Insider research on migration and mobility : international perspectives on researcher positioning 9781315588773, 1315588773

Table of contents :
pt. I. Dimensions of insiderness --
pt. II. Researching home and community --
pt. III. Producing self, producing others.

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Insider Research on Migration and Mobility International Perspectives on Researcher Positioning

Edited by Lejla Voloder and Liudmila Kirpitchenko

Insider Research on Migration and Mobility

Studies in Migration and Diaspora Series Editor: Anne J. Kershen, Queen Mary, University of London, UK Studies in Migration and Diaspora is a series designed to showcase the interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary nature of research in this important field. Volumes in the series cover local, national and global issues and engage with both historical and contemporary events. The books will appeal to scholars, students and all those engaged in the study of migration and diaspora. Amongst the topics covered are minority ethnic relations, transnational movements and the cultural, social and political implications of moving from ‘over there’, to ‘over here’. Also in the series: Second-Generation Transnationalism and Roots Migration Cross-Border Lives Susanne Wessendorf ISBN 978-1-4094-4015-4 Cultures in Refuge Seeking Sanctuary in Modern Australia Edited by Anna Hayes and Robert Mason ISBN 978-1-4094-3475-7 Whiteness and Postcolonialism in the Nordic Region Exceptionalism, Migrant Others and National Identities Edited by Kristín Loftsdóttir and Lars Jensen ISBN 978-1-4094-4481-7 European Identity and Culture Narratives of Transnational Belonging Edited by Rebecca Friedman and Markus Thiel ISBN 978-1-4094-3714-7 Inhabiting Borders, Routes Home Youth, Gender, Asylum Ala Sirriyeh ISBN 978-1-4094-4495-4

Insider Research on Migration and Mobility International Perspectives on Researcher Positioning

Lejla Voloder University of South Australia, Australia and

Liudmila Kirpitchenko Deakin University, Australia

© Lejla Voloder and Liudmila Kirpitchenko 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. Lejla Voloder and Liudmila Kirpitchenko have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the editors of this work. Published by Ashgate Publishing Limited Ashgate Publishing Company Wey Court East 110 Cherry Street Union Road Suite 3-1 Farnham Burlington, VT 05401-3818 Surrey, GU9 7PT USA England www.ashgate.com British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows: Insider research on migration and mobility : international perspectives on researcher positioning / [edited] by Lejla Voloder and Liudmila Kirpitchenko. pages cm. – (Studies in migration and diaspora) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-1-4094-6321-4 (hardback) – ISBN 978-1-4094-6322-1 (ebook) – ISBN 9781-4724-0785-6 (epub) 1. Emigration and immigration–Research–Methodology. 2. Emigration and immigration–Research–Case studies. I. Voloder, Lejla, author, editor of compilation. II. Kirpitchenko, Liudmila author, editor of compilation. JV6013.5.I558 2013 304.8072–dc23 2013019355 ISBN 9781409463214 (hbk) ISBN 9781409463221 (ebk – PDF) ISBN 9781472407856 (ebk – ePUB)

IV

Contents Notes on Contributors   Acknowledgements   Series Editor’s Preface   Introduction: Insiderness in Migration and Mobility Research: Conceptual Considerations   Lejla Voloder

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PART I

Dimensions of Insiderness

1

Negotiating Aboriginal Participation in Research: Dilemmas and Opportunities   Michele Lobo

21

2

Cosmopolitan Engagement in Researching Race Relations in New Zealand   Farida Fozdar

37

3

On the Tide Between Being an Insider and Outsider: Experiences from Research on International Student Mobility in Germany   Başak Bilecen

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4

Conducting Qualitative Research: Dancing a Tango between Insider – and Outsiderness   Christof Van Mol, Rilke Mahieu, Helene Marie-Lou De Clerck, Edith Piqueray, Joris Wauters, François Levrau, Els Vanderwaeren and Joris Michielsen

PART II

Researching Home and Community

5

Behind the Emic Lines: Ethics and Politics of Insiders’ Ethnography   Hariz Halilovich

6

Close, Closer, Closest: Participant Observation at Home   103 Efrat Tzadik-Fallik

69

87

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7

Emotive Connections: Insider Research with Turkish/Kurdish Alevi Migrants in Germany   Derya Ozkul

PART III

Producing Self, Producing Others

8

Between Suspicion and Trust: Fieldwork in the Australian-Hungarian Community   Petra Andits

135

9

Interrupting Anonymity: the Researcher in an Expatriate Community   Angela Lehmann

153

10

Black on Black: Insider Positionality and the Black African Migrant Research Experience in Australia   Virginia Mapedzahama and Kwamena Kwansah-Aidoo

169

11

Academic Intercultural Encounters and Cosmopolitan Knowledge Translation   Liudmila Kirpitchenko

187

Index  

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Notes on Contributors Petra Andits is a postdoctoral researcher affiliated with the University of Melbourne, Australia. Her research interests include transnationalism, diasporas and politics of identity. She has published on Hungarian diasporic discourses in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. Basak Bilecen is a postdoctoral researcher in the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University, Germany. She is interested in the sociology of migration, social network analysis, transnationalism, cosmopolitanism and social protection. She has published on international PhD student experiences in Transnational Social Review – A Social Work Journal and in Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education. Helene Marie-Lou De Clerck is a PhD candidate in Sociology at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. She is currently researching the role of aspirations and capabilities in sub-Saharan African migration processes. She recently contributed to an article published in the International Journal of Children’s Rights. Farida Fozdar is Professor in Anthropology and Sociology at The University of Western Australia. She has published widely in the areas of refugee and migrant settlement, race relations, nationalism and citizenship, predominantly using discourse analysis. In addition to her books, she has published in journals including The Journal of Sociology, Identities, Nations and Nationalism, International Migration Review and Discourse & Society. Hariz Halilovich is a social anthropologist working as Senior Lecturer at Monash University, Australia. His research interests include forced migration, social memory of politically motivated violence and human rights in post-conflict societies. His articles have appeared in various international journals including Journal of Refugee Studies, International Migration and Ethnologie française. His book Places of Pain has recently been published. Liudmila Kirpitchenko is Research Fellow at the Centre for Citizenship and Globalization, Deakin University, Australia. Liudmila’s research interests include academic mobility, intercultural encounters, knowledge creation, cosmopolitanism, social inclusion and qualitative research methods. Among her recent publications are a book Academic Mobility and Intercultural Dialogue in Australia, Canada

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and Italy and an article on academic hyper-mobility in the Journal of Intercultural Communication. Kwamena Kwansah-Aidoo is Associate Professor of Marketing/Public Relations at Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. He has published widely on issues within the broad field of Communication, Media and Public Relations. In recent years, his research and publications have focused more on multiculturalism, issues of identity, belonging, racialization and racism amongst the African Diaspora in Australia. His latest forthcoming publication is on negotiating diasporic black African existence in Australia. Angela Lehmann was awarded a PhD in Sociology from The Australian National University in 2010. She is currently Assistant Professor of Sociology at The University of Xiamen, China. Her forthcoming book Transnational Lives in China: Expatriates in a Globalising City details her ethnographic work on skilled migration from the West to Xiamen. François Levrau is currently a PhD candidate in Social Sciences at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. Much of his research deals with issues of multiculturalism, and the link between ‘integration’ and ‘recognition’. He has published in The Political Quarterly. Michele Lobo is Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University, Australia. She has published widely on issues of whiteness, ethno-religious diversity, race, intercultural encounter and belonging in suburbia. Her recent books include Migration, Citizenship and Intercultural Relations: Looking through the Lens of Social Inclusion, edited with F. Mansouri, and Intercultural Relations in a Global World, edited with V. Marotta and N. Oke. Rilke Mahieu is a PhD candidate in Social Sciences at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. She works on issues around migration policies, female migration, the educational careers of migrants and transnationalism. Her PhD project on second generation migrant transnationalism is funded by the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO). Virginia Mapedzahama holds a PhD in Sociology and is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of New England, Australia. Her research looks at the intersection of nurse/health workforce migration issues with multiculturalism, African immigration, race and ethnicity in Australia. Her most recent publication discusses the violence of tolerance in (Re)Thinking Violence in Health Care Settings, edited by D. Holmes, T. Rudge and A. Perron.

Notes on Contributors

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Joris Michielsen completed his PhD on transformative social protection in health in India. His research offered an evaluation of the impact of community health insurance schemes on the access to quality care for female slum dwellers. He joined the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, in November 2011 to research issues of health and migration. Derya Ozkul is a doctoral candidate at the University of Sydney, Australia. Her PhD thesis is a part of the project titled Social Transformation and International Migration in the 21st Century, directed by Professor Stephen Castles. Her most recent publication focuses on Australia as an immigration country in transition in Controlling Immigration: A Global Perspective, edited by W.A. Cornelius, P.L. Martin and J.F. Hollifield. Edith Piqueray holds an MA in Anthropology and is currently a PhD candidate in Social Sciences at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. She is writing a PhD on the school careers of Polish youngsters in Flanders. Efrat Tzadik-Fallik is a PhD researcher at the KU Leuven, Belgium, and is affiliated with the Leuven Institute for Human Rights and Critical Studies. She has published in Hagira, Israeli Journal of Migration and contributed to A Test of Faith? and Interculturalism, Meaning and Identity. Els Vanderwaeren obtained a PhD in Social Sciences at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. Her work focuses on hybridity, Muslim women and their religion. She has published in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Islam and Women and in Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power. Christof Van Mol is currently a PhD candidate in Sociology at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. His PhD project focuses on European student mobility, European identity and migration aspirations. He has published in Population, Space and Place. Lejla Voloder is a socio-cultural anthropologist with interest in research methodologies, and in the geopolitical and environmental forces that impact upon migration and settlement. She has published in the areas of autoethnography and multiculturalism. Her most recent publication in Ethnic and Racial Studies looks into migratory journeys and the articulations of citizenship in Turkey. Joris Wauters is a PhD candidate in Social Sciences at the Policy Research Centre on Civic Integration at the University of Antwerp, Belgium. His PhD research focuses on the role of schools on the civic integration of migrant parents with school children.

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Acknowledgements As editors, we are very grateful to the contributing authors for being such enthusiastic collaborators. We would like to express our appreciation to them for sharing their invaluable, insightful and diverse perspectives on insiderness. A number of colleagues helped us to formulate and crystallize ideas for this book. We would like to extend our thanks to our colleagues at the School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University, and at the International Centre for Muslim and non-Muslim Understanding, University of South Australia. We would like to acknowledge with gratitude Penny Graham, John Bradley, Ivan Inderbitzin, Dharma Arunachalam, Andrew Markus, Matthew Piscioneri, Sheila Murugasu, Uzma Jamil, Matt Tomlinson, Michael Stevenson, Salman Sayyid and A. Kurtz. We have benefited from the generous support from the Monash European and EU Centre at Monash University, School of Government at LUISS University, and EU-Oceania Social Science Inter-Regional Consortium funded by the EU. We wish to express our heartfelt and most necessary gratitude to our families for their devoted care, love and support.

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Series Editor’s Preface: Insider Research on Migration and Mobility

The thrust of this volume is the interpretation of the position of the academic researcher when carrying out ethnographic research; more particularly, where there are discernible aspects of homogeneity between subject/s and investigator. All the contributors to this volume could be simply categorised as ‘insiders’ in relation to their subject groups, albeit by gender, colour, race, creed, profession and/or nationality. However, as a reading of this book highlights, the researcher/subject relationship is never as crude as this. Covering a spectrum of geographic locations and a variety of subject groups, the collection sets out to challenge traditional perspectives of researcher identity and belonging. In so doing the reader becomes aware of the intersections that take place, and the way in which, when fieldwork is in progress, both migrant and researcher identity and belonging can never be static points on the compass. This is a book which enables us to appreciate the sensitive nature of qualitative fieldwork. For example, while researching in the former-Yugoslavia, Bosnian refugee, Halilovich, becomes both insider and outsider when returning to what had been his, now war-torn, homeland. The account given of that return is a clear demonstration of the necessity for flexibility of identity and language and, at times, the emotional distancing which is demanded in order to satisfy a research agenda. Another example is provided by the dilemma faced by Tzadik-Fallik when her research encroached upon the personal – domestically and nationally – and, by so doing, endangered the academic objectivity even the insider has to observe. The highly emotive nature of Ozkul’s research agenda resulted in personal soulsearching that led her to adopt an insider/outsider role in order to achieve an exchange with her subjects that overcame certain internal religious differences. Underlining the emotive hazards, in her chapter Andits puts in a plea for academics not to censor the emotional aspects of their research. Though in many circumstances colour and race separate, the experiences of Lobo, Fozder, Mpedzahama and Kwansah-Aidoo describe how for them this created bonds between researcher and subjects and a feeling of shared experiences. For Mpedzahama and Kwansah-Aidoo, being black gave them access to a Black African migrant community in Australia, and enabled them to hear at first hand the migrant experience – something their white peers would have been unable to achieve. Lobo’s Indian heritage and Fozder’s mixed race background opened the doors to Indigenous people in Australia and New Zealand; the common denominators of physical appearance and colour transforming the outsider researchers into insiders.

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Although this is a book about the concept of insider research, several of the contributors draw attention to the fact that on occasions the insider becomes the outsider within their so-called fellow group. This is something which features as the focal topic for a group of young scholars in Chapter 4. Lehmann experienced this unexpected change in researcher position when, as a Westerner researching Western migrants (or as they preferred to be called expatriates) in Xiamen, in South West China, she was made to feel unwanted and very much an outsider who was intruding on their ‘anonymous’ way of life. Bilecen causes us to contemplate the issue of bias in the insider/outsider relationship, while in the closing chapter Kirpitchenko reflects on her position as an internationally mobile insider academic. The editors of this volume have done much more than present those engaged in the exploration of the experiences of migration and diaspora with a collection which deserves a prominent place on the shelf marked Research Methods. This compilation is not just a forensic manual for qualitative research in the field; it is one which is about ‘knowledge exchange, transfer and creation’ from the inside and so offers an excellent multi-dimensional guide to garnering, comprehending and applying the results of insider research. Anne J. Kershen Queen Mary University of London Summer 2013

Introduction

Insiderness in Migration and Mobility Research: Conceptual Considerations Lejla Voloder

The salience of the researcher’s individual experience in informing academic inquiry is both a celebrated and contested notion within the social sciences. Researchers who may share experiences or who may claim shared cultural, ethnic, linguistic or religious identities with their participants continue to debate the possibility, ethics and politics of mobilizing ‘insider capital’ in order to gain access to and represent research participants and field sites. With an increasing proportion of migration and mobility field studies being conducted by academics who are themselves migrants or members of ethnic minorities, questions about the scope, utility, authenticity and validity of insider research among migration scholars are gaining interest (Khosravi 2010, Collet 2008, Ganga and Scott 2006, Kusow 2003, Gans 1999, Rumbaut 1999). This edited collection engages in this vivid discussion and considers the questions: What does it mean to be an insider researcher? What is the utility of insider claims? And what are the ramifications of insiderness for academic knowledge? Considerations of the constitution, salience and utility of insider–outsider dynamics have been present within various disciplinary domains; however, within studies of migration and mobility this discussion is a more recent phenomenon. The relatively limited discussion around researcher positioning among migration scholars is perhaps symptomatic of the position of ‘migration studies’ as an interdisciplinary area of research. Studies of international migration and mobility are of concern to various disciplines – economists, demographers, political scientists as well as anthropologists and sociologists are engaging with questions around the reasons, experiences and consequences of human movements. The result is an interdisciplinary and methodological pluralism which on the one hand provides for diverse and rich perspectives on migration but on the other can result in a paucity of comprehensive explorations of the theoretical, methodological and ethical issues confronted by scholars of migration (Castles 2012, Bilger and Van Liempt 2009, Brettell and Hollifield 2000). As a result, there is a need to address methodological issues confronted by migration scholars (Amelina and Faist 2012, Wimmer and Glick Schiller 2003) and within this is the imperative to explore the role of positioning in the research endeavour. This relative lack of critical reflection upon issues of positioning may also be a result of the dominance of quantitative modes of inquiry within studies of migration (see Vargas-Silva 2012). With the shifting demographics of population

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movements and the increasing securitization of migration (De Genova 2007, Weber 2007, Pickering 2001, Sassen 1996), the desire to track and control populations and ‘measure’ and predict the integration of migrants and their descendants has meant that funding agencies, particularly state agencies, favour quantitative modes of inquiry. With migrants being treated as the objects of knowledge and management, studies are produced with ‘authoritative’ measures and indices of people and their social lives and, here, distance and objectivity are treated as the modus operandi of inquiry. The prominence of quantitative approaches to the study of migration and mobility injects expectations of ‘realism’ and ‘objectivity’ for all scholarship in the domain. The dominance of such positivist frames means that qualitative studies of migration have tended to be treated as ‘second best’ (Castles 2012: 10). As a result, many researchers who have conducted qualitative studies have sought to justify their claims on the basis of objectivity, and here surveys and interviews come to occupy more ‘reputable’ and objective positions than ethnographically informed studies. However, the rise of qualitative scholarship and the injection of anthropologically and sociologically informed discussions within the discursive space has translated into increased attention being directed to questions of researcher positioning by migration and mobility scholars. Recent years reveal an increase in scholarship providing rich detail about researchers’ personal encounters with research questions, participants and shared and disputed responses to questions of identity and belonging (Cukut Krilić 2011, Markova 2009, Borkert and De Tona 2006). Very few researchers have extended the discussion beyond the confessional realm, to consider the conceptual, ethical and epistemic concerns of claims to insiderness (exceptions include Wray and Bartholomew 2010, Ganga and Scott 2006, Kusow 2003). This collection aims to open up the conversation around positioning and to disrupt the assumptions that underpin much of the prevailing discussions around insider research. By bringing together the latest research on international migration and mobility, this book presents diverse case studies exploring varied and contested research identities, the politics and ethical challenges of research and the role of positioning for knowledge production. Chapters explore the taxonomies that seek to homogenize people and their experiences, the tensions of self–other distinctions and complexities in confronting the claims of shared identities, experiences and understandings. In a world of increasing international migration and fluid and multiple identities, we consider what contribution claims of and for insider research can make. Before providing an overview of the thematic structure of the book and introducing the individual contributions, I offer a brief discussion of the conceptual considerations that underpin much of the discussion in this collection. Insiderness: Concept and Claim Debates around the utility of insider research presuppose its juxtaposition to outsider research. Thus, the concept and position of the insider emerges out of

Introduction

3

inverted expectations of distance between the researcher and the subject and object of investigation. Social scientific inquiry has, conventionally, sought to maintain distance through cultural, social, identificational and spatial differentiation between home and research field sites, and between self and others (Paerregaard 2002, Amit 2000, Gupta and Ferguson 1997, Abu-Lughod 1991). Indeed, such research has been premised on the ‘othering’ of research participants; their objectification is reliant upon a temporal and spatial differentiation between researcher and ‘researched’, a ‘denial of coevalness’ between self and other (Fabian 1991: 198). The privileging of the assumptions and expectations of distance has meant that much ethnographic and field-based research has been conducted in unfamiliar spaces and/or among unfamiliar populations. While, conventionally, distance has been adopted as the precursor to research, fieldwork remains reliant upon personal relationships as ‘primary vehicles for eliciting findings and insight’ (Amit 2000: 2). Researchers spend prolonged periods of time conducting fieldwork with the aim of reducing distance between themselves and participants and accessing the knowledge of insiders. Indeed, the desire for access to insider knowledge and even possibilities of claiming experiential insiderness emerge from assumptions of a prior outsider positioning. Such distanced positions have tended to be privileged as sites from which authoritative (and objective) knowledge would be produced. For example, in the classical model of anthropological research, the ethnographic endeavour was defined in terms of clear movements in and out of field sites; where ‘the field’ is the site of the unfamiliar, the site of professional and research activities in contrast to ‘home’, the site of the familiar and of personal and non-research activities (Muir 2004, Gupta and Ferguson 1997). Delimiting the temporal and spatial parameters of when and where research is conducted reflects the central paradigm of field-based studies which has tended to privilege self– other and home–field distinctions, where researchers are ‘outsiders’ conducting research among cultural ‘others’. In migration studies, field-based scholarship, which predominately utilizes interviewing and ethnographic methods, has often been conducted in familiar sites; the sites of settlement of migrants and refugees are often the cities in which researchers also reside. Despite such spatial intersections, research populations themselves were othered, and their lifeworlds and identifications were considered distinct from those of the researchers. The concept of ‘insider research’ is often a statement of perceived closeness, an inversion of the distance of the ‘traditional’ researcher. Claims to insiderness emerge in recognition of research conducted among somewhat familiar people, people with whom the researcher may identify on some significant level, or in sites in which home/field are not so clearly demarcated. Scholars who have tended to be typecast as insiders are often migrants themselves or members of ethnically marked minorities, who are also ‘minorities’ within academic institutions. In these settings, the ‘insiders’ are also often positioned, bureaucratically, racially, ethnically, linguistically, as ‘other’, and it is these others who are considered to conduct research amongst their ‘own’. Indeed, quite often they have been treated

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as the objects of the ethnographic gaze and diminished when they have sought to be the creators of knowledge (Behar 1995, hooks 1991, Bennoune 1985). Often declarations of a prior insider status, by researchers themselves or imposed upon them by their colleagues, have meant that such researchers have been treated either as authoritative insiders or questionable academics. While the authoritative insider has been lauded by some as being able to access otherwise restricted information (Ergun and Erdemir 2010, Messerschmidt 1981), the insider has also been open to accusations of ‘over-familiarity’ and ‘over-rapport’ and is often apparently one who needs to overcome such conditions and offer a declaration of status and clarification of bias (Woodward 2008, Hammersley and Atkinson 2007). Such accusations challenge insiders’ academic vigour and diminish their academic authority while at the same time celebrating and questioning their authenticity. In these distinctions between authenticity and authority, Bonilla-Silva (2012: 185) observes that claims of objectivity and neutrality within academia have tended to be accorded to white elites, while non-white academics have been condemned either to justify their results or to be typecast as enmeshed in ‘perpetual subjectivity’. Indeed, as Rosaldo (1988) suggests, while dominant populations are categorized as ‘rational’, others are typecast as ‘cultural’, with such distinctions producing hierarchies in assessments of the validity of knowledge produced by minority scholars. The result is the perpetuation of the paradigm that distinguishes the native/insider from ‘real’ scholars, homogenizing populations and treating insider–outsider positions as clearly demarcated. Within the domain of migration and mobility studies, insiderness is most often the domain of minorities, where culture, difference and identity are dominant tropes of investigation. The privileging of the difference and distance of the migrant reveals how the contemporary ‘insider’ researcher might be considered a referent to dominant conceptualizations of the ‘native’ in earlier periods of ethnographic inquiry. As Boas of the American tradition and Malinowski of the British tradition stressed, the insider represented authenticity and as such anthropological inquiry was to be primarily concerned with understanding social and cultural worlds through this ‘native’s point of view’ (Malinowski 1922: 25). The native, however, did not simply refer to an inhabitant of a particular region, but rather carried with it particular connotations of exoticism and of lifeworlds that were distant in temporal, spatial and civilizational terms from the West (Gupta and Ferguson 1997, Said 1989, Asad 1973). While this ‘native’ evoked images of immobility or rootedness to a particular place (Appadurai 1998), the contemporary ‘insider’, that is, the migrant or member of an ethnically marked minority, is faced with their own ascriptions of foreignness. This foreignness emerges with the scholarly predominance of objectifying and exoticizing migrant, particularly ethnically marked, populations in Western contexts, and by reducing discussions of their social lives to issues of cultural specificity (Hutnyk 2008, Sayyid 2004). The result is the emergent conceptualization of the contemporary insider as the mobile native.

Introduction

5

While some scholars have called for the broadening of the term native and embraced forms of nativization, for example in research conducted at home by ‘natives’ in the West (see Jackson 1987, Messerschmidt 1981), the intersection between the native and the insider emerges most poignantly when one considers that ‘insider’ is an epithet directed predominately to scholars who occupy positions of minorities. Indeed, in response to such categorization, authors such as Narayan (1993) have sought to challenge the ascription of nativeness in their work. This has been pursued through attempts to highlight the shifting positionalities and identifications of researchers and to challenge notions of ‘authenticity’ by offering accounts of complexity of researcher positions and identities. Here, claims to be a native/insider scholar are abandoned in favour of arguing for the multiplicity of subject positions any researcher occupies. While valid, a consequence of such arguments is that they reduce discussions of positioning to discussions of intersubjectivities and to localized interpersonal encounters which appear untouched by histories and politics that impose subject positions. Other scholars, however, have sought to challenge the very concept of the native/insider academic itself. In response to questions about who constitutes a legitimate producer of academic work, Hastrup (1993) contends that a ‘native anthropologist’ is a contradiction in terms. She suggests that, since the scholar is involved in producing knowledge rather than ‘retelling of local stories’ (Hastrup 1993: 179), the scholar cannot be the ‘other’. Hastrup’s position reaffirms the centrality of the scholar’s identity vis-à-vis the native, and neglects to consider how claims to insiderness are not simply statements about methodology but rather are explorations of the ways in which positions, ascriptions and categorizations are produced. Rather than dismissing claims of native/insider scholarship, I posit that the embrace of such positions can work to prompt critical reflections upon the ways the other is created. Such reflections not only consider the ways in which the other emerges in the course of authoring research, but also engage in exploring how the subject/object of research is presupposed within the disciplinary domain (JacobsHuey 2002). And it is this approach that appears most fruitful in embracing discussions of insiderness as it challenges the intersection between the bureaucratic gaze, which seeks to order, manage and dehumanize migrant populations, and the academic gaze, which has tended to adopt dominant classificatory schemes uncritically as the starting points of research. By embracing ‘native’ or ‘insider’ positions, the aim is not simply to claim affinity between the researcher and the ‘researched’ but more so to reflect upon dominant modes that create, isolate and mark populations. Thus, rather than dismissing the validity of insiderness, the possibility and sustainability of insider scholarship emerges in its exploration of the ways in which insiderness is historically and politically constituted.

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Insiderness in Studies of Migration and Mobility Within migration and mobility studies, the determinants of distance and hence insider–outsider status have predominately been judged on the basis of perceptions around shared ethnic and national identities between scholars and informants (Markova 2009, Borkert and De Tona 2006, De Andrade 2000). The focus on international migration is a de facto privileging of the presence of the nationstate in structuring social lives and, as a result, questions of national and ethnic identities come to occupy central research concerns. While the result is that ‘the migrant’ as the subject of research has already been assumed, who and how one occupies this position is a matter of contestation. As mentioned earlier, particular migrant or ethnic groups tend to dominate the academic gaze, and this is often a consequence of the broader discourses that demarcate migrants from hosts, and distinguish between particular types of visible, audible, problematic and (un) integrated populations. And here, the insider in migration studies, quite often, is not any migrant, but one whose status as both migrant and scholar is considered remarkable. While such scholars may nominally ‘share’ ethnic identities (on the basis of bureaucratic categories or dominant taxonomies), the meanings and salience of such identification on the lifeworlds of participants have often been taken for granted, rather than opened for exploration. The result is that the methodological utility of insiderness, that is, the ability to draw upon shared language and migration histories to establish rapport and gain access to field sites, has often been collapsed into claims for the identificational and experiential proximity between researchers and participants. This tendency to conflate histories of national and ethnic subjectification with insiderness has resulted in suggestions that a ‘methodological nationalism’ purveys much research on migration. As Wimmer and Glick Schiller (2003) write, there has been a tendency for scholars in the social sciences to adopt nationstates as units of analysis uncritically, thereby privileging territorial and national attachments and consequently essentializing the salience of national and ethnic identities in people’s lives. The allegation is that research into migrant experiences and ‘communities’ tends to homogenize and perpetuate conceptualizations of bounded social fields and networks that are primarily tied together by ethnic and national attachment. Such oversights are most often reflected in research design where ethnicity is employed as the dominant category through which to frame research questions and select research participants (Amelina and Faist 2012). And in terms of insider research, ethnicity tends to be privileged as the basis of shared identification and the entry point for researchers to claim an insider status. Authors in this collection have been invited to address these concerns and discuss how positionings within and across outsider–insider domains are complex and variegated. Diverse variables can serve to align or distance researchers from participants, and consequently problematize notions of an ‘authentic’ insider perspective, and disrupt expectations of proximity and shared understandings

Introduction

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between researcher and participants. In challenging the essentialization of insider– outsider statuses and disrupting crude dichotomies, scholars have highlighted the variability of identifications and perspectives by drawing attention to differentiation within societies and cultures (Wray and Bartholomew 2010, Jamil 2007, Halstead 2001, Kondo 1986). Building upon such scholarship, I posit that insider and outsider discussions can move towards the exploration of how the constitutions of positions reveal themselves in diverse ways and for particular purposes. A focus on the ways in which insider–outsider distinctions operate can reveal the ways dominant codes create and regulate difference. As points of proximity and difference are produced in the research encounter they become important aspects in identifying how participants are located in broader spaces that promote particular articulations of belonging. Individuals’ locations are not based on a single social status, but rather individuals occupy multiple social statuses that are contextually and situationally produced (Merton 1972). In this vein, many researchers in this collection who may ‘share’ ethnic identities with informants reveal the diversity of experiences, and challenge the homogeneity and reification of ethnic belonging by exploring the ways in which shared and disputed identities are constituted throughout the research process. To foster such a disposition toward the discussions of situated research, it might be useful to move beyond discussions of multiple and fluid identities, and rather focus on the politics in impositions and/or claims to insider positions with attendant attention directed towards the ways in which difference is ordered. By recognizing but also moving beyond discussions of shifting subjective identifications, consideration can be directed to the historicity of otherness and conditions under which insiderness is evoked. Consequently, discussions of insiderness may offer more than simply accounts of moments of closeness in interpersonal interaction to consider how and why insiderness becomes meaningful to reveal an interesting dynamic in the ways research interactions reflect broader societal issues of dominance and discrimination. Thus, rather than seeking to offer definitions and treating insider and outsider as methodologically distinguishable categories for which assessments of advantage/disadvantage are debated, the conditions in and under which difference and similarity are constituted can emerge as critical points of inquiry. The authors in this collection extend the discussion beyond confessions of being an insider and explore the ways in which positions become significant in studies of migration. In addressing questions about the constitution, role and salience of insider research, this collection is divided into three thematic sections. The chapters in Part I explore the contextually contingent dimensions of researcher positioning, the ways in which categories and experiences of identification are created, disputed and challenged. Authors reveal the role of participants in engaging, embracing and challenging discourses that define and delimit the boundaries of group identity. Part II delves further into the ways insiderness may be claimed and negotiated when personal lives, homes and research questions intersect. The chapters here discuss the ethical, methodological and political issues confronted in such

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situations and how they impact upon the way research is conducted. Part III of the volume explores the epistemological contributions and challenges of situated research. The chapters here consider the types of insights and analytic potential that emerge through active reflection on positionings imposed, challenged and negotiated in the field and in the authoring of research. Dimensions of Insiderness: Research Praxis and Identities In Situ Part I addresses concerns and presents case studies about the ways positionality becomes implicated in the research endeavour. The authors consider the ways in which markers such as ethnicity, race, gender, age, class and profession are mobilized by research participants themselves and are made meaningful and relevant in situ. The case studies demonstrate the role of participants in actively casting and redrawing dominant codes of belonging by challenging as well as inviting researchers to claim shared identities. Here self–other distinctions are problematized as scholars are invited to acknowledge their presence in the social worlds they seek to represent. This promotes an awareness of the situational aspects of identity, where the relational interplay and engagement with research participants is located in a particular time and space, mediated through research questions and involved in the pursuit of creating shared meanings. Lobo opens the discussion and draws upon her research with Aboriginal people in Darwin to discuss how experiences of marginalization and outsiderness within Australia were mobilized by research participants in order to create points of experiential intersection between themselves and the researcher. Lobo outlines how being located as a migrant from India, in a hegemonic white Australian space, enabled her to establish points of shared meaning with participants and establish spaces of understanding; revealing the enduring colonial presence in contemporary migration issues and the analogous location of researcher and participants. The importance of such positioning was not anticipated prior to the field encounter but emerged in the course of her research, challenging her preconceptions about the role and meanings of identifying as Australian when conducting research in Australia. The generosity of research participants to include researchers in their social worlds is discussed further by Fozdar. Fozdar discusses how her migrant status and racialized identities were mobilized by both Maori and Pakeha interviewees in New Zealand as ways of inviting her to share their experiences. The chapter highlights the role of reciprocity in the research endeavour. It pinpoints the agency of interviewees in drawing boundaries, challenging power dynamics and ultimately questioning authority, which is often assumed to be held exclusively by researchers. The dynamics of power in the interview encounter are explored further by Bilecen. At the time of research, Bilecen was an international doctoral student exploring international student experiences in Germany and in her chapter she

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discusses the interplay between migration experiences, language, age and professional/academic positions and how it shapes the ways research is conducted. She outlines a multiplicity of positions that emerged in interview encounters and affected the way interviewees related to her. Such encounters could not be reduced to declarations of insider/outsider status; they rather reflected the dynamism of interpersonal and intersubjective interaction located within a particular sociopolitical context. The role of participants in establishing the criteria for shared identities is further elaborated in Van Mol et al.’s contribution. The chapter reveals how the presuppositions of researchers about what might constitute insider positioning was in fact disrupted by their interlocutors. One particular account reveals how interactions with participants were not framed in terms of shared linguistic (in) abilities, but rather in terms of Catholic identities that were mobilized by Polish migrant interlocutors as ways of making their own claims to inclusive identification in Belgium. The authors reveal how the attempt to reduce the ‘other’ of research to dominant ‘migrant’ categories was ineffectual as interviewees themselves sought to redraw the bounds of inclusion. The case studies in Part I demonstrate how a variety of experiences and possible identifications produce different forms of positioning, disrupting the insider–outsider duality by recognizing the diverse ways in which distance and proximity are constituted in interactions with people. Rather than essentializing insider status, the cases demonstrate how interviews, and the research process more generally, is implicated in constituting and challenging identities (De Andrade 2000, Fortier 1996, Ong 1995). Recognition of the active role informants play in shaping encounters draws attention to the social processes at play that privilege aspects of identity, which in turn highlights the broader socio-political context in which these identities are created and considered meaningful. The result is extending the discussion beyond who is an insider, towards an exploration of how insiderness emerges. Researching Home and Community: Questions of Ethics and Politics Moving beyond discussions of the constitution of situational identities, Part II of the book looks into questions concerning the researchers’ own claims to communities of belonging and processes of shared identification. In this section, researchers consider the political and ethical questions one confronts when one’s life experiences intersect significantly with those of one’s participants. These intersections emerge in a variety of ways, including similar migration experiences, or shared engagements with questions of nationality, citizenship and belonging. Here research questions can become relevant in one’s own life, home and field distinctions are problematized and one’s political involvement is explicitly implicated in the research. The experiences of being a refugee, of fostering diasporic networks, and of confronting questions of national political identities

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are considered in relation to the political and ethical considerations they raise in the course of conducting research. In these instances, insiderness emerges from a claim researchers themselves make by identifying intersections of their own life trajectories with those of their research participants. Such significant intersections between the researcher’s and participants’ lives can often lead to assumptions of shared experiences and understandings and result in expectations of an increased ability of the researcher to use their own experiences to reveal insights about the experiences of others. In circumstances when there is an intense proximity between one’s personal life and the research questions, there is a tendency for such researchers to be viewed as writing from positions of ‘intimate affinity’ (Narayan 1993: 671) with participants who possess an ‘authentic’ insider’s knowledge that can unproblematically represent a group. In this section, rather than homogenizing experiences and claiming authenticity, the authors consider what it means for the research process when the researcher is involved in debating, claiming and authoring identities of self and others. The ethical imperatives of such research become particularly salient, and the authors consider what it means to be an insider when one is a highly engaged member of the social worlds under study and how this impacts on the way research is conducted. Halilovich’s paper opens this section with an exploration of the questions around politics and ethics he has encountered in relation to expectations about his representation of war, victims and justice among post-war communities. Halilovich’s own personal experience means that, as he states, he cannot claim distance from the collapse of Yugoslavia and the forced displacement and ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, as these events continue to impact upon his own life. By claiming various positions and commitments, Halilovich questions the ethics of claims of objectivity when working in post-war contexts. Instead he resolves that ethics in such research emerge by adopting a position as an ethnographeractivist, a position that compels one to be particularly conscious of the politics and implications of one’s research. A further exploration of the intersection of personal and professional roles is offered by Tzadik-Fallik who discusses the methodological and ethical challenges confronted while conducting research among Jewish communities in Brussels, Belgium. She questions what it means to feel belonging in the community in which one conducts research and how in such settings the home and conversations among family and friends can come to constitute fieldwork. She observes that research in such instances can be conducted 24 hours a day, as she herself engages with the research questions on a personal basis. Tzadik-Fallik discusses the imperatives to consider if and how boundaries between private lives and research can or should be demarcated in such contexts. In exploring her position within Turkey-related migration research, Ozkul explores the role of nationalist and transnational politics in informing researcher– participant engagement. She discusses how the categorization and hierarchy of differentiation pursued by nationalizing discourses can structure interlocutor

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engagement. Despite these pressures, Ozkul argues that visceral reactions, shared emotive and sensory responses such as fear and intimacy can disrupt and challenge normative modes of identification and produce alternative modes of proximity with her participants in Germany. A theme that emerges from all of the chapters in this section is the ethical imperative that the authors confront in the course of their research to consider the ramifications and expectations of detachment from their work. Allegations of closeness and affinity are often directed towards insider researchers, with suggestions that they can become overly involved in the research sites, and hence there are calls for insider researchers to maintain a distance from participants, as Hume and Mulcock argue for, ‘resisting total integration and commitment to the social domains we are researching’ (2004: xii). However, as the chapters in this section demonstrate, ethical dimensions of research cannot be reduced or rectified with arbitrary distance. Rather, the contributors have argued for and adopted different ways of staking their positions as activists, witnesses and authors who directly confront the implications of their work. Producing Self, Producing Others: Epistemic Concerns In Part III authors consider the transition from positioning to knowledge making, exploring the spaces and positions they occupy in the social worlds under study and how this informs knowledge production. In these instances, insider positioning is constituted through an acknowledgement of the researcher’s role in authoring, representing but also personally evoking the ways in which communities are constituted, challenged and made meaningful in the lives of the participants as well as for themselves. Rather than claiming to represent holistic accounts of migrant lives, reflection upon the implication of the researcher’s presence in the social worlds under study emphasizes the historicity and contingency of knowledge. With this there is recognition that social lives emerge through the continual negotiation of meanings, where researchers do not simply represent others but instead are authors who discursively construct the social (Clifford and Marcus 1986). Opening this section is Andits’s paper with a discussion of the ways her position as a recent migrant from Hungary impacted upon how she authored research on the Hungarian diaspora in Australia. She reveals how her political identity as a ‘Hungarian’ became an important point of reference for participants and how this became a critical factor in promoting exclusion or inclusion among her interlocutors. While field interactions created some tensions, these interactions were themselves important in revealing dimensions of national and ethnic belonging. By being included within dominant discourses of fear and suspicion, Andits was able to become aware and implicated in particular dynamics of the community. The knowledge produced emerged as a result of the reactions participants had to the positions she occupied in the field.

