“Daughter” as a positionality and the gendered politics of taking parents into the field

Abstract

Research on gendered politics of the field has delved into the practices of accompaniment and its implications on research and knowledge production, particularly through the case of researchers’ children and partners. In comparison, the tendency to seek assistance from parents is neglected within the scholarship. Drawing on the PhD fieldwork experiences of two researchers in their “native” country, specifically a Sri Lankan researcher conducting fieldwork in Sri Lanka and a North Indian scholar researching in South India, the paper reveals parents’ contribution to the research process, in terms of enhancing researcher credibility, facilitating contact‐making and access, and providing emotional and practical care. The discussion illuminates two aspects of parents’ involvement in fieldwork: (1) how the unique nature of parent–child relationships shapes the research process at multiple stages, and (2) how the gendered notions of knowledge production result in parents’ contributions being typically unacknowledged. The paper emphasises that a researcher's positionality as a daughter shapes her ability to navigate gendered field sites in her “native” country and is implicated in the wider research process.

Not just parenting in the field: Accompanied research and geographies of caring and responsibility

“…The myth and the always partial reality of the solitary researcher Once sidelined to footnotes and acknowledgements, research companions have increasingly been rendered visible and their contributions considered in scholarly writing. Publications typically focus on accompanying family members (De Silva & Gandhi, 2019;Flinn et al, 1998;Lunn & Moscuzza, 2014;Taylor, 2014), especially children (Cornet & Blumenfield, 2016;Cupples & Kindon, 2003;Farrelly et al, 2014;Frohlick, 2002;Johnston, 2015;Korpela et al, 2016;Starrs et al, 2001;Tripp, 2002), and research assistants or associates (Fertaly & Fluri, 2019;Gold et al, 2014;Middleton & Cons, 2014;Turner, 2010), with some mention of supervisors, students, colleagues, pets, editors, and other collaborators (Gupta, 2014;Heller et al, 2011;Swanson, 2008).…”

“…Flinn (1998) criticizes the persistent model of the lone male fieldworker, pointing to the colonial roots of the image popularized by celebrated ethnographer Bronislaw Malinowski who argued that 'proper conditions for ethnographic fieldwork […] consist mainly in cutting oneself off from the company of other white men' (Malinowski, 1961, in Flinn, 1998. Despite growing acceptance of feminist epistemologies and methodologies over the past two decades, such rhetoric continues to shape the way scholars conceive of legitimate academic research (De Silva & Gandhi, 2019). The normalized image of a professional fieldworker, for example, still displays a considerable degree of bravado and machismo, and is easily mobile, ever energetic, able-bodied, fit, and solitary (Bono et al, 2019;De Silva & Gandhi, 2019;Frohlick, 2002;Gottlieb, 1995;Jokinen & Caretta, 2016;Lunn & Moscuzza, 2014).…”

“…Matthew Sparke (1996) describes the portrayal of fieldwork as a ‘character‐building rite of passage’ in which the field is:

cast as a seductive but wild place that must be observed, penetrated and mastered by the geographer who, having battled with it, reveled in it, and, in the end, triumphantly risen above it, returns to the academy his education complete, his stature assured and his geographical self proven, definitely, his (Sparke, 1996: 209).

Flinn (1998) criticizes the persistent model of the lone male fieldworker, pointing to the colonial roots of the image popularized by celebrated ethnographer Bronislaw Malinowski who argued that ‘proper conditions for ethnographic fieldwork […] consist mainly in cutting oneself off from the company of other white men’ (Malinowski, 1961, in Flinn, 1998: 6). Despite growing acceptance of feminist epistemologies and methodologies over the past two decades, such rhetoric continues to shape the way scholars conceive of legitimate academic research (De Silva & Gandhi, 2019). The normalized image of a professional fieldworker, for example, still displays a considerable degree of bravado and machismo, and is easily mobile, ever energetic, able‐bodied, fit, and solitary (Bono et al ., 2019; De Silva & Gandhi, 2019; Frohlick, 2002; Gottlieb, 1995; Jokinen & Caretta, 2016; Lunn & Moscuzza, 2014).…”

“…Despite growing acceptance of feminist epistemologies and methodologies over the past two decades, such rhetoric continues to shape the way scholars conceive of legitimate academic research (De Silva & Gandhi, 2019). The normalized image of a professional fieldworker, for example, still displays a considerable degree of bravado and machismo, and is easily mobile, ever energetic, able‐bodied, fit, and solitary (Bono et al ., 2019; De Silva & Gandhi, 2019; Frohlick, 2002; Gottlieb, 1995; Jokinen & Caretta, 2016; Lunn & Moscuzza, 2014).…”

“…The gendered, classed and racialized positions, and the degree of respectability and status, attributed to a researcher are different depending on whether or not they are accompanied (Cornet, 2010; 2013; Cupples & Kindon, 2003; Jenkins, 2020; Korpela et al ., 2016; Lunn & Moscuzza, 2014; Seiler Gilmore, 1998; Swanson, 2008). The perceived identities and positionalities of research companions, especially local research assistants and local family members, similarly matter in determining access to resources in the field and the content of information divulged by research subjects, and in shaping research outcomes (Cupples & Kindon, 2003; De Silva & Gandhi, 2019; Flinn, 1998; Gold et al ., 2014; Gupta, 2014; Heller et al ., 2011; Jenkins, 2018; Swanson, 2008; Taylor, 2014; Turner, 2010).…”