Community Perspectives on University-Community Research Collaborations: Addressing Epistemic Injustices and Ethical Challenges

• In Event: AERA Poster Session 9
  In Poster Session: Action Research: Research or Practice-Based Inquiry?

Abstract

The field of university-community partnerships has largely focused on the researcher perspective on the collaborative process, documenting challenges such as lack of scholarly recognition and the extended time required for ethical and epistemically fruitful collaboration. This study focuses instead on community partner perspectives, and centers voices from representatives of 15 community organizations in distinctive community-engaged research projects. We share lessons from their perceptions of research and their academic research partners, including their motivations for partnering, the benefits they accrued and the challenges they faced. We highlight the ethical issues and concerns to redress epistemic injustices as frameworks for a set of critical questions if the field is to achieve the epistemological, ethical, and social justice missions of the university-community partnerships.

Authors

• Rebecca A. London, UC Santa Cruz

• Sheeva Sabati, California State University - Sacramento

• Saugher Nojan, San Jose State University

• Ronald David Glass, University of California - Santa Cruz