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The dynamics of community formation are further explored in Lehmann’s paper. Working with ‘Westerners’ in Xiamen, China, Lehmann reveals how being positioned as a Western academic by interlocutors revealed the ways in which a reluctant community was created amongst expatriate transnational workers. By being the topic of gossip and curiosity, Lehmann’s position amongst these migrants gives her a standpoint to articulate the ways in which a community of outsiders is both claimed and denied by participants. In this process, she highlights how tensions confronted in the field intersected with participants’ concerns about the gaze, power and authority of the researcher in demarcating the visibility and coherence of group membership. Mapedzahama and Kwansah-Aidoo discuss the importance, ramifications and tensions of insider claims for knowledge production. Working with African migrants in Australia, the authors highlight how being identified as black migrants by participants enabled particular types of conversations to be shared. They reveal how conversations about race and racism were prompted by participants’ interpretations of the embodiment of the researchers and of expectations of shared experiences. Mapedzahama and Kwansah-Aidoo note how their participants mobilized racial insiderness in order to shape the encounter which enabled them to articulate significant experiences from their lives. The collection concludes with Kirpitchenko’s reflection upon the relationship between researcher positioning and knowledge translation. Drawing upon her research on academic mobility, in which she has been both a participant and a researcher, Kirpitchenko looks at the synergies between the roles and positions of academic migrants and insider researchers. She suggests that the dispositions of these roles mean that one acts consciously between and across audiences, as one translates and produces forms of knowledge for particular purposes and in particular contexts. The focus on reflexivity in this section clarifies the role and utility of incorporating researchers’ experiences in the construction of academic knowledge. A reflection upon one’s position in terms of identities, ethics and politics in relation to the research questions, research agenda and potential effects on the practice and conduct of research highlights the fact that the researcher is an active participant in the field (Madden 2010, Ellis 2004, Fortier 1996, Rosaldo 1996). Moving beyond the confessional realm, such reflexive moments are not only personal accounts, but also relational accounts which consider the implications of positionings on the ways that diverse types of knowledge about social worlds are produced. The result is that through reflexivity one is prompted to recognize the conditions in and under which statements of knowing are claimed and made. Insiderness and Research Positions By presenting more than simply a collection of personal narratives of migration, the collection’s intention is to promote a discussion of the ways in which positioning,

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intersubjectivity and situated knowledge of migration and mobility are debated and created. With a focus on the situatedness of knowledge, the chapters reveal how the researcher’s engagement in the field produces particular insights. Through such self-reflexivity, Amelina and Faist (2012) suggest migration scholars have the opportunity to address methodological nationalism and critically reflect upon the taken-for-granted ways researcher and participant identities are formulated. Such approaches prompt scholars to question assumptions of positivist objectivity by recognizing the situatedness of knowledge, and the construction of categories and identities, and by disclosing situational power hierarchies in definitions of being and belonging. Rather than arguing for positions of liminality, in-betweenness and transcendence of social positions (Marotta 2011, Reed-Danahay 1997, Bhabha 1994, JanMohamed 1992), our aim is to focus on critical stances towards forms of positioning. In this way, the research described in this book is engaged in considering the ways in which borders are constituted, challenging notions of fixed, constant, ahistorical markers of identity and belonging. Instead of offering routinized confessional revelations of one’s identity, the authors focus on the salience of identification that emerges in the course of research, where the positions of interlocutors are not ‘possessed’ and granted a priori but emerge in the course of the dynamics of the research encounter. Through diverse essays that highlight the situatedness, fluidity and politics of researchers’ roles and positions, the collection considers the unavoidability and implications of conducting situated research. Throughout the chapters, insiderness is evoked to refer to a range of positions and experiences. Insiderness is employed to capture the establishment of rapport and trusting relationships with participants; to refer to feelings of belonging with participants; to capture the ways in which the researcher becomes implicated in the social life of the field; and to comment upon one’s position within broader socio-political spaces. Insiderness is used to refer to shared experiences of institutionalized racism, of being othered and positioned as an outsider within white hegemonic spaces; to capture the ramifications of ethnic cleansing and forced migration; as well as to sharing political allegiances and confronting the salience of the research questions within the researcher’s own life. In some circumstances, insider positions are considered to exist independently of the research endeavour, producing points of experiential and identificational intersection between the researcher’s and informants’ lives. However, such intersections emerge in the production of particular narratives of social worlds. In other circumstances, points of intersection are created in situ, where identities and shared experiences emerge in the research context challenging assumptions of distance–closeness and presenting alternative frameworks for understanding and representing self–others. While insiderness is evoked in various ways and for various purposes, the collection challenges tendencies for insider claims to be conflated with expert authority or questionable academic authority. The recognition that knowledge is always relational and situational highlights the institutional, historical and political

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situatedness of scholarly work. By showing how self and other distinctions are configured in the research process, the aim is to reveal the ways in which researchers and participants are involved in a dialectical process in constituting selves and mobilizing identities. Such critical reflection is not about transcending boundaries or claiming a decontextualized or liminal position, but rather a matter of recognizing the constitution of boundaries in relation to agentic reactions to hegemonic impositions of identity. Thus, statuses are not simply the resolve of participants and researchers but are results of interactions that occur within and across dominant modes that seek to create differences and other marginal populations. Positions are adopted and negotiated across the methodological terrain, in interviews, through survey work and prolonged ethnographic fieldwork, and such positions are informed by broader contingencies. While acknowledging the fluidity of positions and perspectives there is also an imperative to recognize that scholars inevitably selectively ‘other’ their participants. Claiming an insider or outsider position involves a stabilization of statuses and identities, and in the process scholars reveal their authorial authority in fixing and locating positions and making claims about their significance in social lives. The result is recognition of the contingency of social knowledge with the impetus to question what employing narratives and claims of insider/outsider does for and in the research. How and why such positions and roles are adopted by researchers and employed in the authoring of scholarship are topics for ongoing conversations. References Abu-Lughod, L. 1991. Writing against culture, in Recapturing Anthropology, edited by R. Fox. Santa Fe, NM: School of American Research Press, 137–62. Amelina, A. and Faist, T. 2012. De-naturalizing the national in research methodologies: key concepts of transnational studies in migration. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 35(10), 1707–24. Amit, V. 2000. Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary World. London: Routledge. Appadurai, A. 1998. Putting hierarchy in its place. Cultural Anthropology, 3(1), 36–49. Asad, T. 1973. Anthropology and the Colonial Encounter. London: Ithaca Press. Behar, R. 1995. Introduction: out of exile, in Women Writing Culture, edited by R. Behar and D.A. Gordon. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1–29. Bennoune, M. 1985. What does it mean to be a third world anthropologist? Dialectical Anthropology, 1(4), 357–64. Bhabha, H. 1994. The Location of Culture. London: Routledge. Bilger, V. and Van Liempt, I. 2009. Introduction, in The Ethics of Migration Research Methodology, edited by V. Bilger and I. Van Liempt. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 1–24.

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Bonilla-Silva, E. 2012. The invisible weight of whiteness: the racial grammar of everyday life in contemporary America. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 35(2), 173–94. Borkert, M. and De Tona, C. 2006. Stories of HERMES: a qualitative analysis of (qualitative) questions of young researchers, in Migration and Ethnic Studies in Europe. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung/Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 7(3): Art. 9. Available at: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114fqs060397 [accessed: 10 September 2012]. Brettell, C. and Hollifield, J.F. 2000. Migration Theory: Talking Across Disciplines. New York: Routledge. Castles, S. 2012. Understanding the relationship between methodology and methods, in Handbook of Research Methods in Migration, edited by C. VargasSilva. Massachusetts: Edward Elgar Publishing, 7–25. Clifford, J. and Marcus, G. 1986. Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Collet, B. 2008. Confronting the insider–outsider polemic in conducting research with diasporic communities: towards a community-based approach. Refuge, 25(1), 77–83. Cukut Krilić, S. 2011. The role of ethnicity in qualitative migration research. Migracijske i etničke teme. 27(2), 161–75. De Andrade, L.L. 2000. Negotiating from the inside: constructing racial and ethnic identity in qualitative research. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 29(3), 268–90. De Genova, N. 2007. The production of culprits: from deportability to detainability in the aftermath of ‘homeland security’. Citizenship Studies, 11(5), 421–48. Ellis, C. 2004. The Ethnographic I. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press. Ergun, A. and Erdemir, A. 2010. Negotiating insider and outsider identities in the field: ‘insider’ in a foreign land; ‘outsider’ in one’s own land. Field Methods, 22(1), 16–38. Fabian, J. 1991. Time and the Work of Anthropology: Critical Essays 1971–1991. Chur, Switzerland: Harwood Academic Publishers. Fortier, A. 1996. The use of personal experiences as sources of knowledge. Critique of Anthropology, 16(3), 303–23. Ganga, D. and Scott, S. 2006. Cultural ‘insiders’ and the issue of positionality in qualitative migration research: moving ‘across’ and moving ‘along’ researcher participant divides. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 7(3), Art. 7. Available at: http://nbnresolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs060379 [accessed: 10 September 2012]. Gans, H.J. 1999. Filling in some holes: six areas of needed immigration research. American Behavioral Scientist, 42(9), 1302–13. Gupta, A. and Ferguson, J. 1997. Discipline and practice: ‘the field’ as site, method, and location in anthropology, in Anthropological Locations: Boundaries and Grounds of a Field Science, edited by A. Gupta and J. Ferguson. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1–46.

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Halstead, N. 2001. Ethnographic encounters: positionings within and outside the insider frame. Social Anthropology, 9(3), 307–21. Hammersley, M. and Atkinson, P. 2007. Ethnography: Principles in Practice. 3rd Edition. London: Routledge. Hastrup, K. 1993. The native voice – and the anthropological vision. Social Anthropology, 1(2), 173–86. hooks, b. 1991. Essentialism and experience. American Literary History, 3(1), 172–83. Hume, L. and Mulcock, J. 2004. Introduction: awkward spaces, productive places, in Anthropologists in the Field: Cases in Participant Observation, edited by L. Hume and J. Mulcock. New York: Columbia University Press, xi–xxxi. Hutnyk, J. 2008. The dialectic of ‘here and there’: anthropology ‘at home’, in A Postcolonial People: South Asians in Britain, edited by N. Ali, V.S. Kalra and S. Sayyid. New York: Columbia University Press, 74–90. Jackson, A. 1987. Anthropology at Home. London: Tavistock. Jacobs-Huey, L. 2002. The natives are gazing and talking back: reviewing the problematics of positionality, voice, and accountability among ‘native’ anthropologists. American Anthropologist, 104(3), 791–804. Jamil, U. 2007. The stranger within: rethinking distance and proximity of researcher as community member, in Researching with Communities: Grounded Perspectives on Engaging Communities in Research, edited by A. Williamson and R. DeSouza. London: Muddy Creek Press, 209–18. JanMohamed, A.R. 1992. Worldliness-without-world, homelessness-as-home: toward a definition of the specular border intellectual, in Edward Said: A Critical Reader, edited by M. Sprinker. Oxford: Blackwell, 96–120. Khosravi, S. 2010. ‘Illegal’ Traveller: An Auto-ethnography of Borders. Hampshire: Palgrave. Kondo, D. 1986. Dissolution and reconstitution of self: implications for anthropological epistemology. Cultural Anthropology, 1(1), 74–88. Kusow, A.M. 2003. Beyond indigenous authenticity: reflections on the insider/ outsider debate in immigration research. Symbolic Interaction, 26(4), 591–9. Madden, R. 2010. Being Ethnographic: A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Ethnography. London: Sage. Malinowski, B. 1922. Argonauts of the Western Pacific. London: Routledge. Markova, E. 2009. The ‘insider’ position: ethical dilemmas and methodological concerns in researching undocumented migration with the same ethnic background, in The Ethics of Migration Research Methodology, edited by V. Bilger and I. Van Liempt. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 141–54. Marotta, V. 2011. The idea of the in-between subject in social and cultural thought, in Intercultural Relations in a Global World, edited by M. Lobo, V. Marotta and N. Oke. Champaign, IL: Common Ground, 179–200. Merton, R.K. 1972. Insiders and outsiders: a chapter in the sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology, 78(1), 9–47.

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Messerschmidt, D. 1981. Anthropologists at Home in North America: Methods and Issues in the Study of One’s Own Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Muir, S. 2004. Not quite at home: field envy and New Age ethnographic dis-ease, in Anthropologists in the Field: Cases in Participant Observation, edited by L. Hume and J. Mulcock. New York: Columbia University Press, 185–200. Narayan, K. 1993. How native is a ‘native’ anthropologist. American Anthropologist, 95(3), 671–86. Ong, A. 1995. Women out of China: traveling tales and traveling theories in postcolonial feminism, in Women Writing Culture, edited by R. Behar and D.A. Gordon. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 350–372. Paerregaard, K. 2002. The resonance of fieldwork: ethnographers, informants and the creation of anthropological knowledge. Social Anthropology, 10(3), 319–34. Pickering, S. 2001. Common sense and original deviancy: news discourses and asylum seekers in Australia. Journal of Refugee Studies, 14(2), 169–86. Rosaldo, R. 1988. Ideology, place, and people without culture. Cultural Anthropology, 3(1), 77–87. Rosaldo, R. 1996. Grief and a headhunter’s rage, in Anthropological Theory, edited by R.J. McGee and R. Warms. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield, 483–97. Reed-Danahay, D. 1997. Introduction, in Auto/Ethnography: Rewriting the Self and the Social, edited by D. Reed-Danahay. Oxford: Berg, 1–17. Rumbaut, R.G. 1999. Immigration research in the United States: social origins and future orientations. American Behavioral Scientist, 42(9), 1285–301. Said, E. 1989. Representing the colonized: anthropology’s interlocutors. Critical Inquiry, 15(2), 205–25. Sassen, S. 1996. Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization. New York: Columbia University Press. Sayyid, S. 2004. Slippery people: the immigrant imaginary and the grammar of colour, in Institutional Racism in Higher Education, edited by I. Law, D. Philips and L. Turney. London: Trentham Books, 149–60. Vargas-Silva, C. 2012. Handbook of Research Methods in Migration. Massachusetts: Edward Elgar. Weber, L. 2007. Policing the virtual border: punitive pre-emption in Australian offshore migration control. Social Justice, 34(2), 77–93. Wimmer, A. and Glick Schiller, N. 2003. Methodological nationalism, the social sciences, and the study of migration: an essay in historical epistemology. International Migration Review, 37(3), 576–610. Woodward, K. 2008. Hanging out and hanging about: insider/outsider research in the sport of boxing. Ethnography, 9(4), 536–61. Wray, S. and Bartholomew, M. 2010. Some reflections on outsider and insider identities in ethnic and migrant qualitative research. Migration Letters, 7(1), 7–16.

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PART I Dimensions of Insiderness

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Chapter 1

Negotiating Aboriginal Participation in Research: Dilemmas and Opportunities Michele Lobo

Introduction In this chapter, I reflect upon my experiences of negotiating Aboriginal participation for a research project on intercultural encounters in public spaces in the Darwin-Palmerston urban area, Northern Territory, Australia. The discussion shows that, although I prepared for fieldwork through reading and heeding the advice given by experienced researchers, as an Australian woman of Indian heritage, an outsider and a newcomer to the city, I found it difficult to engage residents who identified as Aboriginal. Through the course of my research, however, I discovered that my Indian heritage, evident through my physical appearance and skin colour, elicited curiosity about my home in Kolkata and enabled me to initiate informal conversations with Aboriginal people of diverse cultural backgrounds in public spaces. This chapterargues that my visibility as an outsider, a migrant Indian woman willing to share stories of Kolkata and deviate from mainstream ways of conducting ethical research, was instrumental in negotiating Aboriginal participation. Rather than thinking of the discussion that follows as self-indulgent, I see it as having implications for conducting ethical research, exploring Indigenous–ethnic minority relations and implementing just policies that show respect for Indigenous people of diverse cultural backgrounds in Australia. My research findings suggest that Aboriginals find it difficult to feel respected in a climate of interventionist federal government policies For example, the Northern Territory Emergency Response (2007), implemented through military intervention and the suspension of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 disempowers, discriminates and dehumanizes Aboriginal people. (Lea 2012). In 2012 this policy, which racialized and targeted Aboriginal peoples through compulsory health checks and income and alcohol management, was reinvented as the Stronger Futures Legislation despite strong opposition (McQuire 2012, Yolŋuw Makarr Dhuni 2012). Such interventionist policies show that colonization is a living process for Aboriginal peoples because dominant social and cultural norms that privilege whiteness legitimize practices that continue to deny Indigenous sovereignty and fail to provide a deep appreciation of Indigenous peoples (Dodson and Cronin 2011, Moreton-Robinson 2007). This lack of genuine engagement

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with Aboriginal people, particularly in the Northern Territory, is paralleled by a multicultural policy agenda introduced in the late 1960s that focuses on ethnic minority integration Although the aim of multiculturalism is to value diversity, the policy has been subject to considerable critique because it centres whiteness and Angloness in understanding inclusion. Hage (1998) argues that the implementation of the policy that focused on redistributive measures and the recognition of ethnic minorities also engendered anxieties of white decline and such negative affects were further exacerbated by the events of 9/11. The outcome was little support for a multicultural policy agenda during the Liberal Howard era (1996-2007). Today, there is a renewed emphasis on valuing diversity and producing a just, socially cohesive and harmonious society by incorporating respect for Aboriginal people (DIAC 2011). In practice, however, multicultural policy focuses mainly on the integration of ethnic minorities and its implementation by local government continues to be a considerable challenge (Lobo and Mansouri 2012). The outcomes of such separate policy frameworks of recognition have the unintended effects of positioning Aboriginals and ethnic minorities outside the white hegemonic space of the nation. As a result, there is little understanding of Aboriginal–ethnic minority relations. In Darwin, such institutional approaches to diversity provide a context for understanding my outsider position as a Melbournian and a migrant woman of Indian heritage eager to negotiate Aboriginal participation. I reflect in this chapter on this complexity of outsiderness that impeded as well as created points of experiential understanding in the research process. Feminist researchers use critical self-reflexivity as a tool to draw attention to power relations in cross-cultural settings (Lobo 2010, Moreton-Robinson 2007, O’Connor 2004, Mullings 1999). In particular, they underline the insider–outsider dualism and the moral and ethical dilemmas that arise in assuming these shifting subject positions. For example, O’Connor (2004), a white woman of Australian/Irish heritage, and Mullings (1999), a black woman of British/Jamaican heritage, attribute the difficulties they encountered in inhabiting neutral spaces of trust and cooperation in interviews with participants of the same colour and race to the instability of a temporary insiderness, a position they did not always consciously promote. Migrant and Aboriginal women of colour in Australia have drawn attention to outsiderness and Otherness, which they attribute to the power of white racial privilege. They describe processes of racialization during interviews with white women and men as emotional experiences (Lobo 2010, Moreton-Robinson 2007). As an Australian woman of Indian heritage who had previously conducted interviews in Dandenong, a culturally diverse area in Melbourne, I found communicating with migrants of colour to be emotionally more comfortable, but it was also more difficult to move beyond discussing familiar cultural stereotypes of white working-class identities (Lobo 2010). Within the literature on the insider–outsider dualism, however, there is little research that focuses on the negotiation of Aboriginal participation by migrant women researchers. My research, which focuses on Darwin, a mult-iracial

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city with a polyethnic history of Aboriginal–Asian contact that predates white settlement in the 19th century, introduces complexity into the insider–outsider debate because of my polyvocal subjectivity as an academic, a Kolkatan and a woman of colour from Melbourne or ‘down south’. Henry-Waring (2004) argues that such polyvocal subjectivities enable us to move beyond thinking within a framework of Otherness. As a tropical north Australian city with a population of 120,000 in the resourcerich Northern Territory, Darwin prides itself as an evolving, dynamic, different and diverse city (Carson, Schmallegger and Harwood 2010, Darwin City Council 2008). Ford (2009) argues that the sentiment of being or doing things differently can be attributed to the prevalence of a North–South antagonistic discourse that positions Darwin as multi-ethnic and multi-racial compared to large southern Australian cities like Sydney and Melbourne, which have a dominant white majority culture. Unlike these cities, Darwin also has a high population ‘churn’ as it attracts temporary migrant workers from ‘down south’ (Carson et al. 2010). Carson et al. (2010) emphasize that this mobile population includes young skilled workers employed in resource and construction projects, defence personnel and public sector employees who work with remote Aboriginal communities; long-term residents are more likely to be older and/or Aboriginal. This population ‘churn’ also includes tertiary students, humanitarian migrants and contract staff employed by a large transnational company that manages high-security detention centres that shelter but also imprison asylum seekers who arrive by boat. Newcomers from overseas are often from countries in Asia, the Middle East and Africa. For a researcher of Indian heritage living in Melbourne for the last 12 years, conducting fieldwork in a diverse city marked by high population mobility therefore involved being well prepared. Preparing for Fieldwork I prepared for fieldwork by communicating with researchers from Aboriginal organizations, tertiary institutions and private consultancies who had conducted fieldwork in Darwin. Through their support I contacted representatives from key government organizations and non-government organizations such as the local council, the multicultural council, faith-based community organizations, youth organizations, ethnic minority organizations, women’s organizations and asylum seeker/humanitarian migrant and advocacy networks. I followed up such initial contact by emailing information about the project and sending A3 coloured posters for display in public spaces such as libraries, community centres and shopping centres. The poster showed photographs of Mindil Beach, a popular place in suburban Darwin as well as the Waterfront, a recently developed residential and recreational area in the inner city. I invited residents of diverse backgrounds to participate through a statement expressing my curiosity that read ‘We want to know where you shop, meet and relax’. I was sure that I would get a good response from residents of diverse ethnic

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and racial backgrounds. At the same time, as a Melburnian, a resident from a southern city, I felt like an outsider who had no right to access such personal information, particularly from socioeconomically disadvantaged Aboriginal people such as ‘Long Grassers’ who live ‘rough’ in public spaces of the city. I communicated this discomfort to Rosanne, an experienced researcher who works with ‘Long Grassers’, and this was her response: Obviously you are ultimately the only one who can decide whether you have the right to do research on any topic, but with highly vulnerable populations it is a more agonizing process. You will probably ask these questions of yourself the whole way through if you decide to work with this population in Darwin. (I know I do!) My view is that there is a problem when you stop asking yourself. Anyway, one question I ask myself to help me work through the maze is ‘how will this research improve the life of the population on the ground on a daily basis?’ (May 2012)

Rosanne underlined the necessity for constant self-questioning through the research process. Such self-questioning is necessary given the debates on who has the right to speak on Indigenous matters and on behalf of Indigenous peoples (Fee and Russell 2007). Rosanne, however, was more concerned about how research findings can be embedded in practices that make a difference to the everyday lives of Aboriginal peoples. She argued that, although researchers ‘couch’ benefits for Aboriginal peoples in forms that are palatable to university ethics committees and disseminate knowledge in peer-reviewed academic publications and presentations at conferences, the ‘magic process’ of osmosis does not occur; there is little impact on the day-to-day lives of Aboriginal peoples. For her, ‘meaningful data’ could only be accessed by building relationships, empathizing with participants, listening to their stories and showing care in understanding their plight. Rather than making me aware of my powerful position as a researcher, Rosanne made me conscious of the potential challenges I might face in negotiating Aboriginal participation. For the first time, I became aware that my intentions to contribute to Indigenous wellbeing by providing an insight into the respect and care towards Aboriginal peoples in a multi-ethnic and multi-racial context could be quite difficult. Given the reading, support and advice I received before commencing fieldwork, I felt I was better prepared to negotiate participation and explore the complexity of intercultural relations in Darwin, but my inexperience working in a multi-ethnic and multi-racial context so different from southern cities like Melbourne and Sydney soon became apparent. The ‘Imaginary Divide’ I arrived in Darwin at the end of the dry season with enthusiasm and a spirit of adventure. When I went to the shopping mall to make a few food purchases, my

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position as a newcomer became evident. I exclaimed at the high prices of meat at the butcher’s shop in the large shopping mall and was indecisive about what I intended to purchase. Such behaviour attracted glances, gestures and rude remarks from a young woman. In relation to whiteness, my Indian-ness apparent through my physical appearance, accent and comportment marked me as an outsider. Given my enthusiasm and the need to organize and conduct focus discussions with community groups and interviews with short-term, long-term and mediumterm residents within a month, I soon forgot this racist response. Perhaps this was because many white residents who were professionals, community workers, religious leaders and activists were very keen to participate and help me with my research. Also, prior experiences of conducting research in Dandenong that involved critical reflections on emotions in the research process helped me to move beyond Otherness and value conversations across difference (Lobo 2010). As I expected, recent migrants from South Asia and the Middle East and long-term residents of Indian heritage, in particular, eagerly supported an ‘insider’, a female researcher who had left the comfort of home. The majority of mature-aged residents of Anglo-Australian and ethnic minority heritage confirmed their lack of understanding of Aboriginal ways of life and few opportunities to mix with Aboriginal people. Brian, an Anglo-Australian religious leader who had been working with Aboriginal people in cities and remote communities for several years, spoke of the threat of cultural extinction. He said ‘White Australia just has no idea how Aboriginal Australians feel and think and live, survive. It’s like the rest of Australia just wishes you didn’t exist’. Ben, a mature-aged Anglo-Australian man who had been living in Darwin for six years, attributes this lack of understanding to an ‘imaginary divide’ that causes discomfort; he always feels like an outsider in public spaces where Aboriginals are visible. Women of ethnic minority heritage from South Asia and the Middle East underlined that there were very few opportunities to mix with Aboriginal Australians. For example Jamila, who assumes a leadership role in a South Asian community and has been living in Darwin for 23 years, said ‘Personally I don’t have … I haven’t had many opportunities to mix with the Aboriginal people … with the dominant white culture, yes’ (October 2011). Alya, a woman who arrived from the Middle East as a humanitarian migrant and has been living in Darwin for three years, said: ‘I have not been very much in contact with Aboriginals, not very much. I have not been very close. They stay away, they are quiet. I heard they don’t want more people to come and take the land’ (Darwin, May 2012). Perhaps the lack of opportunities for interaction and such misconceptions stem from an inability and reluctance to engage with Aboriginal people, which is influenced by dominant cultural stereotypes that pathologize and criminalize them. The outcome of such limited engagement, however, can be problematic for two main reasons. First, it inhibits the initiation of a conversation that can challenge everyday practices and policies that racialize and unfairly target Aboriginals as dysfunctional subjects prone to alcoholism and crime (Eldridge 2012, Taylor, Walker and Marawili 2011, Fee and Russell 2007, Povinelli 2002). Second, it

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disempowers Aboriginal people, affects their feelings of comfort and limits their motivation to participate in events and activities in the city’s public spaces where irreducible difference is always visible. The effects of such visibility were clearer in the second phase of the research conducted in 2012, when I found it easier to engage Aboriginal women and perhaps was less of an outsider. Kim, a mature-aged woman who lives alone and prefers to avoid using the skeletal public transport services available on the weekend, said: ‘Some people as a general rule [on the bus] look at us like don’t come near me, don’t touch me. I just stay at home. It costs a lot of money to come in a taxi, lot of money, good practice for old age [laughs]’ (May 2012). This comment, which ended with a touch of humour, shows that, while public spaces and events in the city are supposed to facilitate the co-presence of people of diverse cultural backgrounds, Kim, an Aboriginal woman, is reluctant and unable to avail of such opportunities. Miriam, a young mother with four children, also voiced feelings of discomfort in some public spaces in the city where she gets an ‘uncomfortable feeling’ or a ‘bad reaction’. I am not sure whether my insider status as a woman of colour encouraged such comments and made it difficult for me to listen to stories that unsettled the self–other divide. I think I found it easier to engage Aboriginal women during the second phase of fieldwork, because I was less focused on ‘breezing in and breezing out’ with meaningful data and more interested in listening to their stories of everyday life. Breezing In and Breezing Out During several interviews in the first phase of fieldwork I expressed the difficulties I was facing in negotiating participation from residents of Aboriginal ancestry. In two weeks I had interviewed only two women who identified as Aboriginal and I felt that I was missing some important insights into the complexity of intercultural encounters in public spaces. Brian, an Anglo-Australian religious leader, attributed this inability to involve Aboriginal residents to my position as an ‘outsider’, someone who was ‘breezing in and breezing out’ of Darwin and whose research practice conformed to mainstream norms: Brian: If I want someone to share a bit of themselves I actually have to share a bit of myself, otherwise I haven’t got the right to do it. You don’t need relationships to do mainstream research. Generally speaking you just don’t need to develop relationships, but Aboriginally you’re fighting a losing battle if you don’t. Me: Yeah, and I realize I haven’t been able to develop that with some people. In fact when I talk to them they have been very helpful, but when it comes to research, even though I may plead, they don’t reply. Yeah, and then I think perhaps I’ve offended them … email and say ‘did I do anything to offend you’, but I won’t get a reply.

