The impact of COVID-19 on conducting research is far-reaching, especially for those scholars working for or alongside communities. As the pandemic continues to create and exacerbate many of the issues that communities at the margins faced pre-pandemic, such as health disparities and access to resources, it also creates particular difficulties in collaborative, co-developed participatory research and scholar-activism. These forms of community engagement require the commitment of researchers to look beyond the purview of the racialized capitalist and neoliberal structures and institutions that tend to limit the scope of our research and engagement. Both the presence of the researcher within the community as well as deep community trust in the researcher is required in order to identify and prioritize local, often counter-hegemonic forms of knowledge production, resources, and support networks. The pandemic and similar conditions of crises has likely limited opportunities for building long-term, productive relationships of mutual trust and reciprocity needed for PAR while communities refocus on meeting basic needs. The pandemic has now not only exacerbated existing disparities and made the need for engaged, critical and co-creative partnerships even greater, it has also abruptly halted opportunities for partnerships to occur, and further constrained funds to support communities partnering with researchers. In this paper we highlight accomplishments and discuss the many challenges that arise as participatory action researchers are displaced from the field and classroom, such as funding obstacles and working remotely. An analysis of experiences of the displacement of the scholar exposes the conflicts of conducting PAR during crises within a state of academic capitalism. These experiences are drawn from our work conducting PAR during COVID-19 around the globe, both in urban and rural settings, and during different stages of engagement. From these findings the case is made for mutual learning from peer-experiences and institutional support for PAR. As future crises are expected, increased digital resources and infrastructure, academic flexibility and greater consideration of PAR, increased funding for PAR, and dedicated institutional support programs for PAR are needed.

Saltwater intrusion, erosion, and periodic flooding during severe storms are some of the critical problems bedeviling the precarious coastal environment of Nigeria. A time-lapse study aimed at monitoring the dynamics of saltwater intrusion within the coastland surrounding Ibeno, southeastern Nigeria is presented. Three (3) vertical electrical soundings (VES) and four time-lapse electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) profiles with minimum and maximum electrode spacing of 5 m and 40 m and profile lengths of 120 m and 150 m respectively were acquired in 2016 and 2017 using the Wenner and Schlumberger arrays. Data acquired from the field surveys were modeled with WINRESIST and RES2DINV software to generate 1D and 2D resistivity images of the subsurface. The VES results with a maximum survey length of AB = 300 m revealed a four-layer KH curve. The 2D geo-electrical sections delineated contrast between the high resistivity values obtained for the saturated freshwater zones and the low resistivity values obtained for the saturated saltwater zone. Expectedly, the intrusion was dominant nearer the coastline than inland. The salinity changes are believed to have been caused by both incremental tides passing through highly porous materials in the active-salinity change area and over-pumping of groundwater. The time-lapse resistivity measurements showed significant, active lateral salinity changes rapidly intruding the freshwater aquifers. The study demonstrates the application of time-lapse 2D ERT and vertical electrical sounding in identifying the spatial and temporal changes of saltwater intrusion in the coastal aquifer.

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