Witnessing the Ward: On the Emotional Labor of Doing Hospital Ethnography

Abstract

This paper examines the emotional labor performed by researchers when undertaking ethnographic research in hospitals. Drawing on emotion work theory to situate emotions at the center of qualitative and interdisciplinary research, I provide a methodological reflection based on a 20-week long ethnography at a Canadian pediatric hospital I conducted in the context of a research project examining risk communication of antimicrobial resistance. I argue that the emotional labor in which hospital ethnographers engage starts long before the fieldwork and carries on throughout the project and into the data analysis and writing of results. I divide these instances of emotional labor into four categories: gaining and maintaining access to the field site, resolving ethical concerns, managing relations with participants, and witnessing human suffering. This paper addresses a gap in the literature regarding the various barriers that hospital ethnographers encounter as I reflect upon the challenges I faced and the emotional labor I intuitively engaged in and provide advice for researchers on how to navigate these barriers.

Ethnologist as Foreign Body: A Systemic Explanation

“…The tools to help the ethnographer make sense of, and describe, their personal experiences seem to be lacking. Furthermore, methodological reflections are mostly used to make better sense of what is happening in the fieldwork [40,41], rather than helping the ethnographer to prepare, and are mostly about consent and/or gaining access to the field [42,43].…”

Reflexivity in the field encounter in qualitative research: learning from Gadamer

“…The skewing of the power of access, resources and meaning may attribute a role of guest to the researcher who has little influence over the field encounter. It is then the researcher who is vulnerable, operating in unfamiliar and uncertain territory and harbouring feelings of powerlessness (Bashir, 2020; Capurro, 2021). Access to information is a privilege, easily withdrawn by the participant.…”

“…The connection with the field is not only cognitive but emotional (Michailova et al. , 2014; Capurro, 2021). In order to obtain rich qualitative data, openness and honesty is required.…”

Harnessing Emotions for Embodied Reflexivity in Organizational Ethnography

“…Many papers which discuss emotions in the field are after-the-fact reports from PhD students’ field encounters (e.g., Capurro, 2021; Kisfalvi, 2006; Mazzetti, 2016; Vincett, 2018; Warden, 2013; Wajsberg, 2020). These authors often discuss the wish to share their experiences in hopes to prepare younger scholars for what they may encounter, as they themselves lacked guidance in terms of the emotional challenges they would face as part of ethnographic work.…”

“…Studies report from diverse contexts such as hospital emergency rooms (Capurro, 2021; Hickey & Smith, 2020), social movements (Yousfi & Abdallah, 2020), fire departments (Mazzetti, 2016), refugee sites (Wajsberg, 2020), war-zones (de Rond, 2012), red-light districts (Warden, 2013), and immigrant detention centres (Vincett, 2018). Others focus on specific practices which may in themselves give rise to a multitude of deep emotions, such as the euthanasia of animals (Tallberg et al, 2014).…”