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Brian: Bet they won’t reply to that. Me: Yeah. So I don’t know what I’ve done, you know what I mean? Brian: No, no, well I don’t think you have done anything; it’s just that they haven’t been able to relate to you, yet, in a way where they can just respond to you like that. And maybe e-mails is the wrong way. (October 2011)

This conversation with Brian demonstrates the anxiety I experienced in trying to involve Aboriginal residents. When I positioned myself as a researcher in faceto-face encounters, residents rarely declined to participate, but instead asked for my phone number, sometimes gave me their e-mail address, but often I had no further contact with them. The question that often surfaced in my consciousness was ‘Why should they trust a stranger to the city with their personal stories?’ This trust was not about the minimization of harm prescribed by ethics review boards but about building relationships that demonstrate care, empathy and responsibility in research settings and being aware that as a researcher my questions could be intimidating despite my best intentions (Besio 2010). Dora, a community youth worker, made me aware of the possible impact of my questions when she said: Often, like, people feel intimidated when they’re asked questions about themselves, and that can be anybody, not just Indigenous people. But I guess too, when you come with the research cap, a lot of people, particularly the older ones, tend to be a little bit sceptical and a little bit suspicious I guess, of what it is you want to come and research and because there’s been so many researchers that have come through communities in the past for many, many, many years. And a lot of researchers come in, get what they want, and go out. And then there’s no benefit to the community. (October 2011)

Like Dora, many local residents of Anglo-Australian and ethnic minority background wanted to help me with my research but also protect Aboriginal people from intrusive questions asked by outsiders. As caring rather than just paternalistic gatekeepers they underlined that Aboriginals are over-researched, suffer fatigue from being constantly questioned and are suspicious of researchers. Researchers are outsiders who provide few tangible benefits and unintentionally contribute to policy outcomes that are interventionist and exacerbate experiences of disempowerment, marginalization and racialization. Feminist researchers like Mauthner and Birch (2002) have drawn attention to how gatekeepers aim to be ethical but often regulate access to less powerful and vulnerable groups, which may not always be productive. As an outsider my interactions with gatekeepers in community organizations made me aware of my authoritative power as a researcher who could intimidate others with my questions. I became aware that conforming to the mainstream ways of doing research did not seem to be working. With time I became less

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anxious about negotiating Aboriginal participation and getting formal consent. I unconsciously began to draw on more informal methods that I used in fieldwork among participants in cities and towns in India more than 12 years ago and the results were surprising. Casual Conversations Surprise Me: Meeting ‘Countrymen’ As I travelled by bus to different places to interview people I grew accustomed to talking to people in public spaces such as the street, shopping malls, shopping squares, at the bus interchange, on the bus and at local fresh food markets and tourist markets. I had several casual conversations with Aboriginals, particularly men, many of whom identified me as Indian. For example, when I sat near a young man at the rear of a crowded bus on my way to the Mindil Beach market on Thursday evening who was talking loudly to a group of friends in a language I did not understand, I introduced myself. I said it felt like home in Kolkata, India, a city where travelling by crowded buses is part of everyday life and people often speak loudly in Hindi and Bengali rather than in hushed tones like in Melbourne. When we reached our destination I was invited to come and see how Aboriginal people enjoy the beach, sitting on the sand along with friends and family in a shady grove away from the hustle and bustle of the Mindil Beach market. We talked about various things and I told them that sitting or lying on the sand was how my family enjoyed a holiday at the Indian beaches of Goa and Puri. Perhaps such convivial conversations could be interpreted as having little value because it did not generate the collection of data that is rigorous and can be analysed. I see such encounters, however, as enabling because they allowed me to learn how to inhabit space by valuing the presence of others who share this space, and whose Aboriginality intersected with other aspects of their identity such as gender and disability. For example, when I saw Bernie, a middle-aged man, at a suburban bus interchange I had no intention of interviewing him. He was in a motorized wheelchair moving past the different terminals, talking to people he met. Bernie approached me and asked me why I had come to Darwin. I told him I was a researcher from Melbourne, gave him some details about my research and showed him a poster. Ten minutes later I was travelling on bus route 12 to Malak and noticed Bernie sitting on the bus. He called out and asked me to come and sit near him – he was curious, questioned me and wanted to know more about my life experiences. I told him that I had spent most of my life in Kolkata, India, and migrated to Australia 12 years ago with my husband and two children. He wanted to talk and I asked him if I could make a few notes in my diary, a practice I routinely engaged in during the day when I travelled by public transport and at night after a long day. Bernie agreed and said: ‘You’re Indian, even me a bit. I’ve got a bit of Sri Lankan in me. My great grandfather is from Mumbai’. He told me that his great-grandfather was an intelligent man who owned one of the largest cattle stations in the Northern Territory, but the family lost everything due to bad decisions made under the influence of alcohol.

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Bernie found living in Darwin very expensive and Christmas was a stressful time because he had four daughters and nine grandchildren. He enjoyed the daily visit to the shopping mall which gave him the opportunity to meet people on the bus, talk to the bus drivers and have casual conversations with strangers like me. I responded by telling him that, while it is easy to talk to strangers in public spaces, they rarely want to participate in my research and, if they do, it is hard to get consent. Bernie attributes the lack of participation among Aboriginals to their timid nature and embarrassment when asked personal questions. He said, ‘You can only talk to our countryman if they are drunk’, but I disagreed and used our conversation as evidence. Bernie was keen that I communicate his views and said ‘Darwin is very expensive … food. Give that to them for the survey’. I told him that I was unable to use the content of our conversation in my research as I did not have his consent. He asked me to read the form, borrowed a pen from me and added a signature which was difficult to read. For the first time, I became aware that his hands were bound and I felt ashamed about asking for written consent. At Karama, a northern suburb, he called out to two boys to carry the wheelchair off the bus and he waved goodbye (October 2011). Rather than just strictly adhering to the rules and procedures of ethical practice, which focus on getting informed consent through language, in this interview consent was first given through facial expressions and bodily gestures. Greenhough and Roe (2011: 53) argue that ‘embodied sensibilities’ that incorporate sensations and bodily responses are crucial to informed consent and ethical engagement rather than written or verbal forms of communication. As an outsider my encounter with Bernie made me aware of engaging with Aboriginals in ways that go beyond mere conversation. Travelling by public transport and mingling with people in public spaces allowed me to immerse myself in the daily life of the city and unsettle fixed understandings of an authentic or stigmatized Aboriginal identity. Cowlishaw (2005) argues that conversing on equal terms rather than judging and demonizing others based on appearance, clothes and speech style is crucial to intercultural engagement. Perhaps this is what Iris, an Aboriginal woman, implied when she said, ‘down-south people don’t know how to interact with Aboriginal peoples’. Several participants felt that southerners, ‘city slickers’ and policymakers had few deep insights into a changing and alive Aboriginal culture. I soon realized that the practice of modest witnessing (Haraway 1997) that is open and acknowledges the partial and situated nature of research has the potential to unsettle popular stereotypes of Aboriginals. Rather than seeing Aboriginals who live in public spaces as drunks, homeless people or itinerants who disturb the order of white public space, it became easier for me to welcome them warmly as ‘countrymen’. With the support of the Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation, I began to spend time with countrymen and women who camp at beach reserves and are supported by a program called HEAL (Health Engagement and Assistance in the Long Grass). The HEAL program aims at ‘Looking after Long Grass Mob’, or Aboriginal people who live in public spaces, by providing essential health services and engaging them in the community through social activities such as painting

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(LNAC 2012). I attended several weekly painting sessions of about four hours during which participants, volunteers, visitors and community workers spent time together cooking, talking, joking, painting or just sitting quietly. During such encounters I was always identified as Indian based on my physical appearance, skin colour and accent. During these conversations we talked about how Indians wore colourful clothes and ate hot, spicy food. I spoke in Hindi and Bengali and taught them how to greet others by saying Kamon achhe? (Bengali) and Kaisa hai? (Hindi). They spoke in Tiwi language and tried to teach me a few words of greeting. We told jokes and riddles too. With time I became more open to different ways of conversing, including short statements in English or ‘Tiwi language’ interspersed with long silences as well as jokes and riddles. In such encounters I was not the powerful researcher asking ‘personal’ questions but someone who participated in activities and contributed to a conversation over which I lost control. I was not always sure of the direction and outcomes of the diverse paths the conversation took. Such risktaking is important in the co-production of knowledge because it enables us to resituate and reposition ourselves and focus on what we are doing rather than what we have extracted from the research process (Greenhough 2010). Such ‘doing’ involved receiving consent through bodily gestures and facial expressions from participants and engaging with mature-aged Aboriginal men and women who were happy to talk once they felt that my questions were not intrusive. Although the gift voucher I offered made them happy, I would like to think that sharing my stories of India and listening to what they had to say circulated happiness too. I think this was evident because when I met them at different public spaces in the city, a common experience in a small city like Darwin, they smiled, waved or talked and were very welcoming. Conversations with Aboriginal Women: Dispelling Fixed Understandings of Aboriginality and Indian-ness Stories of my Anglo-Indian heritage, Indian festivals and the hot weather in Kolkata, India, helped me to shift my position as an authoritative researcher and challenge my fixed understandings of Aboriginality in interviews with women. While many Darwinites spoke about how they sensed someone was Aboriginal, as a Melbournian who has limited everyday contact with Aboriginals, I lacked this embodied understanding. In fact, some women like Anne told stories of their Aboriginality towards the end of an interview after I had shared stories of India. Fee and Russell (2007: 187) argue that in Aboriginal cultures it is necessary to introduce oneself, as well as know and understand the others, if ‘real stories’ are to be told and ‘productive conversations’ are to occur. Given my experiences in public spaces in Darwin where my Indian identity was always apparent through my skin colour and facial appearance, I felt that such introduction was not necessary. I therefore usually introduced myself as an ‘insider’, a Melbournian rather than

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a woman from Kolkata, India. Such an introduction, however, did not privilege my Indian heritage, and as a southerner I was paradoxically an ‘outsider’. Such an ‘outsider’ status can perhaps be attributed to an imaginary divide that draws attention to the easy-going lifestyle and multi-ethnic and multi-racial social context of Darwin in the Top End, or northern Australia, which is different from the larger southern cities (Ford 2009). It was only during the course of the interview when I told stories of Kolkata that participants were able to trust me with their stories. The intersection of my gendered identity with my Indian heritage created some connections with women who challenged my essentialist understandings of Aboriginality. When I met Anne, a young woman, I felt sure she was AngloAustralian because of her skin colour and appearance. Anne had lived in the Darwin-Palmerston urban area her entire life and seemed to guess I was Indian. I felt this was evident when she said ‘there’s a lot of Indians in Palmerston area … probably a huge Indian community’ (October 2011). However, I was more interested in listening to her stories and did not share stories of India. Instead, we talked about places in Darwin and I told her about my experience of watching the fireworks display on the closing night at the Mindil Beach market. Anne responded by describing the spectacular fireworks display at several sites along the beach to celebrate Territory Day on the first of July, the day the Northern Territory assumed self-government. Anne also told me how families in Palmerston often lit fire crackers on the street in front of their homes. I told Anne that our family as well as our neighbours did the same on Diwali, the Festival of Light in India, which ushers in the New Year in October/November. I think such conversations enabled Anne to trust me with stories about her parents and grandparents. This was our conversation at the end of our interview: Me: So yeah, I think great stories. So, any other things you want to talk about? Anne: No, that’s it, yep. No, that’s fine. Me: It’s all good, yeah? Anne: Yeah, did you want to talk about, I don’t know if you’ll want to add it in about the Stolen Generation because you know how it affected a lot of people a bit. Well my mother was part of the Stolen Generation and we only met our family last year … and they’re all in Darwin, a lot of my mum’s real family. (October 2011)

Anne told me her grandmother was forcibly separated from her mother when she was young and grew up in a home for Aboriginal children; she belonged to the Stolen Generation, a generation of Aboriginal mothers who were racialized and not considered worthy enough by the state to look after their ‘half-caste children’ (LNAC 2006). The acknowledgement of the traumatic impact of such practices of separation on Aboriginals families were acknowledged and regretted by white

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Australia in an official apology in 2008. Healing the effects of such displacement and dispossession, however, is an ongoing process for which all settlers including newcomers are responsible. During my conversation with Anne I became aware of the impacts of such forcible separation on four generations of Anne’s family. When Anne’s grandmother was pregnant she had to give up her daughter, Anne’s mother, for adoption as she did not have the means to care for her. Anne’s mother’s early life in a mission home was difficult and she began to lead a privileged life only after she was adopted the second time by an Anglo-Australian couple. Anne and her brother were curious to trace their Aboriginal heritage even though they took pride in their Irish ancestry and discovered in 2011 that they had 18 first cousins: ‘There’s like 18 first cousins, not including me and my brother. So there’s so many of them and it felt like, now we’re so close, feels like we’ve always known them, so yeah it’s good’. The outcome was connections with members of her family living in Darwin who provide support during difficult times. I met members of Anne’s family and visited and interviewed her mother in the second phase of the research. I think it was our position outside white hegemonic space as Indigenous and migrant rather than as bodies of colour that created a connection. Such connections have been important in challenging what Paradies (2006) identifies as an essentialized understanding of Aboriginality that fails to appreciate Indigenous diversity, Talking about the weather in Kolkata also helped me to communicate with Norma, a mature-aged woman, who said ‘long, long way back there is Aboriginal blood’. Although Norma had lost her home as well as members of her family when Darwin was devastated by Cyclone Tracy in 1974, these bad memories did not impede her enjoyment of the wet season. Norma said: ‘And I love the wet season. It’s my favourite time of the year because I love the raw energy of the wet season, the lightning, and the storms, even though I went through Cyclone Tracy’. I responded by telling Norma that I experienced similar feelings waiting for the rain after months of heat and humidity in Kolkata, and asked her whether the streets got waterlogged. As the conversation progressed Norma began to talk about the relaxed and easy-going Darwin lifestyle that was so different from ‘down south’ but also shared stories about how she asserts herself to support countrymen and women and humanitarian migrants who face discrimination and racialization in public spaces. Norma’s mixed ancestry, which is quite common in Darwin given its history of Aboriginal–Asian contact, means that she positions herself as Chinese or Aboriginal in different social spaces. Paradies (2006), an urban Aboriginal-Anglo-Asian Australian man, has observed that such a shifting and hybrid identity is enabling rather than marginalizing. Norma uses such a hybrid identity to assume responsibility towards and support marginalized residents of Darwin such as ‘Long Grassers’, countrymen who live in open spaces, asylum seekers and refugees. Perhaps, Norma’s stories made me aware of my mixed ancestry when I spoke to Maude. Maude, a senior citizen whom I had an informal conversation with at a community centre, spoke of her mixed ancestry and forced separation from her

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family. I responded by telling her about my mixed ancestry as an Anglo-Indian and stories of my grandparents who were born in British India (Lobo and Morgan 2012). I also told stories of my aunt who was raised by a single mother and never knew her British father. Soon our conversation became more light-hearted and Maude told me several ‘jacky jokes’ to provide an insight into Aboriginal humour. She said such humour which is often irreverent can also be empowering because it allows Aboriginals to look at the lighter side of life despite the difficulties they face. Maude asked me riddles, recited limericks and poems and showed me a coolamon, traditionally used for carrying a baby or for cooking which she and her friends had crafted from the bark of a tree. Through our conversation I got an insight into Maude’s carefree and welcoming nature. As a member of the Stolen Generation, she took pride in her Aboriginal identity even though she had painful memories. She asked me to be proud of my Indian identity and said something like this: ‘Don’t forget who you are. We don’t look down at you, your country and your background. Be proud of what you are’. I am not sure whether it is ethical to refer to our conversation because, although Maude was happy to talk for more than an hour and keen that I take notes, she did not agree with mainstream ways of conducting ethical research. She said that demonstrations of genuine care towards others were more important than getting written consent and assuring anonymity. Maude wanted to be identified by name so that her voice could be heard and her knowledge valued. Her pride and sense of self-worth empowered her to welcome me but she also questioned my performance as an ethical university researcher keen to adhere to mainstream norms. Such everyday acts of empowerment and welcoming are crucial to strengthening a multicultural policy agenda that appreciates the complexity of Indigenous–white– ethnic minority relations. Conclusion This chapter, which focuses on the Australian context, shows that positioning myself as an insider, a researcher from Melbourne, elicited curiosity about my research but did not necessarily result in participation. To my surprise, it was my ‘outsider’ status as an Indian and migrant that enabled me to connect with Aboriginal people who valued rather than exoticized my Indian heritage. This was in contrast to my previous experience of conducting research in suburban Melbourne where my outsider status and stereotypical perceptions of my migrant Indian identity, particularly among Anglo-Australians, was initially emotionally unsettling (Lobo 2010). My mobility has produced connections between Kolkata, Melbourne and Darwin and made me aware that I occupy shifting positions along the spectrum of an insider–outsider status. In my interviews with residents of Aboriginal heritage, I am not sure whether I was an outsider, insider or an ‘outsider within’, which is a common experience for Asian Australians (Stephenson 2007: 9). What I can say, however, is that my first experience of conducting fieldwork in Darwin has

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been an enriching experience because of the care and respect I have received from Aboriginal people. Rather than reproducing whiteness through hyperpoliteness, as observed by Moon (1999), Aboriginal participants welcomed me through their frankness, humour and bodily responses. These experiences made me realize that an ongoing process of demonstrating responsibility and care to Indigenous people is required to respond to the question posed at the beginning of this chapter, which is ‘How does the research project contribute to short-term and long-term benefits for Indigenous people?’ I would like to underline that Aboriginals benefit when Australians of ethnic minority heritage embody and demonstrate respect towards them in everyday life. Rather than responding with indifference or avoiding such contact in everyday life or supporting interventionist policies though silence or agreement, we need to engage with others to ensure respect for the land, law and languages of Aboriginal people, as stated by the Yolŋuw Makarr Dhuni (2012) in their open letter to the leaders of the Australian Federal and Northern Territory Parliaments. Perhaps, insights into local knowledge and the co-production of knowledge provided in this chapter respond in a modest way to Lea’s call to explore the messiness, richness and pulsating nature of everyday life that can subvert the rationality and the order of bureaucratic responses that focus on the political and economic modes and displace the ‘marvellous and ordinary modes of inhabiting the world’ (2008: 226). Acknowledgements I would like to thank residents of Darwin and the Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation for their support. Thanks also to Assoc. Prof. Yin Paradies, Dr Catherine Holmes and the anonymous referees for their valuable comments. This research was supported by an Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Fellowship, Deakin University. References Besio, K. 2010. The politics and ethics of trust in geographic research, in The Sage Handbook of Social Geographies, edited by S.J. Smith et al. London: Sage, 560–572. Carson, D., Schmallegger, D. and Harwood, S. 2010. A city for the temporary? Political economy and urban planning in Darwin, Australia. Urban Policy and Research, 28(3), 293–310. Cowlishaw, G. 2005. Who’s upsetting who? Strangeness, morality, nostalgia, pleasure, in The State of the North 2003: A Selection of Papers from the 2003 Charles Darwin Symposia, edited by T. Lea and B. Wilson. Darwin: Charles Darwin University Press, 203–23.

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Darwin City Council. 2008. City of Darwin: Community Profile. Darwin: Darwin City Council. Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC). 2011. The People of Australia – Australia’s Multicultural Policy. Canberra: Australian Government. Dodson, P. and Cronin, D. 2011. An Australian dialogue: decolonising the country, in Unsettling the Settler State: Creativity and Resistance in Indigenous SettlerState Governance, edited by S. Maddison and M. Briggs. Sydney: Federation Press, 189–205. Eldridge, I. 2012. Attack drinking problem – not the people. Northern Territory News, 25 April. Fee, M. and Russell, L. 2007. ‘Whiteness’ and ‘Aboriginality’ in Canada and Australia: conversations and identities. Feminist Theory, 8, 187–208. Ford, M. 2009. In Your Face: A Case Study in Post-Multiculturalist Australia. Darwin: Charles Darwin University Press. Greenhough, B. 2010. Vitalist geographies: life and the more-than-human, in Taking Place: Non-Representational Theories and Geography, edited by B. Anderson and P. Harrison. Surrey: Ashgate, 37–54. Greenhough, B. and Roe, E. 2011. Ethics, space, and somatic sensibilities: comparing relationships between scientific researchers and their human and animal experimental subjects. Environment & Planning, 29, 47–66. Henry-Waring, M. 2004. Moving beyond otherness: exploring the polyvocal subjectivities of African Caribbean women across the United Kingdom. Hecate, 30, 31–40. Haraway, D.J. 1997. [email protected]: Feminism and Technoscience. New York: Routledge. Hage, G. 1998. White Nation: Fantasies of White Supremacy in a Multicultural Society. Annandale, NSW: Pluto Press. Lea, T. 2008. Bureaucrats & Bleeding Hearts: Indigenous Health in Northern Australia. Sydney: UNSW Press. Lea, T. 2012. When looking for anarchy, look to the state: fantasies of regulation in forcing disorder within the Australian Indigenous estate. Critique of Anthropology, 32, 109–24. Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation (LNAC). 2006. Saltwater People: Larrakia Stories from around Darwin. Darwin: Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation. Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation (LNAC). 2012. H.E.A.L. Program: Looking after ‘Long Grass’ Mob. Darwin: Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation. Lobo, M. 2010. Negotiating emotions, rethinking Otherness in suburban Melbourne. Gender, Place and Culture, 17, 99–114. Lobo, M. and Mansouri, F. 2012. ‘Hoops’ and ‘bridges’: Muslims and the ‘Australian way of life’, in Muslims in the West and the Challenges of Belonging, edited by F. Mansouri and V. Marotta. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 114–33.

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Lobo, M. and Morgan, L. 2012. Whiteness and the city: Australians of AngloIndian heritage in suburban Melbourne. South Asian Diaspora, 4(2), 123–37. McQuire, A. 2012. Stronger futures is a ‘war on democracy’: Gondarra. Tracker, 29 June. Available at: http://tracker.org.au/2012/06/stronger-futures-is-a-waron-democracy-gondarra/ [accessed: 23 August 2012]. Mauthner, M, and Birch, M. 2002. Ethics in qualitative research, in Ethics in Qualitative Research, edited by M. Mauthner et al. London: Sage, 54–67. Moon, D. 1999. White enculturation and bourgeois ideology: the discursive production of ‘good (white) girls’, in Whiteness: The Communication of Social Identity, edited by T.K. Nakayama and J.N. Martin. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 177–97. Moreton-Robinson, A. 2007. Introduction, in Sovereign Subject, edited by A. Moreton-Robinson. Crows Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1–11. Mullings, B. 1999. Insider or outsider, both or neither: some dilemmas of interviewing in a cross-cultural setting. Geoforum, 30, 337–50. O’Connor, P. 2004. The conditionality of status: experience-based reflections on the insider/outsider issue. Australian Geographer, 35(2), 169–76. Paradies, Y. 2006. Beyond black and white: essentialism, hybridity and indigeneity. Journal of Sociology, 42(4), 355–67. Povinelli, E.A. 2002. The Cunning of Recognition. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Stephenson, P. 2007. The Outsiders Within: Telling Australia’s Indigenous-Asian Story. Sydney: UNSW Press. Taylor, P., Walker, S.J. and Marawili, B. 2011. Message in the Bottle: A Survey of Drinking Patterns and Attitudes about Alcohol Policy amongst Darwin’s Homeless. Darwin: Larrakia Nation Aboriginal Corporation Research Division. Yolŋuw Makarr Dhuni (Yolŋu Nations Assembly). 2012. Statement Regarding Australian Federal Government Stronger Futures Bills and Northern Territory Policies: Letter to the Leaders of the Australian Federal and Northern Territory Parliaments, 24 April.

Chapter 2

Cosmopolitan Engagement in Researching Race Relations in New Zealand Farida Fozdar

Introduction Some two decades ago scientists became excited about fractals, most frequently illustrated in beautiful geometric shapes, seen through the lenses of very strong microscopes or computer-generated graphics. While there are a number of different aspects to fractals, the one of interest here is the way in which edges of matter are found to dissolve into complex patterns that offer no clear delineation between inside and outside – a physical demonstration of the blurriness of boundaries. Another aspect of the fractal is its repetitive patterning, and the definition of the fractal often includes the term ‘self-similarity’ – the edges retain the same pattern as the thing itself. The key point is that edges of material objects are not absolute: fractals demonstrate the ways in which things ‘bleed’ into each other. Fractals show in the material world what social scientists for decades have been arguing in the social world, that while social structures, including ‘groups’, may have material effects, they are socially constructed and therefore never absolute (Brubaker 2006, Barth 1969). Fractals are therefore useful as a metaphor in rethinking assumptions about insiderness and outsiderness generally. They are particularly useful when considering presumptions about the ways in which race and ethnicity affect research. Edwards (1990: 482) argued that: Race does not simply exist as an object of study or a variable in analysis, it enters into the research process itself – into the selection of a problem, into the methodology, the conduct of the research, the assumptions made in it, who is included in the study, whose perspective is highlighted – and importantly influences the relationship with those we are researching.

If this is the case then the self-reflexive researcher should consider the ways in which race is implicated in the choice of research questions, methods used, selection of participants and so on. But rather than making presumptions about the impact of race (or ethnicity, or nationality) on the research process, their focus should be on the ‘practical categories, situated actions, cultural idioms, cognitive schemas, common-sense knowledge … discursive frames … political

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projects, contingent events, and variable groupness’ (Brubaker 2006: 27) enacted through the research process – on how the group, and therefore insiderness and outsiderness, is constructed in the practice of research. In this chapter, I argue that research participants engage with similarity and difference in complex ways, in order to assist the researcher to achieve her ends. Werbner (2008) has argued that social scientists enact a rooted, vernacular cosmopolitanism in their encounters with those they study, demonstrating respect, openness to difference and a desire to understand. Anthropology, she suggests, is the discipline that ‘takes the stance of the stranger in order to probe beneath the common-sense assumptions of everyday life in another society. The stranger’s gaze was a precondition for insight into the social rules and implicit assumptions of another society’ (Werbner 2008: 47–8). She calls this ‘the kindness of strangers’, but notes that strangeness is a position-taking act intended to achieve a particular end, not an absolute. In the research discussed below, evidence is provided of the ways in which those others with whom the social scientist is engaged also orient to the encounter in a ‘kindly’ way. Participants open their definitions of who is ‘in’ to include the researcher as someone with whom communication is worthwhile, while simultaneously orienting to the researcher’s ‘out-ness’ where appropriate to provide as much detail and explanation as is needed, and doing it all in a spirit that can be identified as cosmopolitan. The result, as Benhabib (2004) has noted, is a dialogical encounter that requires, and produces, mutual respect. It is argued that this dialogical anthropology ‘extends the cosmopolitan vision of anthropology by incorporating the other and the self into a single universe of discourse’ (Werbner 2008: 53). A ‘Mixed Race’ Migrant Researching Maori and Pakeha My research interest is in the construction of racial, ethnic and national identities in interaction, and how these are implicated in the formation and enactment of inclusionary and exclusionary attitudes. In New Zealand the most significant and interesting axis around which these questions revolve is in the relationship between Maori (Indigenous New Zealanders) and Pakeha (white New Zealanders). An identity politics based around different levels of Indigeneity, defined in racial terms, has been the foundation on which rights claims have been made in New Zealand since the Treaty of Waitangi which established the nature of the relationship between colonized and colonizer1 (Fleras and Spoonley 1999, Durie 1  The Treaty of Waitangi, signed in 1840, is the founding document of New Zealand which ostensibly settled the relationship between Indigenous New Zealanders and their colonisers. From the start it was a matter of contention, with only some chiefs signing it, and differences in wording in the Maori and English versions leading to disagreements over which rights and resources had been ceded. Fleras and Spoonley (1999) argue that the Treaty, having been largely ignored by historians for decades, is now seen as central to the development of Maori-Pakeha relations. In the 1980s, explicit policies of biculturalism, based on recognition of the two groups as equal partners sharing joint jurisdiction over

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1998). A policy of biculturalism has sought to ensure material and symbolic resources for Maori, but there is also a backlash from Pakeha concerned about its impact on their position, with a perception that Maori are being privileged as a result. Despite fraught relationships at the political level that see regular protests and calls for Maori self-determination, interpersonal interactions among Maori and Pakeha are common and generally positive. For my PhD, I sought to explore these interactions at the micro-level, to understand how friendships within and across cultures/races relate to ethnic identity and attitudes to race relations. The study relied on ‘contact theory’ (Allport 1954), the argument that developing close relationships across cultures reduces prejudice. But rather than assuming that this was given, discursive analysis of the ways in which interactions between Maori and Pakeha were constructed was undertaken. The need to justify this choice of topic became clear immediately, when it was suggested, quite aggressively by a peer, that my gender and family status provided overarching categories that were the legitimate foci of my research, and should determine my choice of topic and participants. I was told I should be studying mothers of young children, not culture/race and interactions. The presumption that certain categories of group membership should be the source of one’s research questions, and not others, gave me a reason to think through this orthodoxy. To provide the context for the following discussion it is necessary to offer some autobiographical details relevant to insiderness/outsiderness. In terms of the groups that the researcher might be considered ‘inside’ or ‘outside’ of, relevant categories include ethnicity, race, nationality, gender and class. These categories are relevant because my focus, and therefore participant selection, included male and female Maori and Pakeha New Zealanders from working-class backgrounds. It has been variously argued that each of these categories (ethnicity, race, nationality, gender, class and migration status) should be subject only to ‘in-group’ research. Gender and class can be dismissed briefly. In terms of gender, there was no apparent reason to restrict the research to either males or females, as the topic was not gender specific – friendship is engaged in by both men and women. I was interested in focusing on the working class where Maori tend to be over-represented and therefore might be more likely to develop cross-cultural friendships. Additionally, earlier research had focussed on middle- and upper-class New Zealanders (Wetherell and Potter 1992), and this was an opportunity to hear from a different section of the population, and provide something of a comparison. I was interested in Maori and Pakeha as these are the two main ethnic/racial groups in New Zealand, the two groups that bicultural policies privilege and the two for whom political and social history is most fraught (Fleras and Spoonley 1999, Durie 1998). areas of mutual concern, were instituted to recognise this relationship. These policies (such as dual language signage) have been criticized as being window dressing, without bringing about real change in terms of access to resources and power, or modifications to incorporate Maori values and perspectives. However, the parallel development of Maori institutions, in education and the legal system for example, offer some evidence that gains are being made.

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I was arguably an outsider for each of these important categories, but exactly what type of ‘outsider’? At the time of the research, I was an Australian citizen living in New Zealand as a migrant (of indeterminate length – my family had moved with my husband’s work four years earlier, and we planned to stay for a few years before returning to Australia). I am of mixed Indian (Parsi) and American parentage, and grew up in Brunei, the US and Australia in a financially insecure middle-class family. At the time of the research, I had lived half my life in Australia, and held an Australian passport, though I rarely identified as Australian. I am perhaps less Australian than others who migrated to the country at a young age because I was raised in a Baha’i family. My family did not participate in traditional ‘Aussie’ cultural rituals, such as the beer-drinking pub culture and Christmas, and was part of a strong, somewhat exclusive, community. The sense of being different was an important part of my identity while growing up (see Tilbury 2007, for a full discussion). However, I do have a mainly Australian accent. I could not be conceived of as being, and never felt myself to be, a New Zealander. I did not ‘feel’ Pakeha, although I was able to ‘pass’ as one, and when in Australia, I am assumed to share a similar ethno-racial position (that is, I am generally seen as a local ‘white’). I have also been told by Maori friends that I could ‘pass’ as Maori. In a sense, then, I was ‘other’ to both groups, being neither Pakeha nor Maori, and as a migrant, not ‘belonging’ to Aotearoa/New Zealand in any sense. Yet, through the course of the research, I was perceived as an insider by both groups – looking Pakeha, I was engaged with as such by the Pakeha participants, and my Indian heritage and darkish looks were taken as a point of similarity by some Maori participants, despite me being ‘Indigenous’ to nowhere and most definitely ‘tau iwi’ (the Maori word for foreigner). I was also oriented as an outsider in a number of senses, but only in ways that enhanced the research, as discussed below. I discuss the effects of these categorization processes shortly, but a rationale for undertaking ‘outsider’ research is provided first. Insiders and Outsiders Arguments about who should study whom were first systematically articulated in the 1970s when Robert Merton wrote a cautionary paper arguing against what he saw as a trend in the social sciences to privilege ‘insider’ knowledge. He was writing from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge, and so he was more concerned with the value of the information produced by the different categories of observers than the ethics of doing the observing (Merton 1972). Merton questioned the view that insider and outsider statuses were distinct, and argued that, regardless, neither ‘insiders’ nor ‘outsiders’ had privileged access to more valid knowledge about a group, either through their distance and therefore ‘objectivity’, or subjectivity and hence ‘authenticity’. Others subsequently wrote extensively about the inappropriateness of outsider research based on differences in access to power, particularly with

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regard to members of majorities studying minorities. Edward Said (1978),2 for instance, in his critique of research undertaken in Eastern countries by Western anthropologists, argued that outsiders tend to construct the East as Other. He saw this as simply an extension of the colonial project. Clifford and Marcus (1986) made a similar argument about ethnographic work more generally, building on the work of Talal Asad (1973). Werbner (2008: 51) notes the crisis of representation in anthropology brought about by the work of these authors: ‘What appeared to have been a somewhat utopian cosmopolitan project to reach out to a cultural and social Other and create a cross-cultural comparative discipline, was reconstructed … as an act of colonialism’. Among the criticisms was that anthropologists were studying cultural Others from the perspective of a central metropolitan position, amounting to a form of domination. Consequently, postcolonial scholars claimed the monopolistic right to study their own societies. Some feminist theorists, too, have concluded that researching ‘others’ necessarily means speaking for them, which ‘becomes a form of colonisation’ (Sinister Wisdom Collective 1990: 4). In Can the Subaltern Speak, feminist literary critic Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (1988) argued that the West consistently either ignores or distances the marginalized. She called for ‘strategic essentialism’ among such groups (women, migrants, Indigenous peoples, postcolonial subjects) as a political tool to claim their right to a voice. Her use of the term ‘strategic’ recognizes such groupings are not ‘real’ categories, but are useful politically. The take-up of such arguments has resulted in their reification. bell hooks (1990: 151–2) similarly suggested researchers should simply stop talking about the ‘Other’, since ‘speech about the “Other” annihilates, erases … [the speaker remains] author, authority. I am still the colonizer, the speaking subject, and you are now at the center of my talk’. The result of such criticisms has been a ‘failure of nerve, as anthropologists have accepted the self-definition imposed upon them by postmodernist anthropologists and postcolonial critics, namely, that the study of the Other, being a form of domination, is no longer a legitimate pursuit’ (Werbner 2008: 53). In Aotearoa/New Zealand these arguments obtained significant purchase. The issue of outsider research became a contentious one in the 1990s with concerns voiced by numerous authors about the potential for exploitation and cultural appropriation and questions raised about validity and political sensitivity (Cram 1997, Paulin 1996, Bishop 1996, 1994, 1992, Mead 1994, Irwin 1994, Smith 1992, Te Awekotuku 1991, Larner 1990, Walker 1990). These authors’ positions range from insistence on complete exclusion of non-Maori researchers (Walker 1990) to cautious acceptance of research by others (Cram 1997, Bishop 1996, Irwin 1994). Russell Bishop (1994: 175) has demonstrated that much research on Maori ‘has been designed to answer research questions that have benefited the researchers and the non-Maori academic community rather than Maori people themselves’. The result has been ‘… many decades – even centuries – of thoughtless, exploitative, 2  See Malik (1996) for a critique that challenges the essentialism implicit in Said’s attempt to distinguish insiders from outsiders.

