imperialism - as well as the context of the relationship between the researcher and the “participants”. As Smith (1999) notes, early ethnographic accounts “were generally the experiences and observations of White men whose interactions with indigenous ‘societies’ or ‘peoples’ were constructed around their own cultural views of gender and sexuality” (p. 8). Scholars of color interested in ethnography as a methodology have initiated reconsiderations of these founding epistemologies, demanding that race, gender and positionality be taken into account to disrupt historically rooted ways of conducting research and building knowledge (McDougal, 2014; Nielsen, 1990; Wilson, 2008).

In qualitative and narrative-based research that centers the stories, identities, and experiences of marginalized peoples, scholars of color have demanded that researchers consistently and continuously engage in reflexive processes. This reflexivity must critically identify moments of potential concern and steer away from playing into the maintenance of oppressive structures and patterns (Tuck and Yang, 2012). As noted by educational researchers as Paris and Winn (2013), humanizing research requires a consistent interrogation of the power relations and hierarchies that undergird how a researcher enters into a relationship with those who they are studying - particularly when studying marginalized peoples in institutional contexts like schools.

This presentation will build on these epistemological and methodological concerns, particularly as they relate to the processes of conducting observational and interview-based research with Black women. I conducted a research project that centered the educational narratives, identities, and linguistic/literate pursuits of seven Black transnational women from the Caribbean, East Africa, and Europe. Framed by a Black and transnational feminist, anticolonial approach, this study sought to produce theory that could adequately contextualize the narratives of the participants and situate them in the fabric of their fraught sociopolitical and educational landscape. I will explore the methodological implications that emerged from interviews with three Black women who were particularly vulnerable (i.e. due to lack of documentation, anti-Muslim rhetoric and/or anti-Black violence when the study was conducted). Despite longstanding relationships that existed between the researcher and the three Black women, vulnerability impacted the research process, particularly with respect to the production of audio recordings and ethical considerations of representation. It raised important questions of when to record conversations and interviews, and when to rely on note-taking to remove data from being included into a document in order to heed the womens’ wishes and honor their fears. Therefore, this presentation will be guided by the following questions: What does it really mean to be a anticolonial, Black feminist researcher? How can we continue to push forward new methodological approaches that can do better work in investigating important narratives while offering more protections for the most vulnerable?

Author

• Tanja Burkhard, University of Pittsburgh