Researcher Identity, Reflexivity, and Positionality

Al-Ali, N., & Pratt, N. (2016). “Positionalities, Intersectionalities, and Transnational Feminism in Researching Women in Post-invasion Iraq.” In A. Wibben (Ed.), Researching War: Feminist Methods, Ethics and Politics (pp. 76–91). Oxon & New York: Routledge. [Link]   

Bahati, I. (2019). The Challenges Facing Female Researchers in Conflict Settings. The Bukavu Series. June 10. [Link]

Bond, K.D. (2018). “Reflexivity and Revelation.” Qualitative and Multi-Method Research, 16(1): 45–47. [Link]

Bouka, Y. (2015). “Researching Violence in Africa as a Black Woman: Notes from Rwanda.” Research in Difficult Settings (Blog). [Link] 

Bressmer, J. (2020). “Reflections on Unlearning Whiteness during Research Fieldwork.” Africa at LSE (blog). January 28. [Link]  

Brigden, N., & Hallett, M. (2020). “Fieldwork as Social Transformation: Place, Time, and Power in a Violent Moment.” Geopolitics, 0(0), 1–17. [PDF]  

Brown, S. (2009). “Dilemmas of Self-Representation and Conduct in the Field.” In C. Sriram et al. (Eds.), Surviving Field Research: Working in Violent and Difficult Situations (pp. 213–226). London & New York: Routledge. [Link] 

Calvey, D. (2018). “The Everyday World of Bouncers: A Rehabilitated Role for Covert Ethnography.” Qualitative Research, 19(3), 247-262. [Link] 

Davenport, C. (2013). “Researching While Black: Why Conflict Research Needs More African Americans (Maybe).” Political Violence at a Glance (Blog). [Link]

Driscoll, J., & Schuster, C. (2018). “Spies Like Us.” Ethnography, 19(3), 411–430. [Link] 

Gillespie, K., & Lopez, P. J. (Eds.). (2019). Vulnerable Witness: The Politics of Grief in the Field. University of California Press. [Link]

Hartman, A.C., Khan, S., Lake, M., Karim, S., Cheema, A., Liaqat, A., and Khan Mohmand, S. (2022) “Field Experiments on Gender: Where the Personal and Political Collide.” PS: Political Science & Politics 55, no. 4: 764–68. [Link]

Henderson, F. B. (2009). “‘We Thought You Would Be White’: Race and Gender in Fieldwork.” PS: Political Science and Politics, 42(2), 291–294. [Link] 

Hermez, S. (2017). “In the Meanwhile: Theory and Fieldwork in Protracted Conflict.” War Is Coming: between Past and Future Violence in Lebanon, Chapter 1. University of Pennsylvania Press. [Link] 

Johansson, L. (2015). “Dangerous Liasons: Risk, Positionality, and Power in Women’s Anthropological Fieldwork.” Journal of the Anthropological Society of Oxford, 7(1), 55–63. [PDF] 

Marchais, G. (2020). “Contemporary Research Must Stop Relying on Racial Inequalities.” Africa at LSE (blog). January 30. [Link]  

Mertens, C., Perazzone, S., & Laudati, A. (2020). “Ethics and Identity in Globally Unequal Structures of Research.” Africa at LSE (blog). January 27. [Link]  

Mohamed, S. Q. (2020). “Spontaneity in Fieldwork is Essential to the Situated Researcher.” Africa at LSE (blog). February 3. [Link]   

Muchukiwa, B. (2020). “Surviving Life-threatening Intimidation as a Researcher.” Africa at LSE (blog). June 24. [Link]  

Ortbals, C. D., & Rincker, M. E. (2009). “Embodied Researchers: Gendered Bodies, Research Activity, and Pregnancy in the Field.” PS: Political Science & Politics, 42(2), 315–319. [Link] 

Pacheco-Vega, R., & Parizeau, K. (2018). “Doubly Engaged Ethnography: Opportunities and Challenges When Working with Vulnerable Communities.” International Journal of Qualitative Methods. [Link] 

Parashar, S. (2019). “Research Brokers, Researcher Identities and Affective Performances: The Insider/Outsider Conundrum.” Civil Wars, 21(2), 249–270. [PDF]

Roxburgh, S. (2017). “Read Black and White: Decolonizing African Studies in North America.” Research in Difficult Settings. [PDF]

Schulz, P. (2021). “Recognizing research participants’ fluid positionalities in (post-)conflict zones.” Qualitative Research, 21(4), 550–567. [Link]

Schwedler, J. (2006). “The Third Gender: Western Female Researchers in the Middle East.” PS: Political Science & Politics, 39(3): 425–428. [Link]

Thaler, K. (2019). “Reflexivity and Temporality in Researching Violent Settings: Problems with the Replicability and Transparency Regime.” Geopolitics, 0(0): 1–27. [Link]

Thapar-Björkert, S., & Henry, M. (2004). “Reassessing the Research Relationship: Location, Position and Power in Fieldwork Accounts.” International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 7(5), 363–381. [Link]

Thomas, L. (2018). “Dear Political Science, It Is Time for a Self-Reflexive Turn!” Duck of Minerva. [Link]

Thomas, L. (2018). “Unmasking: The Role of Reflexivity in Political Science.” Qualitative and Multi-Method Research. 42–44. [Link]

Thompson, M. (2009). “Research, Identities, and Praxis: The Tensions of Integrating Identity into the Field Experience.” Political Science & Politics, 42(2), 325-328. [Link] 

Townsend-Bell, E. (2009). “Being True and Being You: Race, Gender, Class, and the Fieldwork Experience.” PS: Political Science & Politics, 42(2), 311–314. [Link]

Verdery, K. (2018). My Life as a Spy: Investigations in a Secret Police File. Duke University Press. [Link]

Vogel, C., & Musamba, J. (2022). “Towards a politics of collaborative worldmaking: Ethics, epistemologies and mutual positionalities in conflict research.” Ethnography, 14661381221090896. [Link]

Winfield, T. P. (2021). Vulnerable Research: Competencies for Trauma and Justice-Informed Ethnography. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 08912416211017254. [Link]

Yacob-Haliso, O. (2018). “Intersectionalities and Access in Fieldwork in Post-conflict Liberia: Motherland, Motherhood, and Minefields.” African Affairs, 118(470), 168–181. [Link]