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mercenary academic objectification’ (Te Awekotuku 1991: 12). Yet some of the most outspoken critics of non-Maori research of Maori maintain there is a place for such research (Bishop 1994: 177, Irwin 1994: 38). They argue that the skills of Pakeha and other non-Maori can and should be used to further the interests of the Maori people. They argue that, in fact, Pakeha responsibility as a partner to the Treaty of Waitangi requires it. Despite these voices, the question of the appropriateness of researchers and research topics is highly charged in New Zealand. The researcher must have a very clear rationale for their choice of topic, and do a good deal of credentializing work in order to justify asking ‘this’ research question, using ‘that’ sample. Given these objections, what was the rationale for a ‘mixed race’ migrant undertaking research with Maori and Pakeha? There are four main arguments. The first is based on a critique of the essentialism inherent in the ‘insiders only’ doctrine which assumes that members of the same ‘category’, either because of biology or life experience, are more similar to each other than they are to those from other ‘categories’. The ‘insiderness’ acts as a supposed qualification to conduct research within that group. Thus the boundaries of social categories such as race or ethnicity, which are taken as the units of analysis, are seen as absolute. Being situated within a boundary is seen as providing access to more accurate knowledge about that group, and showing greater empathy with its members. However, there is little agreement about what constitutes a group. Indeed the ‘categories’ defining ‘sameness’ have steadily contracted, so that shared gender, class, age, race and ethnicity are no longer seen as sufficient to ensure presumed validity and empathy. Now, unless the researcher matches her research participants on a whole range of axes of similarity/difference, she is open to accusations of not being sufficiently ‘inside’. Researchers have therefore begun to question the parameters of similarity. For example, does a white woman with an Aboriginal co-researcher have the right to research, and comment upon, rape by Aboriginal men of Aboriginal women, or does the fact that she is white exclude her (Bell 1996)? Alternatively does her status as a feminist act as an overarching category, giving her sufficient access and right? Similarly, is being female enough to allow an Indian woman without children access to White middle-class mothers and their child-bearing experiences (Bola 1996)? What problems do arise from a Pakeha lesbian including or excluding Maori bisexual women from her research, due to presumed ‘difference’ (Paulin 1996)? Clearly the edges of the categories replicate. Phoenix (1994: 49) concludes that since race, gender and class positions do not enter the research situation in a unitary way, ‘[p]rescriptions for matching the “race” and/or gender of interviewers and respondents are thus too simplistic’. Indeed, as Forsey (2004) notes, Haraway’s (1991: 192) influential ideas on ‘situated knowledges’ problematize the privileged perspective assumed to result from particular subject positions. Instead Haraway (1991: 192) argues for ‘passionate detachment’ and ‘mobile positioning’ suggesting: ‘One cannot “be” either a cell or molecule – or a woman, colonized person, laborer, and so on – if one intends to see and see from these positions critically. “Being” is much more problematic and

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contingent’. This movement across categories suggests a conscious repositioning of the researcher. This fluidity opens the way for researchers to consider the ways in which categories are constructed in practice, in this case, in the research process, rather than taking them a priori (Brubaker 2006). An appropriate response may be to adopt Stanley and Wise’s position (1993), that is, to refuse to eschew representation of other lives and attempt to provide enough analytical detail on how such representations are produced. Enough reflexivity on the influences on the researcher’s perspective will allow the reader to critically engage with the representations. In this context it is useful to consider Daphne Patai’s (1991: 150) argument that despite the continuing controversy over the ethics of researching ‘others’, ‘no controversy attends the fact that too much ignorance exists in the world to allow us to await perfect research methods before proceeding. Ultimately we have to make up our minds whether our research is worth doing or not, and then determine how to go about it in ways that let it best serve our stated goals’. A second objection to ‘insiders only’ research has to do with studying intergroup phenomena. If research is to be restricted to researchers who can claim membership of the group being researched, for example class, gender or age groups, it would be impossible to study interactions across groups. One could not study interactions between men and women, or the upper and working class, or teenagers and the middle aged, because no researcher can be a member of both groups. For ethnic or racial groups, being of mixed heritage could be argued to provide ‘insider’ status, but being mixed makes one as easily a member of neither group as of both. Using two researchers, one from each group, also does not sufficiently address this problem, given that at some point the researchers would be required to merge their understandings and findings. Thus insider-only prescriptions break down in the face of studying intergroup phenomena. A third argument is that it may be that outsiders, as ‘strangers’, are actually in a better position to undertake research, as they bring new perspectives to a situation with which they are unfamiliar. Early sociological literature identified the special status of the ‘stranger’ in social interactions. Simmel argued that ‘strangers’ may, because of their outsider status, bring certain insights to a phenomenon which may not be available to insiders (Merton 1972, Simmel [1955] 1964). He claimed that this status ensured objectivity, as the stranger would be without local prejudices, would be distanced from the group, and dissimilar enough to be treated as neutral and in need of complete education (Simmel [1955] 1964: 404–6). They also would have no clear group interest at stake, ensuring lack of bias. Werbner (2008: 48) has more recently noted that most early anthropologists, being migrants, were strangers in the countries in which they became well known, and as such could provide new understandings of the social systems in which they found themselves. Feminist researchers have also noted that being an outsider offers a privileged perspective which may provide better access to knowledge. ‘Standpoint feminism’ presumes that being an outsider may enhance validity, as it provides insights into social structures and experiences unavailable to those privileged by those

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structures (Hartsock 1983). Being ‘strangers’ to power provides women with a unique vantage point: The stranger brings to her research just the combination of nearness and remoteness, concern and indifference, that are central to maximising objectivity. Moreover, the ‘natives’ tend to tell a stranger some kinds of things they would never tell each other; further, the stranger can see patterns of belief or behaviour that are hard for those immersed in the culture to detect (Harding quoted in May 1997: 21).

Fourthly, the attempt to distinguish insiders from outsiders is somewhat anachronistic. In a globalized world, where social science is increasingly crossing constructed boundaries in terms of the subject of study, engaging in multi-sited (Marcus 1995) or non-local (Feldman 2011) ethnography, and the social scientist herself is unlikely to neatly fit one or the other exclusive categories (if ever this was the case), it becomes absurd to insist on such attempts at distinction. What became evident during the research and is the subject of this chapter, and all other research with which I have been involved subsequently, is that participants find parameters of similarity through which to relate to the researcher, recognizing both the blurriness of boundaries, and an overarching identification of similarity that allows empathy and engagement across whatever borders might be presumed to exist. I argue that this emerges as evidence of a form of cosmopolitan outlook that focuses on what is shared, when appropriate, and what is different, when necessary. The Research Experience Arguing for the breakdown of insider/outsider categorization does not mean that the researcher should not make every effort to be culturally aware and sensitive to the possible problems inherent in research of this type. Indeed, Ryen (2003) identifies a number of communicative challenges with ‘cross-cultural’ research, including understanding nuances in language and non-verbal communication, dealing with different cultural norms, negotiating roles and so on. But rather than concluding that such research is invalid due to such difficulties, she uses insights from ethnomethodology to argue for the treatment of data produced in such interactions as a collaborative accomplishment that itself can be the site of analysis. Interviews are interactions where participants negotiate the parameters of the relationship, the roles they enact, the ‘face’ they offer, the identities they see as relevant and so on. Ryen (2003: 441) concludes ‘the insider-outsider problem is transformed into something research participants themselves accomplish and resolve rather than merely cope with or suffer from’. With this in mind it is appropriate to discuss the ways in which insiderness and outsiderness were orientated to, both by myself and my participants.

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To ensure Maori input into the project, I not only sought ethics approval from the university at which I was based, but also requested a member of the Maori Studies Department to check the interview schedule for bias and sensitivity. Suggestions from Maori friends were also incorporated into the research design. Irwin (1994) and others (Cram 1997, Bishop 1996, 1994) advise that the ideal situation for research on/about/for Maori is to have a supervisory whanau (extended family; collective) with a variety of expertise which can advise on possible problems with the design. Some of the benefits of having Maori advisers were achieved through the involvement of Maori staff and friends. Having made the decision to engage in the research, it became important to consider how participants responded to my racial/ethnic status, and I to theirs. As Edwards (1990: 482) has noted, ‘race is one of the background variables that assist both the researcher and the researched to place each other within the social structure’. However, fascinatingly, and indicating the naivety of presumptions about the exclusivity of categories, I was placed racially and ethnically in different ways by different participants (and sometimes differently by the same participants, depending on the context). By some I was perceived as an objective observer and an outsider; neither ‘Maori’ nor ‘Pakeha’ in any sense, and therefore someone with whom they could be perfectly open and honest. While a social scientist might not claim such objectivity, it was no doubt useful to be perceived as such. Other participants, both Maori and Pakeha, saw me as an insider. The implications of each are discussed below. Being related to as an ‘outsider’ affected the interviewing process in several ways. Rather than closing off, both those who identified as Maori and Pakeha (and those who identified in other ways) opened up to the non-‘Kiwi’ researcher. Since I look predominantly ‘white’ most Pakeha were unguarded in their responses to my questions in a way they perhaps would not have been with a Maori researcher. Several assumed that what they saw as our ‘shared whiteness’ meant that I would share their sentiments about Maori – or at least that I was a safe pair of ears for them to share negative views about Maori. So to some I was an outsider (an ‘Aussie’) who was still ‘one of us’. My status as an ‘outsider’ also had an effect on the more conservative Maori who were quite open in sharing their negative views about Maori. These views did not appear to be tailored to reflect possible conservative attitudes they may have assumed I had, rather it simply appeared these participants felt free to express themselves honestly, in a way they may not have had I been Maori, or perhaps even a Pakeha New Zealander. It was these participants particularly who treated me as an objective, external observer. Being perceived as an Australian meant that both Maori and Pakeha could, and did, ask for my views about race relations in Australia and my reflections on how they compared with race relations in New Zealand (the presumption often being that whatever their problems in New Zealand, Australian race relations were significantly worse). On a number of fronts then, it became clear that being seen as an ‘outsider’ in some sense was actually an advantage and served to produce a mutually constructive interview situation.

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However, being of mixed parentage also provided me with a connection with the Maori participants which was commented upon by several. In developing a rapport with Maori, I emphasized this aspect of my background, referring to it in the context of explaining my interest in ‘race relations’. I explained that having had parents from quite different racial and cultural backgrounds and having lived in several countries, I had become aware of some of the problems and possibilities of interactions. This had sparked my interest in micro-level cross-cultural interactions and their effects on identity and attitude formation. I was clearly not engaged with as ‘white’, in the sense of being Pakeha, by some Maori respondents, such as the man who admitted that he was ‘wary’ of Pakeha and constrained in his interactions with them. However, I began to feel uncomfortable about this identity claim when another Maori participant said ‘It will be interesting to see what you make of it all … it’s good that this work is being done by a woman of colour’. This attribution was surprising to me, as it is not an identifier I use. Clearly some participants oriented to what they saw as our similarity to classify me as an insider. Yet I had to question, how similar is a person who has always been able to pass as ‘white’, and hence takes pride in claiming a minority ethnic identity, to one who is branded by their looks as belonging to an ethnic group to which they may feel little attachment, as was the case with some of my participants? My looks have meant that my experience has not been shaped by racism in the way that it had been for many of the Maori participants in the research. On the other hand, there was a degree of similarity in that most of the Maori respondents had one Maori and one Pakeha parent, and some saw their Maori heritage and my Indian one as equivalent in terms of English colonial oppression. However, as noted, any suggestion that these aspects of similarity meant similarity in perspective or experience is a moot point. Suffice to say that some Maori respondents felt I was more an ‘insider’ than I myself thought, and that I was aware that consequently we had slightly different interpretations of my position. Another issue relevant to these interactions is the question of power. There is always a power imbalance between the researcher and the researched, and this has led researchers to try to develop more collaborative approaches (Frankenberg 1993, Edwards 1990, Bulmer 1984, Oakley 1981, Zinn 1979). It has also been behind some of the arguments for insider-only research. However, while it is sometimes assumed that the researcher is automatically in a position of power over the subjects of the research, the power imbalance is not necessarily absolute or unidirectional. The interplay between ‘race’, gender and class positions means that researcher and researched will be negotiating from within several axes of power (Phoenix 1994). Such negotiations are affected by the degree of insiderness or outsiderness perceived by participants. In the current research the intersections of the axes of power were complex. Examples included myself as a mixed race, female student on minimal scholarship and living in a lower socio-economic suburb of Wellington, interviewing a Maori businessman who drives a new car with personalized number plates and lives in an expensive house in a prestigious suburb; myself as a Tau Iwi interviewer with no

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Turangawaewae,3 interviewing a staunch Maori feminist in her country; and me as a woman interviewing a Mongrel Mob bikie gang member complete with ‘tats’, ‘leathers’, 8-feet high corrugated iron fencing around his house and a Rottweiler. On the other hand, did my middle-class, educated position, and the fact that I was the one asking the questions, provide a power advantage over all the respondents, regardless of their income, strength of identity, gender or physical power? Power imbalances also shift over the course of the research process – from the initial choice of topic through to analysis and publication. One suggestion has been that in order to redistribute power, particularly where the research is being undertaken by an ‘outsider’, it is necessary to gain a mandate from the community being researched before proceeding. This is problematic as it essentializes groups, but there are further complications. For instance, it is unclear from whom one should get a mandate to conduct research when the ‘group’ one is studying is so large as to constitute millions of people (such as Pakeha). It is also difficult to get such a mandate to study a normatively proscribed and sensitive phenomenon such as racism. If one is an ‘insider’, the question of mandate generally does not arise. If the issue is to redress power imbalances, then as an ‘outsider’, perhaps if one has the support of those marginalized, one then does not need the support of the majority. But if the issue is one of respect more generally then both ‘sides’ should be given the opportunity to veto the research. Such difficulties suggest that the notion of a broader mandate, beyond ‘informed consent’, is impractical in reality. Finally, some comments must be made about the dilemma of research with those whose views one finds distasteful. This is another aspect of being an ‘outsider’ in a way, as it demonstrates that similarity and difference may be more aligned with attitudes than phenotypical features, ethnic, racial or national status. Interviewing people with a wide range of views on race relations issues is stimulating and provocative and I have often been struck by the fact that empathy is possible for people who hold views quite different from my own. For example, in the course of the research one aspect of racism which became clear was its defensive rationale, which saw Pakeha recognizing that their own racism was growing as a result of feeling under siege as whites and colonizers. An example comes from ‘Graham’, claiming in the same breath that he is ‘white and male – basically picked on’ and that he ‘wouldn’t mind betting if the European culture had dropped out, within a hundred years they’d [Maori] be back eating each other’. Such opinions make sense within a particular world-view which sees the colonizer as civilizer. It is also not possible to condemn the Pakeha espousing these views, without simultaneously condemning the Maori who shared them, while remaining cognizant of the ways in which the oppressed may take on the prejudices of their subjugators (Fanon 1972). For example, the following discussion between a Pakeha woman and her Maori husband indicates they share a Social Darwinist perspective: 3  Turangawaewae means literally ‘a place to stand’ – the Maori term for the piece of land one calls home.

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Anne – It’s too, oh I don’t know, maybe this is my ignorance, but the way, oh I don’t know, it’s probably not the right thing to say, but if the English didn’t come here, where would we be? Ken: We’d be running round in grass skirts – that’s what I think. Anne: Not necessarily, but where would the country be? Ken: We’d be like a third world country.

The recognition that it is an unacceptable thing to say, yet an openness to communicate their opinion, deserves an empathic and engaged response from the researcher. Additionally, if individual views are at least to some extent formed by and reflective of current ideologies, the participants can be seen as simply articulating a widely held view. Throughout the interview process I was surprised by the honesty with which all respondents, regardless of their apparent ‘similarity’ or otherwise in relation to me, approached the work, and their generosity in engaging with the research in this way. My aim in undertaking the research had been to try to understand some of the complexities of ethnic identity, interactions, stereotyping and racism, and the views expressed by participants illustrated this complexity. Had I chosen to study only ‘insiders’, those who shared my views, this complexity would have been unavailable. Conclusion Since the project discussed above I have undertaken research with doctors, migrant settlement service providers, employers, mainstream Australians, migrants and refugees. In each case I have been struck by the sense that research participants are open and generous in their engagement, whether or not they shared my racial, ethnic, nationality, class, age or gender position. Whether this comes from their categorization of me as an ‘insider’ is not entirely clear. For instance, when refugees participating in focus groups preface their comments with ‘you must tell them what it is like’, it appears they are engaging with the researcher as a conduit through which to convey their experiences and arguments to policymakers. Once again, the position constructed for the researcher is that of a partial outsider and partial insider – an academic who has shared the migrant experience. The researcher is perhaps seen as someone who can convey a message in an empathetic manner but with adequate ‘outsider’ credentials for it to be heard objectively. This apparent desire to connect through similarity may reflect a change resulting from processes of globalization that have encouraged recognition that boundaries are porous, and identities are fluid and contextual. In the same way that scientists exploring the edges of material things have found that they fractalate

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into self-same patterns, people appear to recognize self-similarity to help make that leap across constructed social boundaries. Rather than focusing on points of difference, respondents try to find the things they have in common with the researcher, in order to categorize the researcher as sufficiently ‘inside’ to engage with, while simultaneously recognizing where difference is relevant to ensure the encounter is productive. One way to characterize this approach is as ‘cosmopolitan’. Held (2010: 69) suggests the premise of a cosmopolitan outlook is that ‘Humankind belongs to a single “moral realm” in which each person is regarded as equally worthy of respect and consideration’. This does not erase difference, however, but offers a moral stance that encourages engagement across whatever difference does exist, as Ulf Hannerz suggests (quoted in Werbner 2008: 48): ‘[It] is first of all an orientation, a willingness to engage with the Other. It entails an intellectual and aesthetic openness … a state of readiness, a personal ability to make one’s way into other cultures, through listening, looking, intuiting, reflecting’. Rather than defining the researcher as insider or outsider along the axes of race, nationality, migration category, ethnicity and so on, research participants engage in ways that recognize our commonality as well as our differences in order to allow us an insight into their ways of being in the world. References Allport, G. 1954. The Nature of Prejudice. New York, Doubleday Anchor. Asad, T. 1973. Anthropology and the Colonial Encounter. London: Ithaca Press. Barth, F. (ed.) 1969. Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Culture Difference. London: Allen & Unwin. Bell, D. 1996. White women can’t speak, in Representing the Other, edited by S. Wilkinson and C. Kitzinger. London: Sage Publications, 107–12. Benhabib, S. 2004. The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents and Citizens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bishop, R. 1992. Te Ropu Tangahau Tikanga Rua: the establishment of a bicultural research group, under the control of Maori people for the betterment of Maori people. New Zealand Review of Education, 2, 205–23. Bishop, R. 1994. Initiating empowering research? New Zealand Journal of Educational Studies, 29(1), 174–88. Bishop, R. 1996. Addressing issues of self-determination and legitimation in Kaupapa Maori research, in Hepaepae Korero Research Perspectives in Maori Education, compiled by B. Webber. Wellington: New Zealand Council of Educational Research, 144–60. Bola, M. 1996. Questions of legitimacy?: the fit between researcher and researched, in Representing the Other, edited by S. Wilkinson and C. Kitzinger. London: Sage Publications, 125–8.

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Brubaker, R. 2006. Ethnicity without Groups. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Bulmer, M. 1984. Sociological Research Methods: An Introduction. London: Macmillan. Clifford, J. and Marcus, G. 1986. Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography. Berkeley, California: University of California Press. Cram, F. 1997. Developing partnerships in research: Pakeha researchers and Maori research. Sites, 35, 44–63. Durie, M. 1998. Te Mana, Te Kawanatanga: The Politics of Maori SelfDetermination. Auckland: Oxford University Press. Edwards, R. 1990. Connecting methods and epistemology: a white woman interviewing black women. Women’s Studies International Forum, 13(5), 477–90. Fanon, F. [1952] 1972. Black Skin, White Masks. London: Paladin. Feldman, G. 2011. If ethnography is more than participant-observation, then relations are more than connections: the case for nonlocal ethnography in a world of apparatuses. Anthropological Theory, 11(4), 375–95. Fleras, A. and Spoonley, P. 1999. Recalling Aotearoa: Indigenous Politics and Ethnic Relations in New Zealand. Auckland: Oxford University Press. Forsey, M. 2004. ‘He’s not a spy, he’s one of us’: Ethnographic positioning in a middle-class setting, in Anthropologists in the Field: Cases in Participant Observation, edited by L. Hume and J. Mulcock. New York: Columbia University Press, 59–70. Frankenberg, R. 1993. White Women, Race Matters: The Social Construction of Whiteness. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Haraway, D. 1991. Situated knowledges: the science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective, in Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature, edited by D. Haraway. London: Routledge, Chapman and Hall, 183–201. Hartsock, N. 1983. The feminist standpoint, in Discovering Reality, edited by S. Harding and M. Hintikka. London: D. Riedel Publishing Company, 283–310. Held, D. 2010. Cosmopolitanism: Ideals, Realities and Deficits. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. hooks, b. 1990. Yearning: Race, Gender and Cultural Politics. Boston, Massachusetts: South End Press. Irwin, K. 1994. Maori research methods and processes: an exploration. Sites, 28, 25–43. Larner, W. 1990. Feminist methodologies and population research. New Zealand Population Review, 16, 26–38. Malik, K. 1996. The Meaning of Race: Race History and Culture in Western Society. London: Macmillan Press. Marcus, G. 1995. Ethnography in/of the world system: the emergence of multisited ethnography. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 95–117.

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May, T. 1997. Social Research: Issues, Methods and Process. Buckingham, UK: Open University Press. Mead, A. 1994. Nga Tikanga, Nga Taonga: Cultural and Intellectual Property: The Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Monograph Number 23. Auckland: The International Research Institute for Maori and Indigenous Education. Merton, R. 1972. Insiders and outsiders: a chapter in the sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology, 78(1), 9–47. Oakley, A. 1981. Interviewing women: a contradiction in terms, in Doing Feminist Research, edited by H. Roberts. London: Routledge, 30–61. Patai, D. 1991. US academics and third world women: is ethical research possible?, in Women’s Words: The Feminist Practice of Oral History, edited by S. Gluck and D. Patai. New York: Routledge, 137–53. Paulin, K. 1996. Putting Pakeha into the picture: analysing lesbian/bisexual politics in Aotearoa/New Zealand, in Representing the Other, edited by S. Wilkinson and C. Kitzinger. London: Sage, 113–8. Phoenix, A. 1994. Practising feminist research: the intersection of gender and race in the research process, in Researching Women’s Lives from a Feminist Perspective, edited by M. Maynard and J. Purvis. London: Taylor and Francis, 49–71. Ryen, A. 2003. Cross-cultural interviewing, in Inside Interviewing: New Lenses, New Concerns, edited by J. Holstein and J. Gubrium. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage, 429–48. Said, E. [1978] 1985. Orientalism: Western Concepts of the Orient. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin. Simmel, G. [1955] 1964. The Sociology of Georg Simmel. Translated by K. Wolff. New York: The Free Press. Sinister Wisdom Collective. 1990. Editorial. Sinister Wisdom, 42, 1–6. Smith, L. 1992. Te Rapungaite Ao Marama: the search for the world of light, in The Issue of Research and Maori, University of Auckland, Monograph No. 9. Auckland: Research Unit for Maori Education. Spivak, G. 1988. Can the subaltern speak?, in Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, edited by C. Nelson and L. Grossberg. London: Macmillan, 271–313. Stanley, L. and Wise, S. 1993. Breaking Out Again: Feminist Ontology and Epistemology. London: Routledge. Te Awekotuku, N. 1991. He Tikanga Whakaaro: Research Ethics in the Maori Community. Wellington: Manatu Maori. Tilbury, F. 2007. Hyphenated realities: growing up an Indian-American-Bruneian Baha’i in ‘multicultural’ Australia, in Visibly Different: Face, Place and Race in Australia, edited by M. Perkins. Bern: Peter Lang, 145–62. Walker, R. 1990. Ka Whawhai Tonu Matou: Struggle Without End. Auckland: Penguin. Werbner, P. 2008. The cosmopolitan encounter – social anthropology and the kindness of strangers, in Anthropology and the New Cosmopolitanism: Rooted,

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Feminist and Vernacular Perspective, edited by P. Werbner. ASA Monograph No. 45.Oxford: Berg Publishers, 47–68. Wetherell, M. and Potter, J. 1992. Mapping the Language of Racism: Discourse and the Legitimation of Exploitation. Hertfordshire, UK: Harvester-Wheatsheaf. Zinn, M. 1979. Field research in minority communities: ethical, methodological and political observations by an insider. Social Problems, 27, 209–19.

Chapter 3

On the Tide Between Being an Insider and Outsider: Experiences from Research on International Student Mobility in Germany Başak Bilecen

Introduction Who accounts for an insider or an outsider in conducting research? For whom are these distinctions meaningful? It is often argued that the necessity of differentiating between insider and outsider positions is based on the fact that a researcher’s relation to his/her respondents informs the topic of the study and data collection process. An insider researcher is presumed to have easy access to the research field, to possess the ability to pose more substantial questions as well as being able to read between the non-verbal lines. Insiders are perceived to possess an authentic comprehension of research situations and interviewees. At the same time, insider researchers are perceived as being innately biased and unable to raise provocative questions because of their closeness to the culture and subjects of study. In contrast, since outsiders are thought to be unfamiliar with the research context, they are perceived as curious and able to pose taboo questions that can elicit interesting findings (Merriam et al. 2001). Thus, the weaknesses of insiders are the presumed strengths of outsiders and vice versa (Serrant-Green 2002). As my experience will illustrate in this chapter, dichotomizing such insider and outsider positions is far too simplistic and methodologically impractical. While the foundational literature of sociology and anthropology presumes a dichotomy between insider and outsider researchers, post-structural and feminist methodologies recognize the complexities of each status as well as blurred boundaries between them (Merriam et al. 2001, Al-Ali 2000, Zavella 1997, Visweswaran 1994, Haraway 1991, 1988). Rather than depending on one exclusive claim, researchers are ‘multiple insiders and outsiders’ (Deutsch 1981: 174) and as such the positioning of the researcher can be seen in terms of a continuum rather than a dichotomy. Such fluidity can also be reflected in discussions of power dynamics between researchers and study participants. Power dynamics are a key concern for qualitative scholars in particular as it has been acknowledged that researchers possess power over the research situation: they decide the subject of study, the method to be emplyed and determine how findings will be presented (Henry 2003, Fontes 1998). Despite this recognition, ‘power is something to not only be aware

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of, but to negotiate in the research process’ (Merriam et al. 2001: 413). As a result, in this chapter, I offer a discussion of the intersection of my positioning as an insider/outsider with the ways in which power dynamics emerged in the course of my study. I explore this in relation to some methodological, epistemological and ethical issues encountered during my research. In discussing the intersection between researcher positioning and power in the research encounter, this chapter draws on my doctoral fieldwork which was conducted in Germany with 35 international doctoral students in 2009. The study looked at the social support networks of international students and considered how they established and maintained friendships. I considered the role of everyday practices in establishing social support networks and within this considered the languages students used, how they engaged with the local academic culture and the type of relationships they established with local students and the wider host society. I conducted semi-structured interviews and employed an interpretative approach to centre the participant narratives, all the while acknowledging that interviews are reconstructed stories actively shaped by both researcher and participant (Scott and Usher 1999), where results are ‘negotiated’ and ‘contextually based’ (Fontana and Frey 2000: 646). The objective of qualitative interviews used in this study was to investigate the education abroad experiences and identifications of international PhD students. While I had adopted a well-rehearsed method for conducting my research, I found that one of the most difficult and stressful experiences of an individual’s life can be engaging in qualitative research. A neglected aspect of learning about doing research is learning how a researcher becomes a fieldworker; this is a separate process from academic development (Burgess 1991). This chapter emerges from reflection upon the fieldwork difficulties I encountered, difficulties that related most significantly to issues of researcher positioning and reflexivity. At the time of my research I was an international doctoral student. Being an international doctoral student myself made me a potential insider researcher, meaning that I could readily understand, comprehend and even visualize some of my respondents’ experiences in Germany. I initially perceived myself as an insider, particularly at the field access stage. I assumed that sharing international student experiences would assist me during the interviews. However, the dynamics between myself and interviewees did not transpire in the ways that I had anticipated. At times I was an outsider and at other times I negotiated various positions during the same interview. Various factors impacted upon these dynamics and upon my positioning during interviews. Nationality was one factor that impacted upon these encounters. I did not share the same nationality with 32 out of 35 interviewees. For instance, I did not share their experiences and encounters with the already established immigrant communities with whom they may have identified. Nationality, however, was not the key determinant in shaping interview situations. Nationality, culture and age intersected to produce different experiences of positioning. Furthermore, I found that the definition of who constituted an insider/outsider was also informed by our respective academic

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positions and statuses. Sometimes these statuses were ‘shared’, at other times they were disputed. Drawing upon these interview dynamics, this chapter will illustrate the ways my position as a researcher, academic and co-national was in constant flux to reveal the multiple meanings insiderness and outsiderness can evoke. The Research Project This research centred on the experiences of international doctoral students enrolled at two different graduate schools in Germany. The research sought to investigate how social support operates within international PhD students’ friendship networks. The aim was to map students’ supportive friendship networks and identify how they maintain cross-border contacts. The major themes of the interview questions and network questionnaires revolved around study abroad experiences, processes involved in selecting Germany as the country of education, friendship ties, supportive roles as well as students’ cross-border social activities. In providing answers to these questions, students reflected on their identity claims and upon their broader world-views. In Germany, the number of foreign doctoral students is on the rise. According to the findings of Wissenschaft Weltoffen by DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) and HIS (Academia Information System), the number has doubled in the last ten years. In 2010, there were more than 18,000 foreign doctoral students in Germany; this is almost more than double compared to figures of the 1990s. Since the beginning of 2000s, the German higher education system has been in transformation. In 2005, in order to internationalize and enter worldwide higher rankings, Germany introduced the ‘Excellence of Initiative’ which aimed to turn the country into an attractive research area. As part of this program, a total of 1.9 billion Euro in funding was made accessible to the higher education institutions on a competitive basis. One of the project-oriented avenues of competition was for new graduate schools for young scientists to provide modernized and structured doctoral programs within an exceptionally good environment and a broad area of science. In this area of competition, there were 253 proposals, 83 finalists and 39 awards. From those 39 successful graduate schools, two were chosen for this research. Due to anonymity, confidentiality and ethical considerations, the names of universities and departments will not be shared. The universities will be referred to as X and Y. Both of the universities are public,1 located in different 1  Universities in Germany are under the legal domain of the Bundeslaender in the federal system, but the financial responsibility is shared both by the regional and federal government. Increasingly, governments are supporting universities to become independent actors through public initiatives. The university system in Germany had an egalitarian tradition based on the idea that all universities are similar and offer equal opportunities to both students and professors. This is being challenged with the recently introduced Initiative of Excellence, which is creating an ivy league which receives additional state funding (Huber 2010).

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states and in middle-sized cities where migrant populations are dense. Neither can be characterized as student cities. Both graduate schools have the same proportion of German and international students and similar graduation rates per year. Relation to the Field and the Realities of Fieldwork When conducting research, the background and position of the researcher affect what s/he chooses to explore, the angle of investigation, the methods employed, the findings considered most appropriate and the manner in which conclusions are framed and communicated. Rose (1997: 307–8) observes that the ‘need to situate knowledge is based on the argument that the sort of knowledge made depends on who its makers are’. The ‘decisions’ made during research, which include the epistemological positioning, theoretical and methodological views and the application of specific methods, are deeply connected to not only the interpersonal, but also institutional frameworks of the researcher. Against this background and since the biography and institutional positioning of the researcher directly affects fieldwork (England 1994), I need to locate myself in relation to this research topic. I was born in Turkey and studied in two big, different cities (including an exchange period in Italy) to receive my Bachelor’s degree in International Relations. I left Turkey as a university graduate and continued my education for a Master’s degree in Sociology with a study into irregular migration in the Netherlands. Immediately afterward I enrolled in a doctoral program in Sociology in Germany. This background information is significant since I believe that my background helped me to shape my ideas about the research topic and about my encounters with respondents. Not only my personal background but also my professional training in different disciplines in different countries influenced how I approached this project. When my personal and professional interests intersected with my reading of the literature, my research topic emerged. However, I found that the topic was in constant evolution due to the unexpected outcomes during interviews and as a result my own everyday experiences in Germany. One’s ‘situated knowledge’ (Haraway 1991, 1988) in one way or another impacts upon research, and my background as an international doctoral student in Germany brought a range of benefits and limitations to the research process. One of the advantages of my position as a PhD student was my relatively quick access to the field, to participants and to the spoken and unspoken languages and cues of the interview. My experience is similar to Watson (1999) who conducted insider research on the subjective experiences of qualitative researchers like herself. Nonetheless, unlike her experience, my access to the field was rather quick and smooth. Furthermore, my position as a student enabled me to see the internal differences in the group of international students who are often addressed as a homogeneous group in the literature. Categorizing international students generally as a homogeneous group undermines their differences, as they are grouped with many students from different

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regions in the world. While students may share academic pursuits, differences exist. The study conducted by Hashim amd Zhiliang (2003), among many others (for example, Campbell and Lee 2008, Volet and Kee 1993, Ballard and Clanchy 1991), overlooks cultural differences by using broad terms such as ‘Anglophone-African’ or ‘White Western’ to categorize populations and their experiences. Ambiguously, terms such as ‘European’ and ‘Turkish’ build on assumed types of cultures that neglect intercultural and intersubjective parallels, and take nationality for granted. These terms tend to equalize a culture to a specific nation, although ‘[c]ultural drafts cannot necessarily be connected to selected nations’ (Amelina 2010: 8). Such homogenization does not allow clear insights into student networks nor into their multiple and overlapping identifications, particularly for doctoral students who usually stay longer than other students in the country of education. Thus, I was constantly aware that differences exist among different nationalities and also within nationalities. With this awareness, through my questions I sought to capture students’ multiple relations to ‘others’ and the meanings they attached to those relations. Furthermore, although nationality is often assumed to be the major difference among international students, I found that it was not the only one. For instance, age, years spent in Germany and years spent as a doctoral student, gender and social network composition varied greatly. My position as a fellow student brought these differences to my attention early and I could reflect upon and illustrate the social divisions of this group profoundly. One of the advantages of being an insider researcher was having intimate access to tacit knowledge and a closer, more direct connection with informants. When the researcher is familiar, interviewees can feel more comfortable and freer to talk openly (Tierney 1994) which enables a greater depth of data to be obtained. During the interviews of this study, I felt that all of the participants were very open and I attributed this openness to my shared position as an international doctoral student, I was one with whom they related and identified. When the interviewees narrated their stories, they often assumed that their stories were mine or at least parallel to mine. For example, while talking about their studies and experiences sometimes they referred to ‘our profession’ or ‘we’ to refer to ‘the group’ of international students. This kind of warmth between the participants and myself contributed to honesty and a genuine sharing of knowledge. However, to reduce the entire interaction to one of insiderness would be an oversimplification for this study. Thus, the notion of positionality needs to be incorporated to offer a further understanding of the dynamic relationship between the researcher and research informants. The concept of positionality shifts the conceptualization of culture from a solid and homogeneous existence, to one which contains internal variations (Amelina and Faist 2012, Aguilar 1981). For instance, during the interviews with those from my own nationality, I was potentially more of an insider; however, in some cases, differences in social class, the region of birth and residence, as well as subjects studied and universities attended, created significant differences between us. One’s role as a researcher requires self-reflexivity at all stages of research. That is so that

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we ‘make our own positions and implications of these explicit and known in order to overcome false notions of neutrality’ (Valentine 2002: 117). In the words of Nightingale and Cromby (1999: 228): Reflexivity requires an awareness of the researcher’s contribution to the construction of meanings throughout the research process, and an acknowledgment of the impossibility of remaining ‘outside of’ one’s subject matter while conducting research. Reflexivity then, urges us to explore the ways in which a researcher’s involvement with a particular study influences, acts upon and informs such research.

Being reflexive is not about being narcissistic and egoistic but rather it is the ‘selfcritical sympathetic introspection and the self-conscious analytical scrutiny of the self as researcher. Indeed reflexivity is critical to the conduct of fieldwork; it induces self-discovery and can lead to insights and new hypotheses about the research questions’ (England 1994: 244). For instance, my initial idea was to study how social support functions among international doctoral students, and during the interviews I found out that identity politics played a crucial role in the way the supportive resources flow within networks. Although I was aiming to map the structure of the networks, and what kinds of supportive resources were exchanged, the interviews led to further questions about the reasons of the flows, the content of the ties and the meanings attached to them. It became interesting to explore why some students were exchanging emotional support with their co-national friends studying in other countries and why not with those co-nationals living in Germany where the physical proximity would work in favour of the relation. When I began to analyse it, I saw that there were a lot of factors impacting upon the actions they undertook. I found that identity was often evoked by interviewees to explain their actions and identifying oneself as cosmopolitan led to specific patterns of support seeking. Since I adopted a transnational lens2 in my research, I was in favour of questioning the borders of the nation-state as a unit of analysis, projecting my scepticism on the ‘container model’ of society (Wimmer and Glick-Schiller 2002). I wanted to study mobile intersubjectivities, supportive practices spanning multiple geographical borders and the embeddedness in various networks which are more multi-dimensional and deterritorialized. Through my constant interactions with other international students I became much more aware of the cultural peculiarities of different nationalities while finding similar patterns across nationalities when it came to cross-border supportive practices. For instance, through my fieldwork, language emerged as an extremely crucial marker of identification. The role of language was discussed by my respondents at length in many instances including 2  Having a transnational lens means acknowledging mobile subjects’ cross-border social practices which includes at least two geographical locales (Levitt and Glick-Schiller 2004, Faist 2000).

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how it was an advantage to study in Germany since they could also learn the German language. However, they also revealed that this presented a double-edged situation, because on the one hand they were happy that could learn a new language that they could use later on, but on the other hand they found German a difficult language to learn and as a result some students felt excluded in academic as well as everyday settings due to limited linguistic abilities. Based on such reflections upon language use and acquisition, some participants made references to their identifications and how their mobility and international education received in English was imbued with cosmopolitan and/or academic world-views. For many of them, it was not the first time receiving education abroad, and their subjectivities were already embedded in the cultures of mobility. Fieldwork Experiences The Role of Language in Research Positioning Participants were asked about their preferred language and the interview was conducted in their language of choice. This resulted in the interviews being conducted in English, Turkish and German, and to a lesser extent in French. English was the main interview language, and this was anticipated since the interviewees were writing their dissertations in English (except for two: one in German and the other in French) and using it as the working language at the university. Moreover, I approached the potential interviewees by sending an English-language letter of invitation via email and this could be considered the determining moment for language choice. Therefore, the decision to use English as the main interview language emerged from the context of an international meeting. I believe the choice of English language for the interview granted me insiderness to the international student group. My choice of English facilitated understanding of group dynamics, while some interviewees’ choice of Turkish granted understanding of both international student dynamics and specific cultural discourses. During these interviews the issue of relations between migrant groups living in Germany became visible to me. When I was doing open coding for the analysis I realized that engagement with local migrant communities was also an issue for students from China, Mexico and Russia, to name a few. As mentioned earlier, I shared the same nationality and, to some extent, culture with only three (out of 35) of my interviewees. I conducted the first interview with one of them, a female student who was educated in English both at the Bachelor’s and Master’s levels. All the interview questions were in English and since my end work would be in English, I thought it would be the language of the interview. However, she wanted to talk in our native language, Turkish, both because she felt more comfortable with the language, and while I am conversant in Turkish I was not prepared for such a request. It began as a stressful conversation for me, since I needed to do a simultaneous translation of the questions while posing them. As the

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interview continued, there were silent understandings due to use of phrases which are culturally bound and I found that we had similar views about our international student experiences. All three interviews conducted in Turkish did not require further effort to analyse or interpret the culturally bound phrases, hand gestures, facial expressions and/or silences. All these interviewees with whom I share the same nationality had an understanding of what it meant to be Turkish as a student in Germany. They choose the country of education with an anticipation of relationships with fellow migrants and university students in the country. They identified the long-lasting migration history between Turkey and Germany as a specific influential factor for choosing to get education in Germany. The value of a German degree in Turkey and the quality of education were additional motivations to study in Germany. The value of a degree obtained from a German university in their countries of origin was emphasized by all of the interviewees and this played a major role in their decision to choose to undertake a PhD in Germany. Turkey has been one of the major providers of labour migrants in Europe since the first official labour recruitment agreement with Germany in 1961 and this was followed by the establishment of recruitment agreements with other countries such as Austria, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Sweden (Martin 2012, AbadanUnat 2011). According to official records in Turkey, nearly 800,000 workers went to Europe through the Turkish Employment Service between 1961 and 1974. Of these workers, 649,000 (81 per cent) went to Germany, 56,000 (7 per cent) to France, 37,000 (5 per cent) to Austria, 25,000 (3 per cent) to the Netherlands (Icduygu 2012: 14). In addition to labour migrants, there have been migrations from Turkey to Europe due to family reunions, marriage, asylum seeking (Icduygu et al. 2001) and student mobility (Bilecen-Süoğlu 2012). According to recent estimates, there are currently 4,000,000 Turkish citizens living in Europe. Of these, 80 per cent reside in Germany (Abadan-Unat 2011). The description of labour migrants from Turkey to Germany in the public discourse as ‘not well integrated’, and ‘not doing well’ was a powerful point of reference for the participants to differentiate from and distance themselves. The Interplay of Nationality, Culture and Class There were also moments when my interviewees and I shared the common descriptions of Turkish migrants in Germany. We discussed experiences of living in a society with that special migration history. In these situations, representations and categorizations of self and others were based on class differences grounded in educational levels as well as the reasons for the mobility, which were always being constructed from the students’ perspective. Nevertheless, my participants’ views were also informed by broader discourses which tend to denigrate Turkish migrants; but such a discussion is beyond the scope of this work. However, what I can say is that my interviewees’ views can be considered manifestations of declassifying the self in the eyes of the other.

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Hence, it became obvious that there were differences in class and socialization periods between Turkish migrants and their descendants, and the international students. According to the interviews, sharing the same nationality did not mean sharing the same culture. The interviewees were highly educated and extensively socialized in the big cities in Turkey, and they contrasted this with the rural backgrounds of many Turkish labour migrants in Germany. Such comparisons of socioeconomic statuses, reasons for migration to Germany and education levels were always present. As one of my interviewees explained: I guess it is about the process of socialization. I sometimes get along with some of them [Turkish immigrants in Germany], but they are not my real friends, you know. I ask [them about] some necessary things since their knowledge of language and the system is better than mine. (Ali,3 age 32, interview conducted in 2009)

The explanation and justification of the respondents’ relationships with immigrant communities became an interesting and important aspect of the study (for a further discussion see Bilecen 2013). Not only those with whom I share the same culture and nationality, but also almost all of the respondents used this question as a way of delineating themselves from the labour migrants and aligning themselves with me and other highly skilled migrants. This is illustrated by the following response by an interviewee to my question if she had established relationships with people from the wider Russian-speaking community:4 Only students, and as for other Russian-speaking community so far, you know, I didn’t even have the idea of contacting other Russian people. I have no connection and I never, I never even had an idea of finding a connection […] I am here in Germany as an academic. (Natalia, age 33, interview conducted in 2009)

The interview excerpts illustrates the moment in the conversation when my position is being contoured as a ‘real’ insider, that ‘I know’, not only because of our shared status as doctoral students but also because of my position as a Turkish person in Germany. Since the Turkish population is the largest foreign population in Germany, most of the respondents also asked about my position and would continue to talk based on my positioning in relation to labour migrants and highly skilled students. Not having relationships or not identifying with the corresponding national 3  Names of participants are pseudonyms. 4  In Germany there is a Russian-speaking community whose members are referred to as ‘re-settlers’. They are considered ‘co-ethnics’ who have returned to Germany and they have been granted citizenship upon providing proof of ethnic ancestry (for an extensive review, see Mushaben 2008).

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community made issues of status, class and generation explicit in nearly all interviews. The answers from nearly all interviews always contained phrases like ‘they are immigrants’, ‘they are workers’, ‘they came here before to work’, ‘they are not skilled’, ‘they are old’, ‘they are not educated’, ‘we don’t have anything in common, you should know better’, ‘they have completely different background’, ‘I don’t want this [to engage in a social activity together]’, ‘they are concentrated on their families’ and ‘I am not part of them’. Often interviewees would then interrogate my experiences in engaging with the Turkish community in Germany. Here I tried to answer as neutrally as possible indicating that the interviewees are the subjects of the study and not me. However, in order to be able to get detailed data and to establish rapport I responded to the expectations of affirmation. I agreed with my interviewees that nationality is not the most significant foundation for friendship formation; rather there are other elements such as age, education, common activities and world-views. While interviewees mobilized differences in migration status, this is not to suggest that these categories are mutually exclusive but rather they serve to illustrate how discourses are created. By claiming to not engage with other immigrant groups and by stressing their differences, all of the interviewees have been absorbed in active negotiation of their mobility and shared identifications.5 Power and Professional Positioning Kvale (1996) advocates that since the interviewer is in charge of posing the questions there is an asymmetry of power in research encounters. This sentiment is further expanded by Rose (1997) who discusses the connections between power and positionality, while, ‘[m]ore recent analyses have exposed the power-based dynamics inherent in any and all research and have suggested that power is something to not only be aware of, but to negotiate in the research process’ (Merriam et al. 2001: 413). The crucial debate about embeddedness of the research questions and data collection methods in unequal power relations between the researcher and the researched has been brought up by several feminist methodologies (Nast 1994, Edwards 1990, Oakley 1981). All steps in the research processes and knowledge production should be done while being reflexive and analytical. In the light of such arguments, I have sought to be reflexive in situating the research and analysing the data collected such that ethical commitments can be sustained. This meant that I was conscious about having similarities and differences with my interviewees and sought to diffuse the power relations inherent in the interview setting by putting considerable effort into understanding their narratives. I also tried to balance power dynamics through establishing rapport, ‘promoting an 5  In some instances I found that students had created relationships with immigrant groups in Germany. Interviewees, however, would stress that these relationships were instrumental or emerged from informational need, for example they would use these contacts to find a doctor or dentist with whom they could speak in their native language.

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egalitarian relationship grounded in reciprocity and a sense of mutuality’ (Hewitt 2007: 1155) based on being an international doctoral student myself. In the course of the interviews, however, the balance of power was not solely in my hands; I found that power relations reversed as the interviews progressed. During interviews, my power as the researcher was always in negotiation with my interviewees. Since I shared the same academic status as them, that is, a doctoral student who is perceived as being in ‘need’ of information to be able to write a dissertation, all of the respondents were willing to ‘help’. For instance, they were very reliable in terms of showing up for the appointments; there were no absences or rescheduling which made the fieldwork run rather smoothly. All of the conversations were very friendly; however, sometimes my questions were probed. Some interviewees evaluated the meanings and assumptions of questions; they sought to challenge the content of questions by posing several questions about what I meant by ‘society’, ‘immigrant group’, ‘German’ and so on. It was rather challenging sometimes when I was criticized during the interview for asking similar questions. I was treated as if I was checking their validity; while they were in fact designed to measure different perceptions or experiences. I had to politely engage with such questions and steer the interview back to the main topics of the study. My participants were being interviewed by ‘one of them’ and in some cases they wanted to show that they possessed similar qualifications or even better ones. They did it by interrogating the questions and reflecting several times on their answers. Furthermore, some of the interviewees treated some of the questions as trivial, not worthy of asking because I should be able to know the answers from my own experience. In such instances, I was perceived by the participants as a professional insider and here they tried to disrupt my position as an expert. At this point, I adopted the role of outsider and prompted them to share their knowledge about their culture, their interpretation and experiences. Occupying such a position resulted in interviewees becoming more open about their experiences and more ready to reveal details; here my conscious stance as an outsider elicited fuller explanations. On other occasions interviewees sought to challenge my authoritative position by stating, ‘I would like to do easy fieldwork like you do, but in my case it is not so easy to find interview respondents’. On the one hand, hearing this led me to think that what I was doing was perceived as less rewarding than writing about another topic which would require access to ‘difficult’ groups. On the other hand, I also interpreted such phrases as marking me as an insider amongst international students which stood in contrast with students who needed to put more effort in conducting fieldwork in foreign and unfamiliar settings. In addition, some interviewees offered suggestions to me about which aspects to concentrate on during the analysis and in writing my dissertation. I really appreciated the comments; the respondents were trying to be positive and helpful, while at the same time their comments showed the dynamics of power relations during the interview. Emphasis on their own education and qualifications was very present in some instances of the interview.

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Age and years spent in the country of education, Germany, were other factors that the interviewees relied on to position themselves as older, more experienced in terms of education, language, and more knowledgeable about how things in the university as well as in Germany work. Some of the respondents also had earned their previous degrees in Germany; some were in Germany only for their doctoral degree. They sought to ‘mentor’ me during the interview. Moreover, my interviewees also had the power of choosing the location and timing of the interview. They also decided which aspects of their personal lives and to what extent their perspectives would be shared. Therefore, it was clear that power dynamics had been negotiated by the researcher and the participants and this was embedded in the interview process. In this manner, fieldwork is an intense and personal experience. It felt like being a part of a student group where individuals talk about themselves freely, encouraging and interfering at the same time. The fieldwork also raised some issues for myself and made me think about ethics and politics of interviewing where relationships and boundaries of identities are in constant negotiation, a condition which simultaneously influences the knowledge produced within the context of intersubjectivities. Insider vs Outsider: to Be or Not to Be The term ‘insider research’ describes projects where the researcher has a direct involvement, participation or association with the research setting (Robson 2002). The differentiation between an insider and outsider position, particularly when the researcher identifies with his/her respondents, has often been raised by researchers. In contrast to insider research, traditional notions of scientifically sound research postulate that the researcher has to be an ‘outsider’ studying subjects external to him/her (Denzin and Lincoln 2000). In contrast to such dualisms, I think my experiences are an example of what Elwood and Martin (2000: 649) allude to as ‘micro-geographies of spatial relations and meaning’, where during an interview a spectrum of social relations and boundaries crisscross. As elucidated by my examples, positions and power were in continual negotiation during interviews. While educational status was perceived by interviewees as our point of similarity and it guaranteed me easier access to the group, it was also a source of differentiation. ‘Our’ status differentiated ‘us’ from the established immigrant groups in Germany, but this status was also employed as a device for checking my work, for challenging the interpretations of my findings and for disrupting my authority in interpreting their work. Since we were perceived as equals based on our international doctoral student status, the respondents were ‘able’ to interrogate the questions and suggest the points in which I should take interest. Therefore, power is not given to the researcher just because s/he is posing the questions; rather it is a negotiated process, which is similar to the position of insiderness or outsiderness.

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The process of qualitative research where the researcher is especially reflective tends to open the opportunity for challenging original perspectives and making the researcher much more open to diverse viewpoints. To some extent, it also transforms identities and positionings of both the researcher and participants involved in the study. The process of participating in this study encouraged the respondents to create links between their personal relationships and their studyabroad experiences. This process of reflection contributed to understanding students’ educational experiences as well as understanding that the structuring of their supportive relationships is underlined by their identity claims and range of identifications. Moreover, I found that, I, as the researcher, influenced the research itself and the research influenced the way I look at myself since identities ‘are made and remade through the research process’ (Rose 1997: 315). As a fellow doctoral student, I found that investigating international student experiences was, for both researcher and researched, personal journeys that incorporated learning and transformation. In other words, ‘the core ingredient is not insider or outsider status but an ability to be open, authentic, honest, deeply interested in the experience of one’s research participants, and committed to accurately and adequately representing their experience’ (Dwyer and Buckle 2009: 59) which I believe this journey has taught me to be and do. References Abadan-Unat, N. 2011. Turks in Europe: From Guestworker to Transnational Citizen. New York: Berghahn Books Inc. Al-Ali, N. 2000. Secularism, Gender and the State in the Middle East: The Egyptian Women’s Movement. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press. Aguilar, J.L. 1981. Insider research: An ethnography of a debate, in Anthropologists at Home in North America, edited by D.A. Messerschmidt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 15–26. Amelina, A. 2010. Searching for an appropriate research strategy on transnational migration: The logic of multi-sited research and the advantage of the cultural interferences approach. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 11(1), Art. 17. Amelina, A. and Faist, T. 2012. De-naturalizing the national in research methodologies: Key concepts of transnational studies in migration. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 35(10), 1–18. Ballard, B. and Clanchy, J. 1991. Teaching Students from Overseas: A Brief Guide for Lecturers and Supervisors. Melbourne: Longman Cheshire. Bilecen, B. 2013. Education abroad as a way of differentiation: experiences of international doctoral students as cosmopolitans. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education (forthcoming). Bilecen-Süoğlu, B. 2012. Trends in student mobility from Turkey to Germany. Perceptions: Journal of International Affairs, 17(2), 61–84.

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Burgess, R. 1991. Sponsors, gatekeepers, members and friends: access in educational settings, in Experiencing Fieldwork: An Inside View of Qualitative Research, edited by W. Shariff and R. Stebbins. Newbury Park: Sage, 43–52. Campbell, J. and Lee, M. 2008. Asian students’ voices: an empirical study of Asian students’ learning experiences at a New Zealand university. Journal of Studies in International Education, 12(4), 375–96. Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. 2000. Introduction: the discipline and practice of qualitative research, in The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln. London: Sage Publications, 1–20. Deutsch, C.P. 1981. The behavioural scientist: insider and outsider. Journal of Social Issues, 37(2), 172–91. Dwyer, S.C. and Buckle, J.L. 2009. The space between: on being an insideroutsider in qualitative research. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 8(1), 54–63. Edwards, R. 1990. Connecting methods and epistemology: a white woman interviewing black woman. Women’s Studies International Forum, 13(5), 477–90. Elwood, S.A. and Martin, D.G. 2000. ‘Placing’ interviews: location and scales of power in qualitative research. Professional Geographer, 52(4), 649–57. England, K.V.L. 1994. Getting personal: reflexivity, positionality and feminist research. The Professional Geographer, 46(1), 241–56. Faist, T. 2000. The Volume and Dynamics of International Migration and Transnational Social Spaces. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fontana, A. and Frey, J.H. 2000. From structured questions to negotiated texts, in The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln. London: Sage Publications, 645–72. Fontes, L.A. 1998. Ethics in family violence research: cross-cultural issues. Family Relations, 47(1), 53–61. Haraway, D. 1988. Situated knowledges: the science question in feminism and the privilege of partial perspective. Feminist Studies, 14(3), 575–99. Haraway, D. 1991. Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge. Hashim, I.H. and Zhiliang, Y. 2003. Cultural and gender differences in perceiving stressors: a cross-cultural investigation of African and western students in Chinese colleges. Stress and Health, 19, 217–25. Henry, M.G. 2003. Where are you really from: representation, identity, and power in the fieldwork experiences of a South Asian diaspora. Qualitative Research, 3(2), 229–42. Hewitt, J. 2007. Ethical components of researcher researched relationships in qualitative interviewing. Qualitative Health Research, 17(8), 1149–59. Huber, B. 2010. The German Excellence Initiative: Changes and Challenges for German Research Universities, in University Research for Innovation, edited by L.E. Weber and J.J. Duderstadt, London: Economica 227–36.

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Icduygu, A. 2012. 50 years after the labour recruitment agreement with Germany: The consequences of emigration for Turkey. Perceptions: Journal of International Affairs, 17(2), 11–36. Icduygu, A., Sirkeci, I. and Muradoglu, G. 2001. Socio-economic Development and International Migration: A Turkish Study. International Migration, 39(4), 39–61. Kvale, S. 1996. Interviews – An Introduction to Qualitative Research Interviewing. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Levitt, P. and Glick-Schiller, N. 2004. Conceptualizing simultaneity. A transnational social field perspective on society. International Migration Review, 38(145), 595–629. Martin, P. 2012. Turkey-EU migration: the road ahead. Perceptions: Journal of International Affairs, 17(2), 125–44. Maykut, P. and Morehouse, R. 1994. Beginning Qualitative Researchers: A Philosophical and Practical Guide. Washington, DC: Falmer. Merriam, S.B., Johnson-Bailey, J., Lee, M.Y., Kee, Y., Gabo Ntseane, G. and Muhamad, M. 2001. Power and positionality: negotiating insider/outsider status within and across cultures. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 20(5), 405–16. Mushaben, J.M. 2008. The Changing Faces of Citizenship: Integration and Mobilization Among Ethnic Minorities in Germany. New York/London: Berghahn Books. Nast, H. 1994. Women in the field: critical feminist methodologies and theoretical perspectives. Professional Geographer, 46(1), 54–66. Nightingale, D. and Cromby, J. 1999. Social Constructionist Psychology: A Critical Analysis of Theory and Practice. Buckingham: Open University Press. Oakley, A. 1981. Interviewing women: a contradiction in terms, in Doing Feminist Research, edited by H. Roberts. London: Routledge, 30–61. Robson, C. 2002. Real World Research: A Resource for Social Scientists and Practitioner Researchers. Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishers. Rose, G. 1997. Situating knowledge: positionality, reflexivities and other tactics. Progress in Human Geography, 21(3), 305–20. Scott, D. and Usher, R. 1999. Researching Education: Data, Methods and Theory in Educational Enquiry. London: Cassell. Serrant-Green, L. 2002. Black on black: methodological issues for black researchers working in minority ethnic communities. Nurse Researcher, 9(4), 30–44. Tierney, M. 1994. On method and hope, in Power and Method, edited by A.D. Gitlin. London: Routledge, 97–115. Valentine, G. 2002. ‘People like us’: Negotiating sameness and difference in the research process, in Feminist Geography in Practice: Research and Methods, edited by P. Moss. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 116–26. Visweswaran, K. 1994. Fictions of Feminist Ethnography. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

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Volet, S.E. and Kee, J.P.P. 1993. Studying in Singapore – Studying in Australia: A student perspective. Occasional Paper No. 1. Murdoch University Teaching Excellence Committee. Watson, K.D. 1999. ‘The Way I Research Who I Am’: The Subjective Experiences of Qualitative Researchers. Unpublished master’s thesis, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Wimmer, A. and Glick-Schiller, N. 2002. Methodological nationalism and beyond: nation-state building, migration and the social sciences. Global Networks, 2(4), 301–34. Zavella, P. 1997. Feminist insider dilemmas: Constructing ethnic identity with ‘Chicana’ informants, in Situated Lives: Gender and Culture in Everyday Life, edited by L. Lamphere, H. Ragone and P. Zavella. New York & London: Routledge, 42–61.

Chapter 4

Conducting Qualitative Research: Dancing a Tango between Insider – and Outsiderness Christof Van Mol, Rilke Mahieu, Helene Marie-Lou De Clerck, Edith Piqueray, Joris Wauters, François Levrau, Els Vanderwaeren and Joris Michielsen1

Introduction In this chapter, we discuss how researchers continuously balance moments of insiderness and outsiderness while conducting qualitative research. In this process, we challenge views that assert that researchers are either insiders or outsiders and that each of these statuses are characterized by certain advantages and disadvantages (Merriam et al. 2001, Merton 1972, Simmel 1968 [1908]), and argue that clear-cut insider and outsider statuses do not exist: rather positions are specific to time and place, and can be influenced by a myriad of attributes. In this chapter, we will provide three cases that illustrate the researcher’s fluid position. The cases originate from a research project that involved a wide-scale quantitative survey with extensive longitudinal ethnographic fieldwork with 90 youngsters of Chinese, Belgian, Moroccan, Polish and Turkish backgrounds in Belgium.2 As Bott (2010: 160) argues, when conducting qualitative fieldwork, ‘inevitably we begin to identify/disidentify, like/dislike, familiarize/otherize’ with our respondents. Consequently, reflexivity of the researchers’ position on the insider/ 1  All authors work at the Centre for Migration and Intercultural Studies, University of Antwerp, Belgium. The chapter is the result of a team effort. While the first author coordinated the writing process, all contributed significantly to the conceptualization of the key themes and arguments of the chapter. All authors participated in group discussions and in commenting upon drafts of the paper. 2  The project emerged in response to academic literature which demonstrates the disadvantaged educational position of youngsters with an immigrant background in Belgium (for example, Duquet et al. 2006). Since youngsters of Turkish and Moroccan background were affected the most, their inclusion in the research population was sought. In order to broaden the research scope in terms of religious background (not only Islamic), migration history (not merely originating in large-scale post-war labour migration) and countries of origin, Chinese and Polish background participants were invited. In order to situate the results in a wider perspective, native youngsters (that is, from Belgian origin) were included.

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outsider continuum is of key importance in qualitative methodologies. The examples we provide in this chapter are based on interview data, field notes and reflexive accounts of three researchers, Edith, Joris and Rilke. Based on this data, three group discussions were held with the three involved researchers and four ‘external’ researchers in order to discuss the positions of Edith, Joris and Rilke. The positions of the involved researchers were examined by researchers internal and external to the project, enabling us to provide a reflexive account of their experiences in the field. Despite the fact that ‘shared ethnic belonging’ between researcher and informants is often considered to have a great impact on the insider or outsider status, we posit that other factors might be more crucial (Cukut Krilić 2011). As we will show, the researchers’ positions within this project could not be defined merely by ethnicity;3 several other factors such as socioeconomic background, common educational background and age came into play, depending on the context. Thus, if traditional and rather static markers of insider and outsiderness in migration research, such as shared ethnicity and/or nationality, are insufficient to define our position vis-à-vis our informants, how should insiderness and outsiderness then be defined? In this chapter, we argue that unambiguous insider and outsider classifications do not exist and so therefore we adopt a more dynamic perspective, approaching insiderness as the moments when there is a noticeable proximity between the interviewer and the informant in a given context. When a certain distance between the interviewer and the informant can be felt, this can be called a ‘moment of outsiderness’. So ‘moments of insiderness and outsiderness’ are the result of dialectic processes of social interaction that take place in a given context, in which individuals create and reformulate boundaries based on perceived commonalities and differences. Consequently, the examples we provide are based on situations when the researcher has noticed that her/his position changed, either intentionally or unintentionally. With ‘intentionality’, we assume that in certain situations the insider or outsider status of a researcher is not merely defined by factors beyond her/his control. A researcher can also alter his/her status deliberately, depending on the informants’ specific profile and the purpose of the encounter. Insiders and Outsiders in Academic Literature The advantages and disadvantages of being an insider/outsider have been documented extensively in academic literature (for example, Ergun and Erdemir 2010). The dynamic nature of the researcher’s position on this continuum can be 3  Ethnicity can refer, on the one hand, to shared beliefs about the past, even to assumed blood ties (Roosens 1998) and, on the other hand, to continuously shifting ethnic boundaries created by an amalgam of different aspects such as religion, language, and the like (Barth 1969).

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discerned by the myriad of characteristics that are ascribed to both positions in the literature. Nevertheless, many field accounts reflect a tendency to consider insider and outsider statuses as rather static. Generally, the category of insiders is – dependent on the research theme and population – based on shared citizenship, ethnicity, language, religion, gender, socioeconomic class and/or cultural identity (Ergun and Erdemir 2010, Merriam et al. 2001). Insiders’ advantages often cited (for example, Mercer 2007, Ganga and Scott 2006, Hockey 1993) are freer access to the research population, relative lack of culture shock, prior knowledge of the (research) context, a stronger rapport with and more openness from informants, understanding of cultural references, the ability of the researcher to trust the honesty and accuracy of responses and the likelihood that informants will reveal more intimate details given their (cultural) proximity. Disadvantages often cited are over-familiarity and the expectation that many notions and concepts would be taken for granted and left unexplored. Moreover, insider status, ‘whilst it may facilitate greater insights, the researcher could be implicated in excessive subjectivity and in privileging one position’ (Woodward 2008: 538). In addition, as empathy with an insider researcher might be greater, the expectations of the research population towards an insider will exceed those towards a stranger, particularly with regard to active participation in the social world of those under study (Hockey 1993), or the moral duty not to disgrace the community, given the fact that insiders may be ascribed the role of representing the community (Ergun and Erdemir 2010). Furthermore, insiders are confronted with what Deianira Ganga and Sam Scott (2006: 21) call the ‘insider paradox’ in migration studies: … whilst researchers are closer to those migrants they are studying, both themselves and their informants are much more aware of each other’s social position as a result. Being an insider brings the investigator closer to the reality that migrant communities are rarely united, and almost always divided by social fissures such as class, generation, age and gender.

The main advantage generally ascribed to outsider status refers to claims that objective knowledge is dependent upon the way a researcher finds a balance between nearness and remoteness (Kusow 2003). Outsider status, thus, entails an objectivity claim: objectivity is supposed only to be achieved by taking a distanced position. However, the disadvantage of the outsider position would be the question whether the researcher can really understand the groups she/he studies (Woodward 2008), given the fact that they are not initiated into their cultural values (Kusow 2003). Instead of favouring one of the two positions, in this chapter we follow the approach of several authors who have warned about a static perception of the insider/outsider dichotomy (for example, Cukut Krilić 2011, Ergun and Erdemir 2010, Woodward 2008, Mercer 2007, Kusow 2003, Naples 1996, Narayan 1993), and acknowledge that the boundaries between these positions are not clearly delineated (Merriam et al. 2001). As Merton (1972) has argued, it is impossible to be a ‘total insider’ since we all dispose of multiple identities, and therefore can

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be an insider at one moment and an outsider at another. Moreover, one can argue that ‘we are all insiders to society as a whole’ (Olsen 2012: 70). As a result, ‘the insider/outsider distinction lacks acknowledgment that insiders and outsiders are frequently situational, depending on the prevailing social, political, and cultural values of a given social context’ (Kusow 2003: 592). As Kirin Narayan (1993: 680) argues: ‘given the multiplex nature of identity, there will inevitably be certain facts of self that join us up with the people we study, other facets that emphasize our difference’. As a result, we argue that the relationship with informants should be conceived as a dialectical one, continuously shaped by the shifting perceptions of researchers and informants. The status of the researcher is ever-shifting and permeable, negotiated and renegotiated during interaction with the informant(s) as well as defined by the social and political context within which the interaction takes place (Kusow 2003, Naples 1996). Indeed, in qualitative research, ‘the fact that we are often distanced – by factors as varied as education, class, or emigration – from the societies we are supposed to represent tends to be underplayed’ (Narayan 1993: 677), but should be taken into consideration. The relationship between researcher and informant is informed by basic principles of social interaction, as described in several classical sociological works (for example, Cooley 1967 [1902], Mead 1974 [1934]) focusing on commonality and difference. Commonalities and differences can be emphasized or concealed by the researcher depending on the context (Ergun and Erdemir 2010); however, they are also defined by informants. The relationship between researcher and informant is influenced by various markers such as sex, ethnic background, as well as age, cultural, social and linguistic affinities, political preferences or professional status. However, as Justine Mercer (2007: 4) argues, there are other dimensions that define the researcher’s position, such as ‘the time and place of the research; the power relationships within which the researcher and the researched co-exist, the personalities and specific informants; and even the precise topic under discussion’. This means that the influence of personality on the research project is very context-dependent: the insider/outsider roles of the researcher are not the product of his or her status characteristics per se, on the contrary, the particular situation in which fieldwork takes place defines the importance of certain personal characteristics (Kusow 2003). Moreover, we can present ourselves in a myriad of ways to informants, purposely creating proximity or distance. Therefore, instead of focusing on whether we are authentic insiders or outsiders, it surely ‘is more rewarding to examine the ways in which each of us is situated in relation to the people we study’ (Narayan 1993: 678). In short, it is important to reflect on the position of the researcher as well as that of the subjects of research (Woodward 2008). Much of the discussion on insider/outsider status is situated in the areas of observation and ethnography (Corbin Dwyer and Buckle 2009). However, we would like to extend the discussion towards in-depth interview situations. Moreover, as the dilemmas for the researcher that inevitably arise before they make contact with the research setting tend to be largely ignored (Roberts and

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Sanders 2005), we also take this phase into account. Since all knowledge is situated, all researchers start data collections with ‘certain assumptions about the phenomenon being investigated, situations to be observed, and people to be interviewed’ (Merriam et al. 2001: 406). In this chapter, we will present three cases that demonstrate how the researcher continuously shifts positions in the interactions with research participants and is situated in, or claims moments of, insiderness and outsiderness. Description of the Research Project The reflections presented in this chapter are based on the research project BET YOU! – Boosting the Educational Trajectories of Youth in Flanders,4 conducted between 2009 and 2012. The main aim of the study was to reveal the obstacles for, and strategies of, pupils in secondary education, with a special focus on youngsters with an immigrant background. Besides a wide-scale quantitative survey, this project involved extensive longitudinal ethnographic fieldwork with 90 pupils of Chinese, Belgian, Moroccan, Polish and Turkish backgrounds. Pupils were selected in ten secondary schools in three Flemish cities – Antwerp, Ghent, and Genk – and balanced in terms of study tracks, school performance, gender and ethnic background. The pupils were the central informants. However, various ‘meaningful others’ were interviewed repeatedly over the course of the project: the pupils’ parents, siblings, peers and school staff. The interviews were conducted in two types of settings: in the school context (pupils and the school staff), and the community environment (pupils, their family members and their peers), with different researchers conducting the interviews in various contexts. The informants were spread over the general, technical and vocational tracks.5 In this chapter, we present a reflection on the position of the researcher while conducting qualitative fieldwork. Three group discussions were held with the authors of this chapter, some of whom were directly involved in the research process and some who were not. We present the cases of three researchers (Edith, Rilke and Joris), based on a reflection on these researchers’ tales from the field, field notes and interview transcripts. The real names of the researchers are used in this chapter, whereas all informants’ names are pseudonyms. 4  Flanders is the northern, Dutch-speaking region of Belgium. As Belgium is a federal state, educational policy is a regional responsibility. As a result the French-speaking region was not included in the research design of the BET YOU! project. 5  In Flanders, the secondary school system offers four tracks: (1) General Secondary Education (ASO); (2) Technical Secondary Education (TSO); (3) Vocational Secondary Education (BSO); and Secondary Art Education (KSO). Whereas in theory the choice of particular tracks solely depends on the interest and skills of the pupils, in practice a strong hierarchical differentiation exists, leading to social and ethnic segregation (Van Avermaet and Sierens 2012).

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Edith’s Research Experience (2009–12) Within the research project, Edith was responsible for the ethnographic fieldwork with people of Polish backgrounds. She conducted research with youngsters, siblings, parents and peers in the after-school environment. Edith is a highly educated Belgian born woman of 28 years of age. In common with the majority of the Belgian population, she was raised as a Catholic. In the Polish community she introduced herself as a doctoral student living in Antwerp. These two facets of her identity were deliberately introduced in the beginning; she expected her status as a ‘student’ and inhabitant of the same city would reduce the distance between herself and her informants. Language as a Marker of Similarity and Difference The influence of language on the researchers’ position on the insider/outsider continuum has been demonstrated by several authors (for example, Jankie 2004, Sherif 2001). Lobo (this volume) showed, for example, how changing her conversation style altered her position towards Aboriginal men and women in the Northern Territory, Australia. Similarly, Sherif (2001) illustrated how, as a researcher of Egyptian-German descent living in the United States, her lack of knowledge of the Arabic language raised questions regarding her position vis-àvis her informants during her fieldwork in Egypt. Edith’s research experience also clearly illustrates the role of language in affecting the position of the researcher in qualitative research projects with migrant populations. Her experience in the field illustrates that even the use of a certain vocabulary can mark shifting points in insider/outsider statuses. Most parents of a Polish background have only limited proficiency in Dutch, and it was assumed that this might create a considerable barrier in Edith’s relationship with them. To overcome this potential barrier, she took Polish language courses, which subsequently proved to be of use in several phases of the research project. Not only was Edith’s (basic) knowledge helpful in the preparation of the fieldwork, namely to invite pupils’ parents to participate in the research project, it also proved to be important during the interviews for two main reasons. Firstly, it improved mutual understanding, since some parents put more effort into expressing themselves in Dutch when they noticed that Edith made an effort to express herself in their language. Secondly, the fact that both Edith and the parents only had limited command of their respective foreign languages improved their relationship, as it downplayed Edith’s more powerful position as an eloquent, all-knowing specialist. This can be illustrated by the following example, originating from Edith’s research journal: The mother appeared stressed or nervous to me. She tried to be very polite, but came across as a bit rough. She said for example very quickly ‘We are going to talk in Polish eh!’. I think she was worried because of the language. […] The fact that the language made her feel uneasy, became also apparent at the end of our

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talk when she said that the interview was better than expected. She had expected to have more problems in understanding the questions and expressing herself.

However, due to Edith’s limited knowledge of Polish, her position on the insider/ outsider continuum regularly changed. For example, during an interview with parents, she wanted to refer to ‘rubbish’ (smiecie in Polish), but used the singular form (smieć), not knowing that this grammatical form actually means ‘filthy scum’ in Polish. As a result, the parents looked at her in bewilderment, and Edith noted that suddenly her status in the interview changed completely. Only when the pupil intervened and explained that there was a misunderstanding could a new status change occur, and the equilibrium in the interview could be restored. This triangular relationship between Edith, the parents and pupil characterized several interview situations: as Edith’s command of Polish language is not perfect, she asked the pupils to help translate when their parents did not know Dutch; this altered her position continuously during the research process. While the example above illustrates how the pupil helped in restoring the relationship between interviewer and parent, in other cases, the pupil impeded Edith’s true understanding of the parents’ thoughts by modifying the meaning of their words in the translation. One of the pupils, for example, translated the mother’s Polish statement ‘Przerażają mnie te Marokany’ – literally meaning ‘Moroccans frighten me and I wholeheartedly detest them’ – into ‘she thinks some Moroccans are not very nice’. By reducing the mother’s harsh tone, this pupil probably aimed at avoiding the impression of her mother as being racist. Indeed, only when Edith read the translated interview transcripts afterwards, she did discover the mother’s blunt opinion. This altered her view of this respondent in retrospect, and influenced further contacts between them. In sum, the case of Edith illustrates how language use and proficiency influences the position of the researcher in the interview encounter. First Impressions Matter? On the Influence of Looks, Ethnicity and Shared Characteristics Beyond language use, many parents and youngsters tried to determine Edith’s insider-outsider position by assessing her appearance, by asking whether she had Polish roots and why she was studying the Polish community specifically. Many suspected that there must be some link with the Polish community and some wondered if she had a Polish partner. Edith, however, did not have a Polish immigration background, Polish family or partner. Despite being positioned as an outsider in this regard, she tried other ways of creating connections and developing rapport with participants. For that reason, she talked a lot about her interest in Poland, and the good moments she had during her holidays and language courses in the country. Even though Edith did not share her informants’ ethnicity, this did not irretrievably place her in an outsider position in relation to her informants. Her

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perceived insider or outsider position seemed dependent upon the themes of her interviews. When talking about their relationships with people of Moroccan and Turkish backgrounds, the Polish informants seemed to consider Edith an insider. Native Belgians, in her informants’ claims, shared Catholic and European identities with Poles, and therefore they assumed that Edith would share their opinion of non-Catholic, non-European minorities such as Moroccans and Turks. Research of the Open Society Foundation (2010) in 11 cities in 7 European countries (Belgium included) showed that Muslims in Europe encounter discrimination on the ground of ethnicity and religion. Furthermore, a largescale survey within the Polish community in Belgium demonstrated that many Poles have more positive attitudes towards Belgians and more negative attitudes towards Moroccan and Turkish Muslims (Vancluysen and Hennau 2011). This became very clear in several fieldwork situations, for instance when informants described the Moroccans as ‘yeah, you know, always noisy’. In these situations, Edith had to consciously balance preserving a certain insiders’ position with keeping enough distance and neutrality to encourage them to fully explain their perceived shared experience. Edith’s position as an insider, based on informants’ claims of shared Catholicism, became very clear in one particular situation. Edith has a Muslim boyfriend with Moroccan roots, but due to the negative attitudes of many informants towards Muslims, she decided not to mention this. However, at the end of the final interview with one family, she deliberately told them about her relationship with a Muslim man. As their daughter went out with an Albanian Muslim boy, and the parents accepted this, she thought it would be interesting to reveal this commonality. The parents reacted by asking which country he came from. When she said that he had Moroccan roots, they reacted with pity, consoling Edith with ‘Yes, but not all Moroccans are the same, of course’. However, the fact that he was born in Belgium, ‘helped a lot’. The perceived commonality obstructed the anticipated insider moment as Edith did not know that the informants ascribed a lower rank to Moroccans compared to Albanians. In such instances, Edith was perceived mainly as an insider when talking about non-Catholic or non-European communities. However, when focus was placed on Polish migrants and Polish identities, the way parents and pupils perceived Edith shifted. Thus, the previously shared attribute of being ‘Belgian’ (or being Catholic and European) suddenly became a marker of difference, and converted her status into that of an outsider. Edith’s fieldwork experience shows how a researcher continuously balances between insiderness and outsiderness, and how this balance is influenced by a myriad of features. Rilke’s Research Experience (2010–11) Rilke conducted fieldwork in four secondary schools, all located in Ghent, but varying according to the type of education they offered (general, technical or vocational tracks). At the start of fieldwork, her informants were in the second

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year of secondary education and were about 14 years old. Contrary to Edith and Joris, Rilke’s informants had different ethnic backgrounds which included Chinese, Moroccan and Polish. The school populations of the selected schools were extremely heterogeneous, containing pupils of a wide range of nationalities, in one case as many as 65. The school personnel, in contrast, consisted mainly of native Belgian teachers, in most cases with an over-representation of women. Being a 26-year-old Belgian woman, Rilke was asked frequently by school personnel and pupils if she was ‘the new teacher’ or due to her rather youthful appearance, the ‘new trainee’. This indicated that – at least in terms of her looks – she blended in well in the school environment. As a result, suspicion about her presence and intentions by ‘insiders’ (school personnel and pupils) in these school environments was limited. On the Significance of Age As we showed in the literature review, ethnicity is not the only criterion to define insider or outsider statuses. Previous studies with ethnically diverse populations already show how, for example, age and educational background play an important role in defining the researchers’ position (Cukut Krilić 2011, Narayan 1993). In the context of Slovenia, Cukut Krilić (2011) showed how age and common educational background played a significant role in the definition of her relationship with female respondents from Bosnia-Herzegovina and former Soviet Union republics. Rilke experienced similar dynamics in her relationship with the informants during her fieldwork. When introducing herself to her pupil informants, Rilke stressed that she was not a member of the school personnel, in order to distance herself from this group of people who are in an authoritative position in relation to students. Still, if not a teacher, she remained an adult, having in this respect an undeniable outsider position regarding her teenage informants. This was a central issue to the research project, as ‘giving a voice to young people’ was one of the starting points of the research. The last thing we wanted was for the position of the interviewers, as ‘outsiders’ to this age group, to impede this aim. As the age difference itself could not be changed, Rilke attempted to downplay her position as an ‘adult’ by using various strategies. Firstly, she adopted a no-nonsense, youthful, informal style of communication with the informants. Her ten-year volunteering experience in a youth movement had helped develop this attitude. She also attempted to present herself as a ‘young person’ by wearing casual clothes during fieldwork in the schools, and using text messages to communicate. Secondly, she reminded her informants that in the recent past she too had been a secondary student, implying that she was able to empathize with them. The relationship between Rilke and Beata, a 16-year-old girl of Polish descent, is a clear example of this. After the interview, Rilke and Beata stayed a while and chatted. Suddenly Beata asked Rilke which study track she followed in secondary school. Rilke answered that she had been on the same track as her, and moreover in the same type of school (a Catholic school), although

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in another city. Beata wanted to know more, and asked what Rilke had studied after finishing secondary education. Once again, her future perspective matched with Rilke’s past school trajectory, enforcing a more confidential relationship between them. In contrast, in an interview with two girls, both on the vocational track, Rilke was very aware of not telling these students she had been on the general track in secondary education, since they reported not having a positive image of that track. She deliberately chose to not share personal information, as telling them would put her in an outsider position and raise obstacles to gathering information on their perception of the general track. However, the disclosure of personal information such as educational background is not always the result of a deliberate strategy, but may also be caused by an unexpected twist in the interview situation. During a group interview with girls with different ethnic backgrounds, all on the technical track, one girl vividly described how going to university would be her ultimate dream, especially in the city of Ghent. She added that she thought university students were extremely smart. A few minutes later, she turned to Rilke and asked what diploma she had. She explained that she had studied at university, even in the city the girl had mentioned. All the participants, and particularly the girl who had asked, expressed their deepest admiration. At the same time, this revelation of personal information created a deep rift between them and the interviewer, since they would experience many obstacles and have difficulty in making it to higher education. Rilke’s experience clearly illustrates how the personal educational experience of the researcher leads to both moments of insiderness and outsiderness for the interviewer and the informants, reflecting Narayan’s (1993) argument that it is more rewarding to examine the particular relationships between the researcher and his/her informants, instead of focussing on whether we are ‘authentic’ insiders or outsiders regarding the research population as a whole. Rilke also avoided using her ‘adult authority’ as much as possible, or reacting based on her ‘moral responsibility’ as an adult. She usually did not react disapprovingly to improper talk or conduct by the pupils. Often, pupils talked in a disrespectful way about others (including racist and gender stereotypes), or confessed to engaging in inappropriate behaviour. For instance, Zohra, a 15-yearold pupil of Moroccan descent, revealed that she started smoking at 14, without the knowledge of her parents, and has since then been spending her entire lunch budget on cigarettes. The same pupil, when describing the bad school atmosphere, spoke about female black students, saying that ‘especially these niggress are very good at giving a beating’. Although Rilke denounced her behaviour and speech, she did not show this, but instead reacted neutrally by asking questions about their causes or consequences. By not reacting in a typical adult, ‘pedagogical’ manner, she managed to downplay her outsider position based on age difference. Only when other pupils were harmed directly by the behaviour of one informant, in group discussions, Rilke felt it was necessary to intervene. After all, as an adult researcher, she has the ethical responsibility to protect minor informants from harm (Alderson and Morrow 2004).

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Ethnic Background Once Again Rilke found the difference in ethnic background between the researcher and the informants to be less relevant. This was probably partly due to the multicultural school context, where interethnic contacts occur on a daily basis. However, there were some instances where ethnic background was significant – although in an unexpected way. In the case of Zohra, ethnic difference between the researcher and participants helped to create a confidential relationship. The girl complained about the negative comments she received about her looks and behaviour from Moroccan peers. She had bleached hair, smoked, had a boyfriend and was overtly atheist, things her peers considered inappropriate for a Moroccan girl. Rilke’s outsider ethnicity (non-Moroccan) and religion (non-Islamic) were common ground, as the girl distanced herself from Islam and the Moroccan community and sought to position herself as an outsider regarding her ‘own’ community and religion. Zohra’s dissociation from religious (Muslim) and ethnic (Moroccan) identities attributed to her is to be understood in a societal context where these identities are often negatively perceived (Open Society Foundation 2010). Joris’s Research Experience (2011) Joris conducted research with pupils of Belgian ethnicity outside the school environment, mapping the influences of parents, siblings, peers and neighbourhood on the pupils’ school careers. Joris is a Dutch-speaking Belgian man, aged 25. He lives in Ghent, the city where his informants live and attend school. Impression Management In contrast with Rilke and Edith, Joris shared the ethnic background and mother tongue with his respondents. Therefore, he could all too quickly be considered an insider with all the advantages and disadvantages mentioned earlier. However, as we have demonstrated thus far, insider/outsider-positions are dynamic, continuously shifting and influenced by situational factors and social interactions between interviewer and interviewee. The following examples show how Joris deliberately balanced between insider/outsider positions with the youngsters or their peers and parents. Joris wanted to present himself to the youngsters as not being part of the school context since, even though pupils collaborated voluntarily with the study, he still had to gain access to their peers and parents. He therefore tried to establish trust with the pupils, with the underlying aim of diminishing possible distrust regarding his wish to talk with their parents and peers. The interviews with parents were therefore deliberately planned after the contact moments with pupils and peers. Several meetings were organized between the school researchers and the pupils, in which Joris passively participated, so that the students could get familiar with

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him, but also to create a clear distinction between the school researchers and the community researchers. Like Rilke, he tried to stress his youth by presenting himself as young: leather jacket, hoodie, jeans and red shoes, MP3-player, laughing when pupils were throwing sweets in the classroom instead of disapproving of their behaviour. All communication between Joris and the pupils was, for the same reason, by SMS. In other words, he deliberately tried to create commonalities. To reduce the barrier between researcher and informants even more, the youngsters could choose the focus group location on most occasions: he would treat them to food and drink in exchange for the recruitment and organization of the focus group. However, the particular situation in which fieldwork takes place defines the importance of certain personal characteristics (Kusow 2003). Joris’s experience clearly illustrates how different informants attribute different meanings to places, forcing Joris to continuously reconstruct his position. For example, one of the first youngsters chose a pizza fast-food restaurant as a location for the focus group. Joris used this place for other focus groups with the young people, assuming that talking there would improve their – positive – perception of Joris as a young researcher with a feeling for their life-world. However, when he used another location, a popular hamburger fast-food restaurant, to conduct a focus group with young people mainly originating from left-wing-oriented progressive families, at the end one of them spontaneously pointed out that they had just collectively contributed to the destruction of the rain forest. In sum, despite his aim to present himself as young by choosing this hamburger fast-food restaurant as the focus group location, this specific group of pupils showed their concerns about the lack of environmental ethics linked to the choice of interview location. As Joris did not seem to share the same set of values, they reframed their group boundaries, unexpectedly ascribing him an outsider status. This example shows that different informants give different meanings to places, so particular fieldwork situations influence the position of the researcher. Deliberately Striving for Distance in the Interviewer-informant Relationship When contacting the parents, Joris did not present himself as a youth, but rather in the formal role of a researcher; presenting himself as a youth would have been grounds for the parents to doubt the seriousness of the research process. Moreover, in contrast to Edith, who tried to invoke confidentiality with the parents interviewed, Joris deliberately chose a different approach: he tried to keep a professional distance from his informants. He opted for this approach since he would not have as much contact with the young people’s parents as Edith did, and moreover assumed they were familiar with the concept of ‘scientific research and interviews’. The fact that Joris formally shared the same language and ethnicity with his informants did not mean that he could use the same approach with all the parents. Despite sharing certain relatively ‘fixed’ characteristics with his informants, it became clear that there were also many distinctions between them. As we argued in the literature review, social background also plays a role in the

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relationship between interviewer and respondent. The young people’s parents in Joris’s fieldwork originated from distinct social strata: some of them had a similar socioeconomic background to Joris’s parents (with a higher education background), whereas another parent for example had serious debts and had to survive by means of charity food parcels. Even though Joris aimed to remain professionally distanced vis-à-vis his informants as he felt close to some of them, it was not always simple. For example, with an underprivileged family it was relatively easy to remain distanced initially; there were enough distinctive features surrounding the interview setting that suggested distance, like the employed language (dialect, vocabulary). Or, when the mother of a youngster told him she made use of debt mediation, he deliberately chose to ask her to explain this, even though he already knew what this meant. However, Joris was also aware that there could grow too much distance between him and his informants, which would also hamper their relationship. Therefore, Joris also tried to mask some differences deliberately, as for example by dressing himself modestly. In contrast, when interviewing parents with a similar socioeconomic background, it was much more difficult for him to adopt and preserve this distanced position. For example, when asking a middle-class parent with higher education about his motivation for buying a house in a middle-class neighbourhood in the city, Joris caught himself with his own prejudice in the question: ‘Of course you wouldn’t deliberately choose a disadvantaged area to buy a house in, but …’. This was the result of Joris’s identification with the informant, invoked by his impression of similarities throughout the interview between the informant and his own father. Moreover, the context reinforced this perception, as the interview took place in the informant’s home, which is similar to Joris’s parental house. Since he envisaged the informant comparable to his father, he also suspected that the informant would have a similar way of thinking, demonstrating how hard it is for a researcher to deliberately adopt an outsider position. Conclusion: Dancing a Tango As the relationship between the researcher and his/her informant(s) is formed through interaction, the researcher’s position is not static, but under constant negotiation (Bott 2010). Traditionally, insiderness is perceived as being based on shared citizenship, ethnicity, language, religion, gender, socioeconomic class and/or cultural identity (Ergun and Erdemir 2010, Merriam et al. 2001). In this chapter, however, we demonstrated that the boundaries between insider and outsider positions are not clearly delineated (Cukut Krilić 2011, Woodward 2008, Mercer 2007). Rather than ‘being’ an insider or outsider, the qualitative researcher is continuously dancing a tango between insiderness and outsiderness. Moreover, shifts may happen intentionally but also unintentionally, as social interaction processes are always characterized by a certain level of unpredictability, due to the multiple social contexts and the agency of all parties involved (Kusow 2003, Naples

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1996, Narayan 1993). The presented cases of Edith, Joris and Rilke illustrate these constant and abrupt status changes on the insider/outsider continuum. Instead of thinking of insider and outsider positions as static, predefined positions of the researcher vis-à-vis his/her research population, it might be more fruitful to consider ‘moments’ of insiderness and outsiderness – and the shifts between them. We have illustrated this with a variety of examples from the field, all underpinning the fact that the often used dichotomy of insider and outsider is incapable of capturing the fluid and constantly changing position of the researcher in the qualitative research process. Criteria that are often considered as determining the researcher’s position, such as ethnicity and social class, are much more flexible and context-dependent than often assumed. Instead, the choreography of the tango is influenced by a myriad of factors that are not always under the control of the researcher: the dancing partner may take the lead as well. Acknowledgments The authors would like to express their gratitude to the BET YOU! Research Team and their coordinator, Dr Noel Clycq (Universiteit Antwerpen), for granting us the permission to use research data for the three cases presented in this chapter. References Alderson, P. and Morrow, V. 2004. Ethics, Social Research and Consulting with Children and Young People. Barkingside: Barnardo’s. Barth, F. 1969. Ethnic Groups and Boundaries. The social organization of culture difference. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Bott, E. 2010. Favourites and others: reflexivity and the shaping of subjectivities and data in qualitative research. Qualitative Research, 10(2), 159–73. Cooley, C.H. 1967 [1902]. Human Nature and the Social Order. New York: Schocken Books. Corbin Dwyer, S. and Buckle, J.L. 2009. The space between: On being an insideroutsider in qualitative research. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 8(1), 54–63. Cukut Krilić, S. 2011. The role of ethnicity in qualitative migration research. Migracijske i Etničke Teme, 27(2), 161–75. Duquet, N., Glorieux, I., Laurijssen, I. and Van Doorselaer, Y. 2006. Wit krijt schrijft beter. Schoolloopbanen van allochtone jongeren in beeld. Antwerpen: Garant. Ergun, A. and Erdemir, A. 2010. Negotiating insider and outsider identities in the field: ‘Insider’ in a foreign land; ‘Outsider’ in one’s own land. Field Methods, 22(1), 16–38.

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Ganga, D. and Scott, S. 2006. Cultural “insiders” and the issue of positionality in qualitative migration research: Moving “across” and moving “along” researcher-participant divides. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 7(3), Art. 7. Available at: http://nbnresolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs060379. Hockey, J. 1993. Research methods – researching peers and familiar settings. Research Papers in Education, 8(2), 199–225. Jankie, D. 2004. ‘Tell me who you are’: Problematizing the construction and positionalities of ‘insider’/‘outsider’ of a ‘native’ ethnographer in a postcolonial context, in Decolonizing Research in Cross-Cultural Contexts. Critical Personal Narratives, edited by K. Mutua and B.B. Swadener. Albany: State University of New York Press, 87–106. Kusow, A.M. 2003. Beyond indigenous authenticity: Reflections on the insider/ outsider debate in immigration research. Symbolic Interaction, 26(4), 591–9. Mead, G.H. 1974 [1934]. Mind, Self, and Society from the Standpoint of a Social Behaviorist. Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press. Mercer, J. 2007. The challenges of insider research in educational institutions: wielding a double-edged sword and resolving delicate dilemmas. Oxford Review of Education, 33(1), 1–17. Merriam, S.B., Johnson-Bailey, J., Lee, M., Kee, Y., Ntseane, G. and Muhamad, M. 2001. Power and positionality: negotiating insider/outsider status within and across cultures. International Journal of Lifelong Education, 20(5), 405–16. Merton, R.K. 1972. Insiders and outsiders: A chapter in the sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology, 78(1), 9–47. Naples, N.A. 1996. A feminist revisiting of the insider/outsider debate: The ‘Outsider Phenomenon’ in Rural Iowa. Qualitative Sociology, 19(1), 83–106. Narayan, K. 1993. How native is a ‘native’ anthropologist? American Anthropologist, 95(3), 671–86. Olsen, W. 2012. Data Collection. Key Debates and Methods in Social Research. Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore & Washington DC: SAGE. Open Society Foundation, 2010. Muslims in Europe. A Report on 11 EU Cities. At Home in Europe Project. New York, London & Budapest: Open Society Institute. Roberts, J.M. and Sanders, T. 2005. Before, during and after: realism, reflexivity and ethnography. The Sociological Review, 53(2), 294–313. Roosens, E. 1998. Eigen grond eerst? Primordiale autochtonie, dilemma van de multiculturele samenleving. Leuven & Amersfoort: ACCO. Sherif, B. 2001. The ambiguity of boundaries in the fieldwork experience: Establishing rapport and negotiating insider/outsider status. Qualitative Inquiry, 7(4), 436–47. Simmel, G. 1968 [1908]. Soziologie. Untersuchungen über die Formen der Vergesellschaftung. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. Van Avermaet, P. and Sierens, S. 2012. Van de periferie naar de kern. Omgaan met diversiteit in onderwijs, in Cultuuroverdracht en onderwijs in een

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multiculturele context, edited by C. Timmerman, N. Clycq and B. Segaert. Gent: Academia Press, 16–49. Vancluysen, K. and Hennau, S. 2011. Vanuit Pools perspectief. Een bevraging van de Poolse gemeenschap in Antwerpen. Hasselt: Steunpunt Gelijkekansenbeleid. Woodward, K. 2008. Hanging out and hanging about: Insider/outsider research in the sport of boxing. Ethnography, 9(4), 536–61.

PART II Researching Home and Community

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Chapter 5

Behind the Emic Lines: Ethics and Politics of Insiders’ Ethnography Hariz Halilovich

Introduction In this chapter, I discuss the ethical and political dilemmas encountered in the field while conducting a multi-sited ethnography on the effects of politically motivated violence on the communities in and from the former Yugoslavia. Much of the fieldwork discussed here relates to my research among the survivors of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia-Herzegovina and their compatriots, Bosnian refugees and migrants, in diaspora. I also go on to describe my experiences in the ethnically divided Albanian and Serbian communities in Kosovo. In the majority of situations, being a cultural insider, someone who was born and grew up in Yugoslavia – speaking relevant languages and having knowledge of shared cultural codes, norms and histories – was an advantage in understanding the issues, gaining access to prospective participants and establishing relationships with the research cohorts. Being seen and accepted as an insider provided me with access to information that might have been off limits to outside researchers. However, the insider/outsider status proved to be very fluid, at times complicating my role as a researcher and even becoming a source of potential risk. While those who saw me as an insider expected understanding and sympathies for their political cause, there were times when my political alignment and loyalty were questioned when identified, or perceived, as the ‘ethnic other’. By critically reflecting on some of these situations and changing roles and perceptions, I’d like to raise awareness of the issues the insider ethnographer faces in the field and, ultimately, to contribute to a deeper understanding of research involving co-ethnic and cross-ethnic ethnography in communities after violence and forced migration. Anthropology from Inside, Outside and In-between Anthropology has for long been regarded as the ‘science of the other’, where the researcher is one of ‘us’ and the researched are ‘them’ – the ‘other’, members of the exotic foreign cultures, those different from ‘us’ about whom ‘we’ want to learn and understand more. In order to produce a ‘thick description’ of the cultural

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phenomena explored, that is, to unveil the meanings of the informants’ actions, anthropologists are required to engage with those they research at a very close, personal level (Geertz 1973). In the process, the researcher gradually moves from the ‘culturally neutral’, outsider’s perspective, to the one of an insider, adopting at least to some extent a view and understanding of a person from within the culture being studied. Originally defined by Kenneth Pike (1967) in relation to the phonemic and phonetic analysis of language – the first concerned with meaning and the second with sounds of a language – emic and etic have come to stand for the two main perspectives employed in ethnography: the insider’s and the outsider’s point of view (Harris 1976). Long before these terms were conceptualized, the importance of the two perspectives were recognized by anthropologists such as Bronisław Malinowski (1922), who emphasized the importance of understanding exotic cultures from ‘the native’s point of view’. More recently, however, anthropological research has increasingly been done ‘at home’, that is, in the researcher’s own cultural setting; thus turning anthropology from the ‘science of the other’ to one of the familiar or proximate. This anthropological turn has not stopped there; a number of researchers – like Shahram Khosravi (2007) and Lejla Voloder (2008), for instance – have also used themselves as their primary research subjects, focusing on and describing their personal experiences relating to the topic under investigation. Unlike the traditional ethnographies of the ‘other’, these researchers have produced ethnographies of the ‘self’, or autoethnographies – ‘forms of self-narrative that places the self within a social context’ (Reed-Danahay 1997: 9). All these methodological shifts have made the collective categories ‘us’ and ‘them’ – as well as the divide between the researchers and the researched – if not completely obsolete then very fluid and hard to fix and define, while ethnographers are challenged to find and (re)define their own etic and emic perspectives. The ‘incomplete and unstable nature of insiderness’, as Patricia O’Connor (2004: 69) calls it, is especially true in migration research where many researchers are also migrants. Abdi Kusow (2003: 591), for instance, reports that close to a half of ‘immigration scholars in the United States are themselves of immigrant stock’. Even a cursory review of the key migration literature suggests that this trend is very similar in many other countries including Australia. As a migration scholar ‘of immigrant stock’ myself, the issue of insiderness, in-betweenness and positioning with all the complexities and challenges has been an integral part of my research. At times, I have felt a tacit tension between my personal and professional selves and that the (un)written expectation that the ‘two selves’ need to be kept apart in the research context. However, over time I have come to reconcile these two selves, the one of a cultural insider and the other of a professional outsider, and to use them to enrich my ethnographies both in the field and text. In this reflexive chapter, I share some of the experiences, challenges and discontents relating to the fluid role of an insider/outsider conducting research with co-ethnics and (former) compatriots.

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A Bosnian Among Bosnians Much of my research over the last decade has revolved around the Bosnian refugee diaspora groups in Australia, Europe and the USA – that is, other Bosnians with whom I share many cultural connections and whose experiences sometimes mirror my own. For instance, many of my research participants and I have shared the realities of forced displacement from Bosnia and migration and emplacement in ‘host’ countries. However, these shared realities – influenced by various sociocultural, political, generational and even geographical factors – can also be seen as quite different in many respects. As sociologists Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann (1967: 134) recognized 40 years ago, realities are socially defined, but ‘the definitions are always embodied, that is, concrete individuals and groups of individuals serve as definers of reality’. As a researcher and a ‘definer of reality’, I am aware of my positioning and my subjectivities not only in relation to my research participants but also in relation to the broader context of the topic of my research into forced migration. In her book Reflexive Ethnography, Charlotte Aull Davies (2008: 3) argues: ‘all researchers are to some degree connected to, or part of, the object of their research’. Or, as Friedrich Nietzsche (1994: 238) put it more bluntly, ‘[…] however far man may extend himself with his knowledge, however objective he may appear to himself – ultimately he reaps nothing but his own biography’. Davies (2008: 5), on the other hand, allows for both personal and ‘non-personal’ factors, arguing that ‘not only the personal history of ethnographers but also the disciplinary and broader sociocultural circumstances under which they work, have a profound effect on which topic and peoples are selected for study’. These statements strongly resonate with me. There can be no denying my passion for researching forced displacement, refugees and migrants – and in particular displacement, migration and emplacement of Bosnians and other ‘post-Yugoslavs’. Beyond an academic inquisitiveness and the epistemological relevance of the themes, my research has been driven by a search for answers to ontological questions that affect me at a deep personal level. These ontological questions relate to the fact that I cannot claim historical, personal or simply human distance from the collapse of Yugoslavia and the related issues of forced displacement, ethnic cleansing and genocide in Bosnia. All these issues have had a direct impact on my life. In 1992, in a dramatic turn of events, my ordinary student life at the University of Sarajevo was replaced with the life of a refugee, the displaced and immigrant, firstly in Europe and later in Australia. Hence, my interest in the issues affecting migrants, and refugees in particular, stem very much from my own experiences. However, while reflexive, my research into displacement and migration of Bosnians has not turned into an autoethnography, nor have members of my family been involved in it as direct informants. Having said this, I fully acknowledge my double roles: as a cultural insider born and socialized in Bosnia (and Yugoslavia) and a professional outsider, an anthropologist scholar living in

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Australia. Thus my ethnographic approach to researching forced migration can be seen as a mix of both emic and etic perspectives. It also comes very close to what Jasna Čapo Žmegač et al. (2006: 287–89) termed ‘ethnology of the proximate’, where ‘research … clearly incorporates the autobiographical elements’ – regardless of whether they are consciously repressed in the text or not. As they note, ‘in cases where the researcher is practically, cognitively and emotionally living with the field, the research is a continual blend of personal experience and the creation of anthropological knowledge’ (Čapo Žmegač et al. 2006: 287). As there is no universal recipe for how to deal with insider/outsider role in the field or in the text, each researcher is challenged to find their own way of dealing with their cognitive and emotional selves. Sometimes, in the field and when describing the events, interactions and stories I engaged with during my research, I let the me fade from the picture, let my presence and autobiographical elements disappear between the lines, to focus on the exchange between the participants I observe. At other times, I acknowledge my presence by using first person voice or through reflexive vignettes of my own thoughts, feelings, assumptions and role as a researcher in a given situation. Either way, at no point do I claim to be representing a value-neutral social reality. As Thomas Cushman (2004: 7) points out, ‘the accounts produced as a result of anthropological work are never neutral, in spite of their rhetorical pretensions to being so’. In a changing multi-sited context, in which much of my research has been taking place, personal, ethical and political issues seem to be even more challenging than in politically stable single sites. As George Marcus (1995: 113) argues: The conventional ‘how-to’ methodological questions of social science seem to be thoroughly embedded in or merged with the political-ethical discourse of self-identification developed by the ethnographer of multi-sited research. The movement among sites (and levels) of society lends a character of activism to such investigation.

That ‘activist role’ has often overlapped with and indeed deepened my ethnographic exploration, in terms of both the nature of the data collected and advancing the human rights cause of my informants: refugees, internally displaced persons and genocide survivors. Reflecting on Cultural Insiderness: Ethics, Politics, Activism Being a ‘cultural insider’ has definitely been an advantage in understanding the issues and gaining access to prospective participants and establishing trusting relationships. At times, the insider status provided me with access to information that might have been off limits to outside researchers (Edwards 2002). Not that I subscribe to the view that a researcher needs to come from the same ethnic, religious or social background in order to understand their subjects (cf. Finlay

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2001, Van de Port 1999). As Selma Porobić (2012: 104) argues, the insider positioning comes foremost from the informants themselves, who perceive the researcher as ‘one of us’ and whose role is to present their stories accurately to the outside world. Certainly, as I describe later in this chapter, insider/outsider status at times complicated my role as a researcher and even became a source of potential risk – including personal safety issues. There were times when my insider’s loyalties and political sympathies were ‘naturally’ expected or questioned when I was identified as the ‘ethnic other’ and suspected of being a wayward or subversive insider. Bizarrely, I felt safer when being mistaken for a spy – I was asked by a local official what Western intelligence service I was working for – as officials seemed to have more respect for spies than for pestering anthropologists visiting ethnically cleansed villages and talking to survivors in remote Bosnian villages (Halilovich 2012b). Leaving aside questions of ‘real’ loyalties, in regard to the ethics of my research, I cannot but agree with Cushman (2004: 7) that ‘anthropologists have specific ethical obligations to a) avoid producing work that legitimizes or rationalizes the accounts of perpetrators of mass violence; and b) avoid producing accounts which deny the phenomenological realities of social suffering’. These ethical imperatives imply that refugee research can never be apolitical or ‘objectively neutral’. Such an ethical approach often requires action beyond text production and research in more than one site. However, as Marcus (1995: 113) puts it, ‘in conducting multisited research, one finds oneself with all sorts of cross-cutting and contradictory personal commitments’. The way to deal with these commitments, he argues, is ‘not by refuge in being a detached anthropological scholar, but in being a sort of ethnographer-activist, renegotiating identities in different sites as one learns more about a slice of the world system’ (Marcus 1995: 113). Once in the field(s), there was no easy way out of that ‘ethnographer-activist’ role, nor was I looking for an easy escape. Instead, I learned that doing multi-sited ethnography of forced displacement inevitably leads into researching and dealing with the harsh realities of causes and consequences (Harrell-Bond and Voutira 1992). The forced displacement executed through the policy of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia between 1992 and 1995 was carried out through the systematic violation of human rights, the complete disregard for the lives and dignity of others and war crimes that culminated in the 1995 Srebrenica genocide (Halilovich 2012b, 2011). Therefore, any research into forced displacement cannot avoid dealing with the issues of dispossession, personal loss, dramatic flights and homelessness. For me, collecting and writing up these stories represent some of the most profound and cathartic experiences I have had as a researcher and a person. To me, they are above all a reminder, a written memorial to those who perished and an affirmation of those who survived but whose stories would not have been otherwise heard and remembered. Some of my participants from ethnically cleansed communities in Bosnia presented me with testimonies and first-hand witness accounts of horrific war crimes and information about war criminals who continued to benefit from their

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deeds. While tempted to use the full names of the alleged war criminals as reported by my respondents, I opted for their initials, but my writing about these war crimes subsequently led to an investigation by the ICTY.1 My participants insisted on my keeping their original names and their identities in my notes and publications (Halilovich 2011). They were worried if they were to ‘hide behind fake names’ that the integrity of their stories would be compromised. Participating in the research provided them with the opportunity to get their stories ‘off the chest’, to get them told to and recorded by someone who cared and showed sincere interest in them, to someone whom they perceived as one of them, an insider – and who effectively became their advocate assisting them in addressing at least some of the injustices they suffered. In another situation, confronted with the magnitude of the loss of human lives and the continuing institutional discrimination against a handful of Bosnian survivors who returned to their destroyed village ten years after they fled, my advocacy and activism could be seen as an ‘emergency response’ prompted by ‘an ethical responsibility to address processes of unfairness or injustice within [this] particular lived domain’ (Madison 2005: 5). In addition to academic publications and presenting papers at international conferences and seminars, my response also involved speaking about the devastated community and their day-to-day problems on radio and TV, participating in documentaries and writing a number of articles in widely read newspapers and magazines within and outside Bosnia. As Marie Smyth (2001: 6) insists, ‘if research is to inform international organisations, policy makers and the public both outside and within divided societies, then the researcher must be able to communicate with integrity in several languages: as a specialist, as a generalist, as an academic, as a populist, as a public speaker, and as a journalist’. The wide dissemination of information about the village and the living conditions of returnees resulted in the village being put back on the map (literally!) and its residents being provided with material aid in the form of livestock, a tractor and agricultural machinery by international NGOs assisting returnees in Bosnia. This action-research approach might alarm a ‘traditionally oriented’ anthropologist, for whom the ethnographer has been expected to convey their fieldwork in the text as rational, academic, task-oriented, scientific and apolitical – with my personal and literary approach considered as soft, lacking in rigor, too subjective, even emotional and ‘feminine’. But, as Edward Bruner (1993) argues, writing is a political act. ‘Those who claim’, Bruner (1993: 6) writes, ‘that what is literary is not political or that humanistic interpretative anthropology does not deal with political issues are rather dead wrong, as any act of representation of the Other is inherently political’. I have not tried to disguise that my research, the issues explored, the findings and their broader social impacts are highly political. Regardless of the real or perceived insiderness, it would be almost impossible as well as unethical, to explore issues such as discrimination, marginalization, 1  The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

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war crimes and genocide without making them the subject of political action. As Victoria Sanford (2006: 31) argues, ‘issues of authority and subjectivity matter to all who work in the field trying to contextualize and sometimes categorize the meaning of surviving genocide and other crimes against humanity’. Similarly, Smyth (2001: 8–9) points out that ‘in the face of human suffering … it may be impossible to remain rigidly within the research role, and not cross the line into intervention’. Crossing that line also implies that the ethical imperative primum non nocere is not sufficient when researching communities subjected to various human rights abuses that range from ‘banal’ institutional discrimination to the annihilation of whole communities. Such an approach does not compromise the validity of the anthropologist’s research. On the contrary, as Sanford (2006: 14) argues, ‘activist scholarship reminds us that all research is inherently political, even, and perhaps especially, that scholarship presented under the guise of “objectivity”, which is really no more than a veiled defence of the status quo’. The most common reason for researchers’ activism and advocacy comes simply from the fact that ‘anthropologists cannot escape physically, ethically and emotionally the suffering and the brutality of their research subject and the historical epoch they live in’ (Bourgois 2006: xii). While ‘inability’ to physically, ethically and emotionally distance themselves from their participants may be even more pronounced by researchers who come from the same cultural background as their participants, David Turton (1996: 96) insists that all researchers involved in refugee research need to include the alleviation of human suffering as an ‘explicit objective of their research’ and ultimately aim to influence the behaviour and thinking of policymakers and practitioners, so that their interventions are more likely to improve than worsen the situation of refugees and displaced people. Indeed, as Barbara Harrell-Bond and Eftihia Voutira (1992: 7) point out, ‘anthropologists’ insights into power, and their expertise on structure of authority, place them in an advantageous position to contribute to the formation of policy’. Ethnic Outsider in an Ethnically Divided Region In the course of my research into the effects of violence and forced displacement on local communities, I occasionally crossed into different parts of what I knew as my homeland, the country which in the last 20 years has become known as ‘the Former Yugoslavia’. Apart from the ‘Autonomous Province of Vojvodina’ still conjoined with Serbia, all other constitutive parts of what was once the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia had become independent states after the dissolution of the Yugoslav federation in the 1990s. The seven ‘post-Yugoslav’ states are now separated by tightly controlled nation-state borders. The recent hostilities between many of them are still visible on the scarred landscape in many parts of the region. They may not be as visible but they are also palpable on many individuals and communities in the divided region.

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When visiting my ‘former’ homeland, in order to avoid possible harassment by the formal and informal local authorities, I always travel on my Australian passport and, depending on situations, decide what language to speak. As ‘culture is communication and no communication by humans can be divorced from culture’ (Hall 1992: 212), speaking ‘the right’ language has not only been the way to tap into or divert from different cultures, but also crucial in reaching out to my participants, gaining their trust and getting them to tell me their stories without them feeling that they may be speaking to a complete outsider, or even worse to someone who they might regard as their former enemy rather than their former countryman. It is important to remember that in the context of the (post-)ethnic hostilities in the former Yugoslavia an ‘enemy’ is often not a ‘complete outsider’ but rather a ‘subversive insider’ – an ethnic neighbour and up to recently a fellow countryman. In the early 2000s, while conducting research in ethnically divided communities in Kosovo, I deliberately spoke only English and relied on the language assistance of an Albanian interpreter when I met with my Albanian informants in places like Prishtina, Račak and Prizren. I resorted to English (which most of my participants did not speak) rather than Serbian (which many Kosovo Albanians spoke) in order to avoid being mistaken for a Serb, as any perceived association with Serbs was highly likely to impact on the research in a negative way. To many Albanians, speaking Serbian was reminiscent of the times under Serb oppression and recent violence. According to my Albanian interpreter who, like me, grew up and was socialized in Yugoslavia, Albanians perceived the Serbian language as an instrument of oppression, reminding them that only up to a few years ago Kosovo’s majority population, Albanians, were obliged to use Serbian as their official language, while the ethnic Serbs, who made an ethnic minority, saw Albanian as an inferior language not worth learning. Subsequently, speaking Serbian, the language of the ‘occupiers’, in the ‘liberated’ Kosovo was seen by many proud Albanians as humiliating, unpatriotic and politically incorrect. My interpreter, who also was my driver and cultural guide, told me all this before we embarked on the research; while, once outside of the communities, we spoke to each other in ‘the old Yugoslav language’, as he referred to what once was known as Serbo-Croat. Whereas the language was an issue with my Albanian informants, they perceived my Bosnian and Muslim heritage favourably, providing me with the status of a partial insider – or, to put it more correctly, an outsider who was able to understand and empathize. As a Kosovar official at the airport in Prishtina – seeing the Bosnian name and place of birth in my Australian passport – remarked in solidarity, ‘we both have the same enemy’, he was implying that the Serbs were our common enemies. Following this logic of ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’, by default I was perceived as an ally by the Albanian official. This sentiment was shared by many other Albanians I met for the first time in the Republic of Kosovo, even though I restrained from expressing my political views in relation to the conflict in this former Yugoslav province.

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The question of insiderness/outsiderness and my perceived cross-ethnic sympathies was also an issue in the Kosovar Serbian communities of Gračanica and Mitrovica, who vigorously opposed Kosovo’s independence and saw Albanians as their ethnic rivals. While, at the time, English was a lingua franca in the Albanian communities for non-Albanian visitors, the Serb communities in Kosovo were much friendlier with the outsiders speaking Serbian, or a related Slavic language. Within the Serb communities, English speakers were generally treated with a degree of suspicion and even hostility as outsiders linked to their English-speaking enemies the NATO and Western governments supporting the Albanians in Kosovo. While my Serb participants overlooked my ‘post-Yugoslav’ Bosnian, Muslim and Australian backgrounds, they emphasized our shared Slavic and Yugoslav origins and how we ‘understand each other much better than we would ever be able to understand the non-Slavic outsiders’, the Albanians. In such conversations, the state of Yugoslavia ‘from Vardar to Triglav’,2 which was systematically destroyed during the 1990s, was lamented over. As my insiderness was limited to past Yugoslav times, most of my Serb participants would omit mentioning anything that took place after 1991, when Yugoslavia started disintegrating. During the 1990s, the former compatriots, who up to 1991 were the fellow Yugoslavs and insiders in a shared multicultural state, had become not only the outsiders to each other but in many cases also bitter enemies divided by frontlines and new borders. Thus, ‘playing the Yugoslav card’ provided my participants and me with a safe and neutral contact zone, a ‘no man’s land’ in which we all found some comfort and in which similarities rather than differences were emphasized. However, even if Yugoslavia were still in place, there would be many factors that would clearly make me an outsider in the context in which the research was taking place. For instance, I didn’t visit Kosovo when it was an autonomous province of the Socialist Yugoslavia and hence had no lived experiences in this part of the world before. Frankly, I did not feel much of an insider in any of the communities in Kosovo. My role was much closer to what Tamar Hermann (2001: 79) calls an ‘involved outsider’ – due to the facts that I personally was connected to the conflict by virtue of my ‘post-Yugoslav’ background and my personal interest in understanding post-conflict communities in the country I was born in and which ceased to exist. To me, an outsider from what once was inner Yugoslavia, my Serb and Albanian participants had much more in common with each other than they suggested having with me. Their shared ‘Kosovo mentality’ could not escape me. Some of the stereotypes I knew about the Kosovars (both Albanians and Serbs) were confirmed: they all were extremely hospitable to their guests and extremely proud of their cultural, ethnic and local belonging to Kosovo and their respective ethnicities. Of course, after the recent violence, members of both ethnic communities were more 2  Once known as the most southern and the most western Yugoslav landmarks – the river Vardar in Macedonia and the Alpine peak Triglav in Slovenia respectively.

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eager to embrace outsiders – or rather to carefully monitor boundaries and create forms of allegiance with them – than to admit similarities with fellow Kosovars of different ethnic backgrounds in what has effectively become an ethnically divided society. By downplaying some aspects of my identity and by not challenging the fixed perceptions of my identity by my participants from both sides of the ethnic divide – as well as by choosing to speak the ‘politically correct language’ – I was able to engage my participants and to learn about their past and present grievances in the new political context of the independent Republic of Kosovo in which the Albanian and Serbian ethnic communities experienced their shared reality very differently. These encounters reveal not only the way my research was conducted, but also the ways identities are mobilized and monitored in an ethnically divided society. Crossing the Disputed Borders from Inside After completing my fieldwork in Kosovo, rather than leaving the former Serbian province by plane, I took a bus from Prishtina to the Serbian town of Novi Pazar and was to cross the newly established – and disputed – state border between neighbouring Kosovo and Serbia.3 As with other border crossings, at the border between Kosovo and Serbia, which happened to be just ahead of a narrow bridge in a deep canyon, I presented my passport to the Serbian border guard, who entered the bus and asked passengers for ID and travel documents. Aware that ‘the border ritual reproduces the meaning and order of the state system’, as Khosravi (2007: 330) puts it, I showed my utter respect for the ritual I was to participate in as an unequal party. As the Australian passport holders did not require visas for the countries in the region, I did not expect difficulties entering Serbia. However, on that foggy morning somewhere in the mountains between Kosovo and Serbia, the situation became somewhat tense and difficult, to say the least. When the border guard struggled with English asking me for an ‘entrenc štemp’ in my passport, I switched to Serbian in order to understand him better and also to smooth the conversation by claiming some insiderness through a shared language. Surprisingly, this time the trick did not work and in a louder voice than necessary the guard asked me in Serbian when and where I had entered Serbia. I found this a confusing question as I was still on the outside border of the country, so I said that I was just entering Serbia now, and hadn’t entered it before. Obviously this was a wrong answer as the guard got irritated and asked, ‘Where did you board the bus?’ I showed him the bus ticket and replied, ‘In Prishtina’. Now visibly angry, the policeman told me ‘the known facts’ that Prishtina was in Serbia, as Kosovo was a part of Serbia, which meant that I had already entered Serbia back in Prishtina. According to his logic, as I did not have any entry stamp in my passport, I was 3  At the time of my fieldwork, as at the time of writing this chapter in 2012, Serbia bitterly opposed Kosovo’s independence and treated it as its own territory.

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illegally in the country. Understanding where he was coming from and not wanting to irritate him further, I explained that I was a researcher conducting fieldwork in Kosovo. I explained that I arrived by plane from Vienna and the guards at the airport in Prishtina failed to stamp my passport for some reason. So, it was not my fault that I did not have a stamp in my passport. My story related in Serbian did not seem to impress the Serbian border policeman, nor did he show any sign of believing me or not perceiving me as an outsider. My earlier answer that ‘I was entering Serbia only now’ was understood as my not recognizing Prishtina ‘being in Serbia’. My Bosnian Muslim name and the place of birth in the Australian passport placed me further apart from ‘Serbian insiderness’, and by now I was definitively regarded by the guard as an arrogant outsider, or rather an unfriendly neighbour and expatriate, a provocateur, a Muslim and a likely Albanian sympathizer. I was ordered to get off the bus, while my passport was temporarily confiscated and examined by two other guards in a wooden hut made of logs, which served as the border post and was the only ‘building’ beneath rugged cliffs in a thick pine forest canyon in the middle of nowhere. Many real insiders in a similar situation would have offered the policemen a bribe, but even though I had heard of widespread corruption in the region, I had never bribed any uniformed person before, and did not know how it was done. I also worried that offering a bribe might complicate my situation even further as it would confirm the guards’ suspicions about my ‘secret agenda’; they seemed not to show much respect for or interest in my role as a researcher conducting fieldwork in Kosovo. Not knowing how to deal with this ‘cross-cultural misunderstanding’, I decided to play safe – to keep my mouth shut and wait. And it worked in the end! After approximately an hour, just when the bus driver told me sympathetically that he couldn’t wait for me any longer, I was given my passport back and allowed to enter Serbia, but warned to report to the police station in the first town in Serbia and register my stay in the country. And, yes, the same guard repeated to me that I should remember that Kosovo would always remain in Serbia! I learnt something. Luckily, my exit from Serbia a few days later was less problematic; no-one asked for my passport. Once safely out of Serbia, I was happy to claim my outsiderness in relation to a culture, language and geography with which I thought I had more familiarity than the Serbian border guard was willing to recognize. However, reflecting more deeply on the situation, I realized that this episode revealed many of the nuances of my complicated positioning. Had I, for instance, made the same statement as a ‘complete outsider’ (in terms of being a cultural, linguistic and even regional outsider, and one not familiar or invested in the political situation), I don’t think I would have been received with so much hostility by the Serb border guard. But because it was expected that I should know the politics of the place, I was treated as a provocateur, a subversive insider. Thus, the divides of insider/outsider positioning in such politically charged contexts do not work neatly as one may expect; researchers’ roles are subject to a constant renegotiation and repositioning in the politically fluid social environments.

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An Australian Bosnian Among the Swedish and American Bosnians At various other times in the course of my research, the questions of insiderness and outsiderness, or emic and etic perspectives, have resurfaced not only in the ‘non-Bosnian’ cultural contexts, but also both in my ‘native’ Bosnia and in the Bosnian diaspora. While to a complete outsider Bosnianness – like Germanness, Europeanness or Australianness – may seem an identity category with clear boundaries between insiders and outsiders, in reality most researchers-insiders realize that their insiderness is a much more delicate matter, subject to a range of situational and relational factors (Kusow 2003). Some readers might point to the Bosnian ethnic and religious identities as obvious exclusive categories when it comes to Bosnian insiderness. However, in my research with Bosnians of various ethnic backgrounds, I have regularly come across other, less obvious but not less exclusive, group identities such as regional belonging, local dialects, country of residence, adopted second language and cultural norms of the host country, time of migration, gender and even generational belonging (Halilovich 2012a). Some of these generational, diasporic and regional differences, which made me feel more like an outsider than an insider, I experienced during my research with the Bosnian diaspora communities in Sweden and the USA. In the naval city of Karlskrona, in southern Sweden, I discovered that the majority of Bosnians who settled there come from the western Bosnian towns of Banja Luka, Prijedor and Prnjavor – a part of Bosnia also known as Krajina. The fact that all these communities come from the same broader region of western Bosnia has led to the development of a distinct, regional Krajina identity of the Bosnian diaspora in Karlskrona. Apart from clear trans-local and trans-regional settlement patterns of Bosnians in Karlskrona, what was also striking to me about the Bosnian presence in this historical and cultural jewel of southern Sweden, was the extent to which, quite disproportionate to their actual numbers in the city, Bosnians featured in the city’s cultural scene (Halilovich 2012b: 211–2). During my stay there in 2008, I was given a tour of the Maritime Museum and a history lesson about the Swedish navy by a group of (western) Bosnian high school students and their Bosnian teacher, also a curator at the Museum. While I could hear, and understand, their distinct Krajina dialect – different from the Bosnian I spoke – during this tour I became even more aware of my outsider role in relation to my participants, who, through their narrative performance, positioned themselves as insiders, making personal connections with the history of their new country. This was especially obvious when my tour guides used the terms ‘we’, ‘us’ and ‘our’ to refer to Sweden and its history. They displayed a degree of pride when, amongst thousands of exhibits – some dating back several hundred years – they showed me a mini submarine made in Sarajevo during the Yugoslav era. This object had a symbolic value to them as a material link between their old and new histories and identities, as if to say, in ‘our’ Swedish history there is also something from ‘our’ old country. The history lesson I was given by these teenage Swedish Krajina Bosnians effectively intersected at different local/

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regional, national and transnational levels, and as a Bosnian-Australian born in eastern Bosnia I felt more on the outside of the fascinating story than in it; not to mention all the side-conversations in Swedish from which I felt completely excluded. In St Louis (USA), however, where my most loyal research participants were Bosnians from the region of Podrinje, in eastern Bosnia, I naturally felt my emic perspective to be much stronger than with the Swedish Bosnians in Karlskrona. As well as the Bosnians from Podrinje living in St Louis, my research included participants from other parts of Bosnia who settled in ‘the largest Bosnian city outside Bosnia’ (Hemon 2006). The fact that I hardly knew any of my participants before meeting them in St Louis was of secondary importance to my Podrinje participants; we could easily find many connecting points – from speaking a familiar dialect to knowing about places, events and people we, Podrinje insiders, shared as a part of our regional identity and history. Not surprisingly, I was warmly embraced as ‘one of us’ in the re-territorialized Podrinje community in St Louis. In some way, my emic perspective impacted upon the data collection and what kind of knowledge was produced in the process. Many of my interviews with the Podrinje insiders turned into twoway conversations in which I also responded to many questions posed by my participants, thus creating a joint narrative of displaced Podrinje. However, I opted for a more etic perspective when exploring their contemporary migrant realities in St Louis. In fact, our different experiences of migration, my Australianness and their Americanness often set us apart. Most of my fellow Bosnians from Podrinje living in St Louis weren’t aware of how much they had become Americans over the last two decades, and my Australianness did not escape them; they even made fun of my Australian English and some typical Australian phrases I used. I also became aware of gender and generational aspects with many of my Podrinje participants who were women, war widows, who often lost sons of my age in the war. In the interviews, many of the women told me about how they lost their sons in the 1995 Srebrenica genocide. As much as I felt cognitively and emotionally immersed in and overwhelmed by their stories of pain and loss, I could only imagine how it must feel for a mother to lose her children in such tragic circumstances. As a man and someone who did not go through the most tragic experience a parent could survive, my insiderness remained partial, caught somewhere between empathy, hopelessness, shame and anger. As Ghassan Hage (2009: 62) points out, ‘talking about anthropologists’ emotions in the field necessarily brings out personal dimensions specific to each anthropologist. This is so even when concentrating on emotions that are to do more with the social, political, or structural location of the anthropologist in general than with his or her specific biography’.

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Conclusion This chapter has offered a discussion on the ethics and politics of research in relation to researchers’ positioning in the field. One of the conclusions that could be drawn from this discussion is that researchers’ emic/etic position is rarely fixed and stable. Insiderness may be taken for granted when researchers conduct research with fellow co-ethnics and people coming from a similar sociocultural background, but the experience in the field often challenges any preconceived ideas about when, how and to what extent any researcher is able to claim or sustain a purely insider’s or emic perspective. Whereas researchers-outsiders are expected to move from a purely etic, or outside, perspective closer to the one of cultural insiders, the researchers-cultural insiders may be required to move in the opposite direction – to adopt a more etic perspective in order to enrich their ethnographies by considering the field (and the participants) from a variety of perspectives. The reflexive vignettes from my own fieldwork – involving fellow Bosnian migrants and other people with whom I share(d) some cultural, historical and national backgrounds – demonstrate that insiderness is often arbitrary and always remains selective and partial, with most social exchange taking place somewhere between etic and emic perspectives. References Berger, P. and Luckmann, T. 1967. The Social Construction of Reality. New York: Doubleday. Bourgois, P. 2006. Anthropology in the global state of emergency, in Engaged Observer: Anthropology, Advocacy and Activism, edited by V. Sanford and A. Angel-Ajani. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, ix–xii. Bruner, E.M. 1993. Introduction: The ethnographic self and the personal self, in Anthropology and Literature, edited by P. Benson. University of Illinois Press: Urbana & Chicago, 1–26. Čapo Žmegač, J., Gulin Zrnić V. and Šantek G.P. 2006. Ethnology of the Proximate: The Poetics and Politics of Contemporary Fieldwork, in Etnologija Bliskoga. Poetika i politika suvremenih terenskih istraživanja, edited by J. Čapo Žmegač, V. Gulin Zrnić and G.P Šantek. Zagreb: Naklada Jesenski i Turk, 261–310. Cushman, T. 2004. Anthropology and Genocide in the Balkans. Anthropological Theory, 4(1), 5–28. Davies, C.A. 2008. Reflexive Ethnography: A Guide to Researching Selves and Others. London: Routledge. Edwards, B. 2002. Deep insider research. Qualitative Research Journal, 2(1), 71–84. Finlay, A. 2001. Reflexivity and the dilemmas of identification: Ethnographic encounter in Northern Ireland, in Researching Violently Divided Societies:

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Ethical and Methodological Issues, edited by M. Smyth and G. Robinson. Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 55–76. Geertz, C. 1973. The Interpretations of Cultures. New York: Basic Books. Hage, G. 2009. Hating Israel in the field: On ethnography and political emotions. Anthropological Theory, 9(1), 59–79. Halilovich, H. 2011. Beyond the sadness: Memories and homecomings among survivors of ‘ethnic cleansing’ in a Bosnian village. Memory Studies, 4(1), 42–52. Halilovich, H. 2012a. Trans-local communities in the age of transnationalism: Bosnians in diaspora. International Migration, 50(1), 162–78. Halilovich, H. 2012b. Places of Pain: Forced Displacement, Popular Memory and Trans-local Identities in Bosnian War-torn Communities. Oxford-New York: Berghahn Books. Hall, T.E. 1992. Anthropology of Everyday Life. New York: Doubleday. Harrell-Bond, B. and Voutira, E. 1992. Anthropology and the study of refugees. Anthropology Today, 8(4), 6–10. Harris, M. 1976. History and significance of the emic/etic distinction. Annual Review of Anthropology, 5(1), 329–50. Hemon, A. 2006. Hemonwood: Na kapiji Zapada. BH Dani, 10 January, 452. Hermann, T. 2001. The impermeable identity wall: The study of violent conflicts by ‘insiders’ and ‘outsiders’, in Researching Violently Divided Societies: Ethical and Methodological Issues, edited by M. Smyth and G. Robinson. Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 77–91. Khosravi, S. 2007. The ‘illegal’ traveller: an auto-ethnography of borders. Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, 15(3), 321–34. Kusow, A. 2003. Beyond indigenous authenticity: Reflections on the Insider/ Outsider debate in immigration research. Symbolic Interaction, 26(4), 591–9. Malinowski, B. 1922. Argonauts of the Western Pacific. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. Madison, D.S. 2005. Critical Ethnography: Method, Ethics, and Performance. Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications. Marcus, G.E. 1995. Ethnography in/of the world system: The emergence of multisited ethnography. Annual Review of Anthropology, 24, 95–117. Nietzsche, F. 1994. Human, All Too Human. London: Penguin Group. O’Connor, P. 2004. The conditionality of status: Experience-based reflections on the insider/outsider issue. Australian Geographer, 35(2), 169–76. Pike, K.L. 1967. Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior. The Hague: Mouton. Porobić, S. 2012, Resilience and Religion in a Forced Migration Context. Lund: Centre for Theology and Religious Studies – Lund University. Reed-Danahay, D. (ed.) 1997. Introduction, in Auto/ethnography: Rewriting the Self and the Social, edited by D. Reed-Danahay. Oxford: Berg, 1–17.

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Sanford, V. 2006. Excavations of the heart: Reflexions on truth, memory, and structures of understanding, in Engaged Observer: Anthropology, Advocacy and Activism, edited by V. Sanford and A. Angel-Ajani. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1–19. Smyth, M. 2001. Introduction, in Researching violently Divided Societies: Ethical and Methodological Issues, edited by M. Smyth and G. Robinson. Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 12–33. Turton, D. 1996. Migrants and refugees: A Mursi case study, in In Search of Cool Ground: War, Flight and Homecoming in Northeast Africa, edited by T. Allen. Laurenceville: Africa World Press, 96–110. Van de Port, M. 1999. It takes a Serb to know a Serb. Critique of Anthropology, 19(1), 7–30. Voloder, L. 2008. Autoethnographic challenges: Confronting self, field and home. Australian Journal of Anthropology, 19(1), 27–40.

Chapter 6

Close, Closer, Closest: Participant Observation at Home Efrat Tzadik-Fallik

While anthropologists are increasingly said to be conducting research ‘at home’ (Wilding 2007, Peirano 1998, Gupta and Ferguson 1997), there are many ways to do ‘research at home’. Home can be conceptualized as the place where both the researcher and the respondents live (Caputo 2000, Wade 1984) or home can refer to intimate relationships where researchers write about themselves or about very close subjects – an example is Waterston’s (2005) discussion of her own father. For the purposes of this research, home is the physical space where the researcher lives. Moreover, home refers to the place to which the researcher feels belonging, the place where memories and experiences have been established. Indeed, such emotional connections can be established by researchers to their research site, but in the case of this study, home refers to the place that was constructed and conceptualized as ‘home’ prior, during and after the research was conducted. In this case, the home space is Brussels and it transforms into a place, full of experiences, friends and a sense of belonging. Researching at home and one’s own culture raises many questions regarding the position of the researcher in the field. Such research differs from traditional participant observation since the researcher does not leave his or her own home, but belongs spatially and culturally to the field being studied. While this position gives the researcher familiarity with the field, it also creates challenges in conducting research. In this chapter, I discuss the challenges encountered and mechanisms used to deal with them in relation to my own research in Brussels. In this chapter, I situate myself as a Jewish Israeli woman exploring my own community within the context of Jewish Israeli women in Belgium. The total Jewish population in Belgium is approximately 35,000, with a high concentration in Brussels and Antwerp (Oreck 2011). The Jewish community of Belgium was rebuilt after the World War II. Approximately 15,000 Jews live in Brussels with small Jewish communities in Charleroi, Oostende, Ghent, Liège, Mons, Arlon, Waterloo and Knokke (Oreck 2011). The population has stabilized in recent years due to a low birth-rate and a high rate of mixed marriages and a shifting away from religious institutions such as synagogues. Brussels has more than a dozen synagogues, representing all streams of faith, from Reform to

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Orthodox and both Ashkenazi and Sephardi.1 Brussels is also the headquarters of the European Union of Jewish Students and the Comité de Coordination des Organisations Juives de Belgique (Coordinating Committee of Jewish Organizations in Belgium (CCOJB), the Belgian Jewish communities’ umbrella organization (Oreck 2011). The Jewish community of Brussels consists of many small sub-groups related mainly to different Jewish organizations such as the CCLJ (Centre Communautaire Laic Juif de Belgique – Espace Yitzhaq Rabin), EJCC (European Jewish Community Center), EUJS (European Union of Jewish Students), CGB (Cercle Ben Gourion & Radio Judaica), Maccabi Sports – Jewish sports association and so on. The Jewish community, in general, is a non-religious community but small communities of Orthodox Jews have been established in Brussels in recent years. The spoken language in private and in public is French. The research took place officially between 2007 and 2011, and started when I came to live in Brussels with an interest in exploring the city and the culture. While the research has formally concluded, since it is research ‘at home’, it continues informally. In total, 43 interviews were conducted, out of them: 18 interviews were conducted with Belgian Jewish women; 9 interviews with Jewish migrant women from other countries such as France, Canada Romania; and 16 interviews with Israeli women living in Brussels. Three of the Israeli women who were interviewed have since returned to Israel. The age of the women ranges from 25 to 56. All are mothers of children who are in different education systems in Belgium. Twelve of the Israeli women came to Brussels due to the work of their partner; four of the women are married to Belgian men. In terms of their educational level, 36 of the women interviewed obtained at least one university degree and the interviewees reported a medium to high economic status. My choice to work with women whose profile is similar to mine came from an intersection of circumstances: through my position as a migrant, academic and anthropologist I had actively participated in the daily life of the ‘field’ in which the research was conducted; as an immigrant I went through the process new immigrants go through by exploring a new culture and new values in a new country; and as an anthropologist I had sought to understand the steps leading to a person’s decision to migrate, and the influence of the migration on the person’s identity. With this intersection of roles and experiences, I found that within and through my research I also wanted to understand my own experience as an immigrant. The aim of the research has changed with time. My living in the Jewish community of Brussels exposed me to different experiences, events, relationships and conversations that reframed the focus of the research. The research aims to answer questions related to the identity of the Jewish women living in Brussels. The research compares three main groups of women: the first group consists of Jewish Belgian women who were born and live in Brussels, the 1  Ashkenazi Jew is a common name to Jewish people coming from different countries of Eastern Europe. Sephardic Jew is a common name for Jewish people coming from mainly Arab or Muslim countries.

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second group consists of Israeli Jewish women who immigrated to Brussels and the third group consists of Jewish women who immigrated to Belgium from other countries. These three groups are compared in relation to three main subjects. The first subject considered women’s experiences of gender and gendered identities: I explored what it meant to them to be a woman, a wife and a mother. The second subject explored the professional identity of these women and how they experienced being Jewish women in the Belgian workplace. The third subject focused on women’s experiences of national identity and how they achieved a sense of belonging to a community or a group. Across all these subjects, I considered the intersections of what it meant to identify as Jew (including what it meant to be an atheist Jew or an Orthodox Jew), with other aspects of social, national and personal identities. In order to explore these issues within such a large community with so much variety in the ways of life and senses of belonging, participatory observation was adopted as the primary research method. In order to understand the belonging of a person to a place, it is necessary to understand the place the person belongs to and what the consequences are of this belonging for the person and for the community as a whole. For example, one of my main findings was that belonging was pursued and achieved through the formation of ‘bubble’ groups. I had to be a part of the community as a whole in order to observe group formation and to identify how sub-groups were formed. I explored how and why Israelis and Jews who came from other countries formed social networks with some people and not with others. I had to experience myself the feeling of acceptance (where I feel belonging to the group) and rejection (not being part of the group) and the processes that lead to these positionalities. In this chapter, I shed some light on my research into Jewish women’s migration experiences with an exploration of my own experience. Even within classic anthropological research where the researcher leaves one’s culture to enter another, one of the important elements is the immersion in the field which fosters an understanding of the field via the self (Armbruster 2008, Laerke 2008, Caputo 2000, Pink 2000, Gupta and Ferguson 1997). The exploration of self is particularly resonant when one is so personally affected by the research questions. Through a thick description of some of my own experiences I will draw understandings about the field and the research process (Atkinson and Hammersley 1994). However, like Voloder (2008), I have sought to use myself as a tool rather than placing my own experience as the central focus of the research. The research is not about my experiences but rather grew out of it and so I have used myself for comparison with informants to explore how, why and whether we share similar ideas, experiences and reflections about being Jewish women in Belgium. With this close intersection between my own experiences and the encounters that informants relayed, I found that I could draw upon my experiences to understand processes of group formation in play. This chapter discusses this research process with a focus on issues relating to defining the research field at home, researching 24 hours a day and creating boundaries between one’s private life and research life, as well as considering the ethical dilemmas when one’s friends become informants.

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My Life in Brussels: Defining and Entering the Field In describing the path followed by anthropologists in conducting fieldwork, Wilding (2007) suggests that many anthropologists are nomadic in a way or another. People move from one place to another, from one culture to another, moving between statuses and identities, transitioning from house to house and from one set of values to another. Thus, for the classical anthropologist, ‘the field’ is where ‘others’ exist and it is anthropologists who ‘go to the field’ to do their research (Gupta and Ferguson 1997). In current anthropology, however, these borders and definitions are increasingly challenged as it is becoming extremely difficult to define the territory of ‘the field’ when conducting research at home. Indeed, as Amit (2000: 15) claims, to ‘distinguish between “home” and “away” has become blurred by the transnational contexts in which anthropologists and their ethnographic subjects move’. In such circumstances, it is difficult to define ‘the field’ and to separate it from ‘home’ (Pink 2000). With these blurred boundaries, another issue emerges and that is as Laerke (2008) identifies, the need of the ‘other’ in anthropology. The ‘other’ is the primary focus, it is the object of study in anthropology and working at home creates alternative notions of ‘otherness’. In my research the ‘other’ was so close that I found it extremely difficult to distinguish between ‘the research’ including ‘the others’ and ‘the private’, including ‘me’. My research demanded me to transform ‘home’ to ‘the field’ and to bring ‘the field’ back ‘home’. Much like Pink (2000) who describes her partner as one of her informants, I had to transform my ‘home’, my private spaces into ‘the field’: my family became my assistants through whom I contacted other people and observed different events and some of the chats I had with friends in my house became part of the collected data. Within traditional conceptualizations of fieldwork, there is a tendency to view the field as static since it is the ethnographer who moves back and forth between the field and her own culture, and between values and identities. My personal journey and anthropological journey followed a different trajectory. I had migrated to Belgium and it was this personal move that impacted directly upon the research and choice of the research question; working with women who had also immigrated to Belgium. I met my husband in August 1994 and while we initially had a long distance relationship I wanted very much to live with him in Brussels and did so four years later. Initially, I did not like it in Belgium. I felt very lonely; I longed for my job at the university and missed my family and friends. On arriving to Brussels I did not know anyone, and did not feel that I belonged. For me, exploring the new place was, at the beginning, a real need for social survival. Being a nomad and an academic influenced the research in a number of important ways and I found that the research questions were very close to me and that I had been through the same processes described by the women interviewed. For example, many of my informants discussed the separation between the Israeli and the Jewish Belgian communities and described the difficulties they faced when seeking to establish connections between these groups. Looking at my own

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experience in searching for social contact upon arrival, I could personally identify with the difficulties they faced and the feelings they expressed. The research started out of pure curiosity to understand Israelis who migrated to Brussels, the place where I lived. I wanted to understand what drives women to leave everything and to follow their husband to a new country knowing from very personal experience the price she has to pay. My choice to work with women whose profile is similar to mine came out of a need to understand the processes I was going through. I started to make friends and my social network extended and gradually the Israeli group became a natural environment for me. As a result, in the first phase I conducted research only with Israeli expatriates. Later, as I was became better integrated in the Jewish community, I extended the research to include the Jewish community more broadly. My research focus shifted from centring on the experiences of Israeli women to a broader focus on Jewish Belgian women, categories and identities that I myself had come to embrace. My Jewish identity, my knowledge of Judaism, my Israeli identity meant that I floated between being part of various communities and being positioned as an Israeli, a Jewish woman, as well as a stranger living in Belgium who does not know the language, values, people. In gathering data, I employed participant observation as my key methodology as this enables the researcher to develop relationships with participants and to learn a great deal about people’s daily interactions. Occupying similar spaces and having a similar profile to the interviewees also helped build a rapport and relationships with informants. This ‘insiderness’ across the Israeli and Jewish communities in Brussels was also informed by my very wide experience of working in different Jewish communities in the world; as such I was very familiar and open to different ways of practicing Judaism. With these prior experiences, I was in some senses like a ‘chameleon’ focusing on different aspects of my knowledge when speaking to different informants. With my broad knowledge of Judaism, I found myself ‘speaking the same language’, using or avoiding others that would be used in more or less orthodox surroundings. Knowing how to dress ‘suitably’ according to the group I was meeting impacted on my degree of both acceptance and identification with the groups. This personal narrative in some way explains my positioning within the Jewish community and through my research I tell the stories of the Jewish and Israeli communities in Brussels. Below I provide a brief overview of how my belonging to both the Israeli group and to the Jewish community affected the way the research questions were conceived and research conducted. Exploring the Field After mapping the Jewish community in Brussels, I decided to participate in as many activities as possible in different sub-communities. This was an intensive period of exploring the field to let the field decide what is important and worthy of exploration. As a result, I did not lay any boundaries to the field and joined different activities organized by different groups, meeting religious and non-

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religious groups within the Jewish community and participating in lectures and events such as the annual party for the Israeli Independence Day organized by a Jewish organization. I volunteered in the European Union of Jewish students, and participated in the community celebrations of holidays such as Rosh Hashana (Jewish New Year) and Pesach (Passover) and attended concerts and Israeli folk dance groups and so on. These forms of participation were not always in keeping with my personal wishes; for example, I preferred to celebrate holidays at home with my family rather than in a big community celebration but understood that participating in these ways would help me gain a better understanding of the field and allow me to formulate my research questions. Knowing the field helps the researcher to map it and to gain a better understanding of what might be meaningful research questions to participants themselves. Researching 24 Hours a Day According to Gupta and Ferguson (1997), there is a special separation between the ‘site’ and ‘home’. This special separation creates a notion of ‘entry’ into the field and ‘exit’ from the field and these entries and exits function to construct the differences between ‘home’ and ‘field’. Classical participant observation, where the researcher moves from his/her culture to another and from one country to another, allows the researcher to move from one cultural setting where she/he has certain, more professional codes of behaviour, to another setting, more personal, where she/he can be more relaxed. Caputo (2000) who worked with children at school describes her need to justify the work close to home as an anthropological field; and for her the anthropological field consists of the following characters: it is marked by travel, there is a physical displacement, an intensive dwelling in an unfamiliar setting away from home, experience of initiation and a movement in and out of the field. On arriving in Brussels, I faced the same challenges that classical anthropologists face. I entered a completely new culture, new languages and new values. It was a real journey ‘elsewhere’ for me. I looked upon the people I met as ‘the others’, I learned their spoken and unspoken languages, exploring their way of life by marrying ‘one of the locals’. Contrary to classical anthropologists, I did not have the experience of ‘exit’; the field became my new home. As a result, researching potentially 24 hours a day has been one of the most difficult aspects of conducting a research at home. As indicated earlier, ‘the field’ became ‘home’ and, much like Dyck (2000) and Pink (2000), my field work continues 24 hours a day and some of the greatest insights come surprisingly when least expected. For example, on May 2008, at the beginning of my research, my family was invited to a BBQ to celebrate the Israeli Independence Day. At a certain point most people went into the living room to watch an Israeli film. For me this was a normal activity during an Independence Day celebration; this is how we do it in Israel. My husband, who is Belgian, saw it differently. He didn’t understand how people could be so rude as to watch a film while they had guests. This small

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event offered a great deal of insight into some of the differences between the two cultures and underscored the importance of these little rituals for the construction of the Israeli identity in the diaspora. Such encounters which reveal the strong intersections between my personal and professional roles have continued despite my formal fieldwork ending some time ago. For example, only recently when celebrating Yom Kippur (Jewish Day of Atonement) at the synagogue with my family, while standing in the women’s section I started looking around with my ‘anthropological eye’, and soon realized that I was ‘doing fieldwork’. Observing what women do, who came to the synagogue this year compared to the year before, where people sat, with whom they spoke and what about and so forth was part of my professional role. Thus, as an insider researching at home, fieldwork doesn’t stop at the formal end of the research project; when one is very much involved personally in the research field it is very difficult to stop the participation. Indeed, while I have completed formally interviewing participants, by continuing to talk to people about topics of life that intersect with my research I get to know more people and hear more stories. Some of these new stories give new insights and thoughts that enrich my research. However, this also creates the problem of knowing when to stop fieldwork and complicates the roles I occupy as a migrant, friend and researcher. Migrant, Researcher and Friend In describing the journey of anthropologists who move from one culture to another, Wilding (2007) suggests that the researcher can be described as a kind of migrant. In my case, my arrival to Belgium stemmed from a personal need as I wanted to join my partner there and hence initially did not enter the community (formally) as a researcher. Brussels became my new permanent home and by building relationships with people on a personal basis I entered the core of the Israeli and the Jewish communities. Hence, the position of insider–outsider receives a different meaning in my research as I have occupied the positions of friend and researcher regularly. Wade (1984) refers to these changing positions as ‘changing hats’ but in my case, I wear the same two hats all the time. I refer to it as ‘walking on a very thin line’ and pass frequently from one aspect to another: from being a researcher to being a friend, from being a researcher to being a mother who works on motherhood. On occasions when I go out for coffee with friends I am always on the alert to observe as it is in these situations that women share their experiences, and these chats are very important for the understanding of values, concepts, fears, problems and so on of people in their everyday lives. Thus, researching my own culture means I do not have such movements as Wilding (2007) suggests. I stay in the field, not only for the time of the research but thereafter as well. As a result, my private life is completely linked to the research field. It is very difficult to move out of the setting as there is no ‘other context’ to which to move. This can be very overwhelming for a researcher; my eyes and ears are always

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open to new insights. Where the boundaries between personal life and ‘field life’ are blurred it is no longer clear when one’s personal life ends and when one’s researcher life starts. When invited to a dinner, for instance, I don’t know whether it is because of my position as a researcher or due to my personal connection with the person. Thus, field friendships are a very delicate area; by conducting research among friends, my personal and professional spheres were enmeshed in different occasions. Friends become informants. Informants become friends. In such instances, a key issue is to identify the best practice for handling transparency within friendships. When starting the research, my goal was to try to be on good terms with everyone. I wanted to be able to explore the field to the maximum but with many contacts and good relationships with a lot of people, could one say that they are all ‘friends’? Conversely, a woman told me: ‘you do not let everyone get in. You keep layers where we cannot approach’. This is one of the mechanisms I used to protect myself from being too exposed to the people with whom I worked, but as the research advanced I learned to share my opinions without jeopardizing my privacy; this entailed being very sensitive to the field, learning to walk a very fine line. Edwards (1993) expresses the need for the researcher to share personal issues with the interviewees to obtain openness, confidence and rapport during the interviews. Nevertheless, there was a tension between this and my ethical duty to draw attention, where possible, to my position as a researcher. Similarly, when noticing that very open and honest insights often come at moments following an interview, I questioned whether this was due to the apparent change in my role, from interviewer to a friend. Moreover, I questioned what ethical significance this had for the data collected. Sharing different aspects of ‘me’ with the informants enabled me keep a certain level of privacy. During ‘friendly chats’ when women spoke about other people (that is, gossiped) I ensured not to provide any information received from other informants who were acquaintances of my interlocutor. I did not reveal the names of the women interviewed and never spoke about the content of the interview, being very careful about which information to share. This was one way of ensuring the privacy and anonymity of informants, and while difficult, I practiced this rule religiously. Such encounters, however, raise questions about managing and being transparent about the different roles one occupies, and highlight ethical concerns that emerge from these various positions in the field. Ethical Use of Information Moral and ethical concerns in the course of research emerged from questions around knowing what/when information collected in the field could be used and how/when I should tell/reiterate to informants that information they shared with me might be used for research purposes. Presenting myself as a researcher was a little problematic because of the intertwined relationships I had with friends/informants

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and as such I turned to the American Anthropological Association’s (AAA) code of ethics2 for guidance on how to handle using the data I received daily. A variety of instances revealed that such guidelines were applicable in some but not all occasions. One less problematic encounter occurred when I started to take my children to an after-school activity which happens to be a place frequented by other Jewish people. There, women who waited together for their children created a small ‘coffee group’. I joined this group while waiting for my own children and there would chat and share coffee with the other women. Very soon I learned that two of the women had recently settled in Belgium and soon conversations turned to discussing the problems they faced, their observations about the different synagogues in Belgium and what distinguished one from the other, as well as comparisons with other places in the world and their various experiences of Jewish identities. In these interactions, I told the women about my research in the very early stages of our interaction and so felt comfortable using the information they shared. Or in another case, I was invited to participate in a women’s study group that was organized by one of the Rabannits.3 Towards the end of the study, the Rabbanit introduced me as a researcher, after which I explained my topic and asked if there were women willing to be interviewed. Talking to women about the research created a very positive reaction and many wanted to express their knowledge and experiences. They also helped me by introducing me to additional women who were interested in taking part in the research. In such occasions, small talk became a very important source of information throughout the research process and this way gathered a lot of interesting and valuable information; it became common that when the recorder was shut, the information flowed. These conversations, contributed to the formation of my research questions and to my questions list. However, as I described earlier, the intersection between my role as friend and researcher often overlapped and this created ethical concerns. As noted fieldwork lasted 24 hours a day and I participated in events all the time, this created the problem of knowing how and when to present myself as an anthropologist. On some occasions, when invited to an event on a personal basis it would not be clear to me what my exact position was, and I questioned if participants did not relate to me as a researcher, could I use the information from the event. For example, on one occasion my family was invited to a Sabbath meal, and for all of us it was a private affair. However, throughout the night I found myself asking whether I could describe the event in my research. While at one point in the evening the host asked me to talk about my research, this did not provide a definitive answer; even though people knew that I was conducting this research, I was uncertain whether it was sufficient to allow reporting of the event.

2  The code of ethics of the American Anthropological Association, see: www.aaanet. org/committees/ethics/ethcode.htm. 3  The wife of a Rabbi.

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In dealing with these ethical concerns, my reference code for ethics was the AAA. According to the AAA, the anthropologist has to be open about the purposes, potential impacts and sources of support at all times (III part- ‘research’). However, when it comes to conducting research at home it is impossible to declare oneself a ‘researcher’ constantly. As it happens, one might participate in a cocktail party that ends up being observation in the end, revealing that the borders are so fragile and flexible that it would almost require one to walk around with a name tag which describes my professional intentions if I was to meet the demands of the code of ethics. In most instances, I resolved this challenge by asking permission to use the material, after collecting the data and not before. Another example demonstrating the problematic aspect of being too close to the field concerns issues around identities in publications. Since the field is quite small, and community members know each other, I have needed to be selective about revealing participants’ details. Imparting personal details would negate my explicit agreement to abide by the code of ethics and an – often implicit – agreement to use anonymous information. Since many women wanted to read what I wrote, I could potentially face anger from friends if I used information that might reveal their identity. I resolved that within my research, the participant’s identity would be diligently protected; names are not revealed and biographical information is treated sensitively. Another ethical concern raised by the AAA in Part III A, is that the anthropologist has a ‘primary ethical obligation to the people, species and materials they study and to the people with whom they work’. In my case, I found that I had a strong intimate obligation to the people with whom I worked and in the process of writing found myself thinking of the potential implications or even complications of my texts on the Jewish and Israeli communities. On the one hand, these communities are very close to my heart and I feel a strong obligation not to harm their image. On the other hand, I do not want to jeopardize my academic integrity. Here I walked a very thin line between academic authority and my commitment to ‘my’ community. Scheper-Hughes (1995), who asserts that anthropologists, since they work with people, must commit to the people they investigate, distinguishes between an observer and a witness. The observer, on the one hand, performs ‘a passive act which positions the anthropologist above and outside human events as neutral and objective’ (Scheper-Hughes 1995: 419). The witness, on the other hand, is more of an active voice that positions the anthropologist inside human events. As an Israeli Jewish woman living abroad, an insider in my research, I have an ‘awareness of audiences’ (Peirano 1998: 113–4), making me sensitive to the audience to whom I write. The fact that I write my dissertation in Belgium, in English, demands a much more detailed ethnography, with many more explanations on various subjects which positions me between being an observer and a full witness. However, there were situations where I felt that I had to act and not only observe. For example: one of the main findings of my research relates to the cultural separation between Israelis and Belgian Jews. I learned that one part of the problem related to the school system where they use terminology that reinforces

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this separation. I wanted to speak to the school principle and share my findings with the school in order to create a program where more interaction between Israelis and Jewish children could occur. I hesitated for a long time before I decided what actions to take. I did not know if I could influence the field or not. Eventually I spoke to the principle and I was surprised to see how such ‘interventions’ in the field taught me a great deal about the field itself. Personal Questions in the Field An insider researcher can be confronted with the implications of studying delicate issues around family matters and relationships between partners. Here, I found that the position of the researcher can be a resource in this undertaking and it is important to analyse the feelings and experiences of the researcher as part of the research (Edwards 1993). Being a mother myself enabled me to participate in conversations with other mothers regarding their children. It helped me to approach other mothers and being in the same situation as my informants created a bridge between people. The ice would break when mothers started sharing ‘common problems’ they faced. Personal ways of life, personal values and positions influenced the way I observed and analysed the field. The researcher who claims to be researching their own culture should be ready to face questions and sometimes challenge their own identity. Some of my questions were very intimate and changed the balance I achieved in my life. For example, part of my research involved wring about the influence of my own biography on the research. This process raised many feelings I did not deal with daily; for example I questioned: am I a good mother? Listening to other mothers talking about their motherhood prompted me to consider what I should do to improve my way of being a mother. This research raised personal questions about intimate subjects such as relationships between partners and the presumptions women have regarding their femininity. As Edwards (1993) mentions, the position of the researcher in the research is very important in the process of analysing data. When the researcher deals with private, intimate subjects, it is easier to approach it via sharing. Being an introverted person myself, I found that I had to learn to open up without jeopardizing my privacy. This research helped me to overcome personal fears and to understand myself and my identity as a result of talking to other women about their identity. On the 5th of October 2011, in my fieldwork notebook I explained the process of working with questions that are in the core of my life: Searching my own culture provided me with the opportunity to look at core issues in my life through other peoples’ life stories. When I speak to women about femininity I look deep inside of me. I bring up this question and look at myself. What feminine identity do I present for myself? The same happens with all the other aspects I research: motherhood, being a wife, Israeli identity, Belgian identity, professional identity and my Jewish identity. It is not easy for

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someone whose identity is not complete to conduct such research. I believe that the research itself helped me to reconstruct my own identity at a time of important social change for me … I feel that the role of the researcher in such research is so important that it comes down to writing on your life from different angles. To do so you have to change yourself and to come out from different dogmas you grew up with. The psychological journey a researcher goes through while researching her/his own culture is fascinating in itself.

While some argue that, ‘writing is supposed to take them (anthropologists) out of the field and the field out of them’ (Laerke 2008), I have found that the research process itself has the potential of transforming ‘people’ into ‘subjects’ or even ‘objects’ of the research. This process reveals entanglements when working with material collected among people who are sometimes considered close friends and with data that draws on the researcher’s own personal experiences. Conclusions Anthropological research into ‘my own’ culture is a fascinating journey, highlighting cultural heritage and illuminating previously unrecognized traditions and trends. As a researcher, I concurrently learned and analysed the processes that I experienced. One of the highly challenging aspects of researching at home is the intensity of the field. This intimacy with the field leads a researcher to ask him/ herself fundamental questions about his/her work. But how close is too close? According to sociologist Stuart Hall (1997), we are all ethically and historically located, and in my research the Jewish diaspora provides a site for investigating my social and cultural journey and overlapping issues of gendered identities. In the final analysis, I recognize that the agreed-upon pre-study ethical considerations concerning transparency and use of data were not concrete and clear, but could only be viewed as part of a continuum. Decisions as to what kinds of data were appropriate to collect, and when to remind participants of my position as a researcher, had to be made in the field rather than in the comfort of an academic institution. Whilst Edwards (1993) recommends a close relationship with participants and the benefits of exchanging personal stories, I would counter that too close a relationship can lead to ethical complications, raising questions about the use of information that was obtained outside of an official interview. This also raises questions around separating information gathered as a member of the community and information gathered as a researcher. This requires the researcher to reflect upon achieving a balance between what can be used and what cannot as well as considering how far they can be involved in the field. In addition, I found that as a woman living in the field that is also her home, I questioned to what degree I could influence the field by my actions. I grappled with my position as a researcher who would like to aim for academic integrity, but also as one who had concerns about the implications of publications upon the communities in which

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I live. These and many more questions make research at home a very delicate platform for the researcher. In order to overcome some of the main obstacles, the researcher has to find her/his way to work with the field. In my case, knowing my story and the potential influences on the research are big steps in the process of separating the researcher from the field. I posit that the researcher should understand when she/he tells her/his story rather than the stories of the women he/she interviewed. However, writing about home cannot be an objective process. Acknowledgment of subjectivity should be part of every step of research: from entering the field, constructing the questions, participating in events, choosing informants and writing. Such an awareness of subjectivity and personal involvement may contribute to a personal transformation and a questioning of the self by providing the anthropologist with a unique tool for analysing the field via her own experiences. Taking the notion of autoethnography that allows ‘utilising self to understand the experiences of others’ (Voloder 2008: 28), understanding myself provides a unique tool to understand others through processes of comparison. The idea is thus not to prioritize myself in the process but to use my understandings and my experiences for grasping an understanding of the subjective experiences of women and their social worlds. References Amit, V. 2000. Constructing the field. Introduction, in Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary World, edited by V. Amit. London: Routledge, 1–18. Armbruster, H. 2008. Introduction: The ethics of taking sides, in Taking sides: Ethics, Politics and Fieldwork in Anthropology, edited by H. Armbruster and Anna Laerke, USA: Berghahn books, 1–22. Atkinson, P. and Hammersley, M. 1994. Ethnography and participant observation, in Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 248–21. Caputo, V. 2000. At ‘home’ and ‘away’: Reconfiguring the field for late twentieth century Anthropology, in Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary World, edited by V. Amit. London: Routledge, 19–31. D’Andrade, R. 1995. Moral models in anthropology. Current Anthropology, 36(3), 399–408. Dyck, N. 2000. Home field advantage? Exploring the social construction of children’s sports, in Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary World edited by V. Amit. London: Routledge, 32–53. Edwards, R. 1993. An education in interviewing: Placing the researcher and the research, in Researching Sensitive Topics, edited by C. Renzetti and R. Lee. London: Sage, 181–96. Grossman, H. and Nia, L. 1990. The Experience and the Meaning of Work in Womens’ Lives. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.

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Gupta, A. and Ferguson, J. 1997. Discipline and practice: ‘The field’ as a site, method and location in anthropology, in Anthropological Locations Boundaries and Ground of a field science, edited by A. Gupta and J. Ferguson, Los Angeles: University of California press, 1–46. Hall, S. 1997. The work of representation, in Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, edited by S. Hall. London: Sage, 13–74. Laerke, A. 2008. Confessions of a downbeat anthropologist, in Taking sidesethics, politics and fieldwork in Anthropology, edited by H. Armbruster and A. Laerke. USA: Berghahn Books, 143–74. Oreck, A. The virtual Jewish history tour: Belgium. Jewish Virtual Library: The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise. Available at www. jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Belgium.html [accessed: 13 April 2011]. Pink, S. 2000. ‘Informants’ who come ‘home’, in Constructing the Field: Ethnographic Fieldwork in the Contemporary world, edited by V. Amit. London: Routledge, 96–119. Peirano, M. 1998. When anthropology is at home: The different contexts of a single discipline. Annual Review of Anthropology, 27, 105–28. Scheper-Hughes, N. 1995. The primacy of the ethical propositions for a militant anthropology. Current Anthropology, 36(3), 409–40. Skevington, S. 1989. A place for emotions in social identity theory, in The Social Identity of Women, edited by S. Skevington and D. Baker, London: Sage Publications, 40–59. Voloder, L. (2008). Authoethnographic challenges: Confronting self, field and home. The Australian Journal of Anthropology, 19(1), 27–40. Wade, J. 1984. Role boundaries and paying back; Switching hats in participant observation. Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 15(3), 211–24. Waterston, A. 2005. Bringing the past into the present: Family narratives of holocaust, exile and diaspora the story of my story: an anthropology of violence, dispossession and diaspora. Anthropological Quarterly, 78(1), 43–61. Wilding, R. 2007. Transnational ethnographies and anthropological imagining of migrancy. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 33(2), 331–48.

Chapter 7

Emotive Connections: Insider Research with Turkish/Kurdish Alevi Migrants in Germany Derya Ozkul

On 13 March 2012 the court case dealing with the Sivas massacre in Turkey was abandoned. The Criminal Court in Ankara declared that the statute of limitations had expired. As I heard the news from my friend, previously an interviewee in my research, I was sitting in a coffee house in Köln, one of the German cities in which I was conducting fieldwork. I felt the flow of blood to my brain stop for a while, before I hung up the phone. I thought, ‘how could they terminate the case that constitutes one of the deepest scars of Turkey and declare, “For our country, it shall be fortunate!”?’ I then started to speak with some of my interviewees, sharing the exasperation that I felt building up inside me. Each time we spoke, I felt that our embodied reaction to the events was what connected us. Throughout my fieldwork, I constantly reflected on our shared reactions, such as our flushed faces while reading the newspaper together, and considered how such emotive and sensory dimensions had implications for my research on many levels. These reflections made it imperative for me to write this piece, in which I question the underlying implications of defining an insider and consider whether ‘insiderness’ in migration research presumes being from the same nationality, ethnicity or religion. In particular, I scrutinize the processes through which I am identified as an insider in Turkey-related migration research. I question how my Sunni-Turkish background locates me in different positions vis-à-vis Sunni/ Alevi–Turkish/Kurdish identities in Germany and I consider how religious and ethnic identities are defined and undefined as part of broader politics of identities in which the conflict over multi-ethnicity and multi-religiosity is part of everyday life. Therefore, in this chapter, I first of all explore how insider research is defined and enacted in multi-ethnic and multi-religious contexts. I argue that these questions should be understood within broader politics of identity, in other words, as a result of interplay between the categorization of differences in the logics of administering nation-states, and the resulting methodological nationalism in social sciences. I demonstrate how my identification as Sunni-Turkish was mobilized, negated and challenged with my interviewees in relation to ideas around a constructed common nationality, a common or distinct ethnicity and distinct religious backgrounds, and how this related to broader contestations between nationalized and ethnicized identities in Turkey and Germany.

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Second, I extend the discussion around the complexity of positions and shared identifications by investigating how emotive and sensory reactions may connect the researcher to participants and how this offers an alternative way of operationalizing ‘insiderness’ in the context of migration research. Here, I scrutinize the nature of suffering and the position a researcher takes within the triadic relationship between the victim, the perpetrator and the witness. In challenging the binary of insider–outsider claims based on ethnic/national/religious identities, I argue that the emotive and sensitive proximity of the researcher to research participants generates bodily effects, which vitalize or alienate the researcher within the research process. Insiderness in Social Research The extensive literature on ‘insider research’ has grown as part of a paradigm shift from a positivist to an interpretive approach, where challenges to positivism are furthered by ‘reflexive understanding, hermeneutic mediation, and philosophical critique’ (Scholte 1974: 431). Thus, self-reflexivity and critical epistemology suggest that: To merely observe the Other as exotic specimen, or equally unacceptable, to see the Other as a clone of the Self, is the worst sort of projection. Instead we must constantly aim for a critical awareness of our assumptions and those of our informants, to trace the parameters, the limits and the possibilities of our located understandings. (Kondo 1986: 86)

This shift away from deterministic positivism in turn prompted some scholars to debate issues around access to particular research questions and participants (Harding 1986, Acker, Barry and Esseveld 1983). Initially insider research arose with claims that only members of the same community could understand and represent the experience of others (Bridges 2001, Banks 1998, Baca Zinn 1979). For that reason ‘native’ social scientists were acclaimed: ‘If native anthropologists can gain enough distance between their personal selves and their collective selves – their cultures – they can make an important contribution … because of their access to intimate knowledge of their own culture’ (Ohnuki-Tierney 1984: 585). However, critique has stressed that the boundaries between the insider and outsider are not constant: ‘As situations involving different values arise, different statuses are activated and the lines of separation shift’ (Merton 1972: 28). As such, the insider’s situated knowledge poses methodological issues arising from the multiplicity of identities that constitute the researcher’s subject position (Naples 1996). Thus, recent critique has made it clear that the researcher’s insiderness operates to varying extents in different stages of the research process (Davies and Davies 2007, Hill 2006). Merton’s point resonates with such concerns: ‘Along with the faults of neglecting the implications of structural differentiation, status

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sets, and institutional autonomy, the Insider doctrine has the fault of assuming in its claims of monopolistic or highly privileged status-based access to knowledge that social position wholly determines intellectual perspectives’ (1972: 26). While insider research was developed with the ‘black social sciences’ (Ibn Alkalimat 1969) by researchers with experience of immigration, investigating the ways in which insiderness is operationalized during the process of migration research is relatively new. Insider research in migration studies has started to develop, with an increasing number of migrant researchers looking at their own communities. However, much of the focus has been directed toward constructing insiderness based on ‘national’ identities, thus failing to take into account the complex encounters with positioning as a result of multi-ethnic and multireligious, although nominally homogenized, national identities in origin countries. The definition of an insider or an outsider is further complicated in these contexts, which offers us a space to reflect upon the politics of identities that constructs the role of the researcher and research participants. In this chapter I scrutinize the processes through which I am identified as an insider in Turkey-related migration research, and in the following section I will explain my own background and the context of Turkey where, as I argue, identities are ethnicized and sectarianized. This will provide a platform to explain further how my research process has been shaped according to my and my interviewees’ positionalities. Identities in a Land of Conflicts over Multi-ethnicity and Multi-religiosity No research comes out of the air; research can be informed by a range of personal motivations. Thus, Chavez suggests that scholars ‘need to reflect on [their] own intentions and consider how [their] own multifarious roles and identities affect fieldwork procedures and the way [they] write about research’ (2008: 491). In my case, my research with Turkish/Kurdish-Alevi migrants in Germany could be informed by my own trajectory and experience of multi-ethnic, multi-religious relations in Turkey. I have spent most of my life in Istanbul, which is in fact a cosmopolitan Turkey populated by people from all regions of the country. While Istanbul reflects the ethnic and religious diversity of the entire country, the population is highly segregated into gated communities. As a result, the inhabitants of Istanbul are both aware and ignorant of their own diversity. Therefore, one cannot assume that a researcher coming from Istanbul would know all aspects of that place. My exposure to the multi-ethnicity and multi-religiosity of Istanbul was refracted through my own familial circumstances. My fourth generation relatives migrated to Istanbul from the Balkans in the 1930s to be protected under the newly established Turkish Republic. They were so grateful to the republic that they soon acquired the ideals of the newly formed nation. They were identified as Sunni Muslims, privileged in the lands of Turkey regardless of their ethnicity. However, they did not practise the compulsory

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requirements of Sunni Islam, such as praying five times a day, going to mosque or Hajj.1 Yet, coming from the Balkans with a desire and a need to prove they were good Sunni-Turks, they were afraid of being identified as heretics, a common epithet directed toward Alevis2 in Turkey. In principle, my relatives had nothing against Alevis and did not agree with claims that Alevis were ‘heretics’ or ‘incestuous’, while neither did they have really close Alevi friends. But this appears to be the result of the geographical differences in settlement of the Sunni and Alevi populations of Turkey.3 This physical and social distance lessened when my mother started to work in a district of Istanbul populated by both orthodox Sunnis and Alevis who came from various regions of Turkey. I spent most of my childhood in this shop, serving the customers and chatting with them. This was a newly emerging low-income district that attracted internal migrants from diverse religious and ethnic backgrounds. Here predominantly women who had different lifestyles and views would come together in my mother’s comfortable chairs and chat all day. One does not learn to think through one’s everyday life; one learns to live it. Until I started high school I spent most of my time after school in this store witnessing the interactions between women through my mother. Although conversations would last for hours and all enjoyed my mother’s seemingly neutral position, things were not always as rosy as one idealizes multi-ethnicity and multi-religiosity. I remember many did not trust the Alevis among us on the basis that they might be dirty and suggested that it would not be good to drink Turkish coffee prepared by them because ‘one would not drink or eat from Alevi hands’.4 As a child I did not understand why one would not drink a coffee that the other prepared, yet accepted it like everyone else. On reflection, divisions were always there, although absent in a child’s language. These divisions became apparent in 1995 with the massacre of Alevis in another district of Istanbul. The killings and protests expanded to other districts, including ours, where a large number of Alevis lived. In total, 15 people were killed and hundreds of people were injured. These events reified the divisions 1  The Hajj is the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia. It constitutes the fifth pillar of Islam: Muslims must carry out this religious duty at least once in their life, provided they can afford it. 2  Alevis are believers in heterogeneous sets of beliefs and practices in Turkey. Some claim that Alevism is part of Islam; others argue that Alevism is a religion in its own right. Some argue that it is not a religion, but a lifestyle. It should also be noted that Anatolian Alevism is very different from other forms in the Middle East. 3  In Turkey Alevis live mostly in the eastern parts of Turkey and in the Aegean region including cities such as Tunceli, Erzurum, Erzincan, Sivas, Malatya, Corum and to a lesser extent Diyarbakir and Hatay. For various reasons they have migrated to other cities including the metropolis of Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir. 4  ‘To eat from one’s hands’ means the same as ‘to eat something that the other makes’. In Turkish, however, the importance of hands shows the corporeal properties and therefore bodily reflections of one’s identities.

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I could feel but could not articulate in our shop. Many of our Alevi friends migrated from there to other districts of Istanbul or abroad. Now, years later, I have started to investigate the politics of identity in Turkey and the salience of such events for Alevi identities among migrants in Germany. In 2011 I conducted semi-structured interviews in Germany, as well as participant observation of commemoration events for the massacres, Nevruz celebrations,5 Cem ceremonies as well as the official state holidays. I conducted immigration policy analysis and archival research in exploring Alevi organizations’ working reports, publications, symposium presentations and recordings of talks with invited guests. My aim has been to try to understand the interplay between the politics of sectarianized identities and expressions of ethnic and religious differences in Turkey and abroad. In this process, I have been confronted with my own position as a Sunni-Turkish woman in the research process itself. Next I turn to providing an overview of the position of Alevis in Turkey, which precipitated their migration, before I begin discussing my fieldwork experiences in Germany and the inherently complex relationships I, as a researcher, may have brought about. Ethnicized and Sectarianized Identities in Post-imperial Places Alevis have occupied a precarious position in the late Ottoman Empire and in the post-Ottoman Turkish Republic. Indeed, as Nagar and Geiger (2007: 270) suggest, ‘it is inadequate for us to position ourselves only in theoretical and ideological place’; we must also recognize ‘our geographical location, and by implication, the politics of that place’. Thus, in order to discuss contemporary debates around identity, one needs to consider the conditions under which the Turkish Republic was forged and how this has produced enduring ramifications around issues of multiethnicity and multi-religiosity. Turkey was established in the 1920s in an era of a brutal de-imperialization and nation-state building. Violence that was inherent in the formation of the nation-state meant that conflicts erupted on ethnic and religious lines (Appadurai 1998, Humphrey 1997) and in Turkey the attempts at homogenizing the national space along a Sunni-Turkish axis created further fragmentation. Within this context of seeking to create a homogenous national identity, Alevis have not received formal recognition as a religious group. In Turkey, the law subscribes all persons to Sunni Islam by birth, as registered on identity cards, unless they belong to a Christian church. Although it is clear that Alevis do exist, the Diyanet (Presidency of Religious Affairs) in Turkey does not recognize Alevism in its own right. For example, their places of worship (Cemevis) are not recognized. The official reason is that this might lead to fragmentation of the national religion. From a similar perspective, the census data does not ask about 5  Nevruz marks the first day of spring. For a long time it has been celebrated in many places in the lands of Turkey and neighbouring countries. However, today in Turkey the celebrations are generally politicized. State officials have regarded the use of the Kurdish language in some of the celebrations as provoking ethnic divisions.

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religious affiliations; therefore there is no exact figure for the Alevi population though estimates range between 15 and 30 per cent of the national population (Göner 2005: 109, Camuroglu 1997: 32, 1998: 84). Although the law does not allow residents of Turkey to be identified as Kurdish (ethnic) and/or Alevi (religious), identities are ethnicized and sectarianized through the conflicts over them. Linguistically Alevis speak the languages of Turkish, Kurdish, Zaza, Kirmanji and/or Arabic. Today they present themselves as Alevi or Turkish, Kurdish, Zaza, Arab or as hyphenated (for example Alevi-Turkish, AleviKurdish, and so on). Hence their religious and ethnic identities are intermingled and complex.6 Two key factors affected the emergence of these multi-identities. First, differences between numerous native languages as well as beliefs and religious practices have been problematized in the political arena in Turkey since the demise of the Ottoman Empire. Seeing differences as problems ultimately transformed them into essentialized identities. Second, internal and international migration has played an important role: migrants were compelled to use identities and definitions employed by the local populations in their places of destination. This often created issues around defining forms of religious and ethnic belonging. In other words, both internal and international migration have forced migrants to have a clear definition of their identities and, by doing so, have further essentialized identity claims. Now a commonly used term etnisite (ethnicity) is employed by Turkish migrants who have resided in Western countries. There is still no word in Turkish nor in Kurdish that corresponds to etnisite, yet the word has become a widely used concept. This reveals that migration plays an important role in identity claims, and so this is what I turn to next in relation to Alevi migrants in Germany. From Turkey to Alevis in Germany Between the 1930s and 1950s, forced and labour migrations led Alevis to leave their villages and move to bigger cities in Turkey, then from the 1960s Alevis started to emigrate abroad. From the early 1960s Turkey signed bilateral labour agreements with Germany, France, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Switzerland, Belgium, Sweden and Australia to alleviate its unemployment rates (Abadan-Unat 2011). Among these, Germany attracted most of the migrants due to its growing economy and employment opportunities.7 The labour selection processes in the 6  For instance some Alevis, although their native language is Kurdish, do not identify themselves as Kurdish, merely as Alevis, due to their perception that the Kurdish are Safii Sunnis (an oppressive set of beliefs, they say). 7  Although offering good opportunities to work, at the time Germany implemented a restrictionist citizenship policy. Guestworkers were only accepted for a limited period of time and were seen as a buffer against economic fluctuations. The reality of migration and settlement differed from the planned migration policies (Castles and Miller 2009).

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1960s gave Alevis more chances to emigrate from Turkey. For example, following an earthquake in the late 1960s in Varto, an eastern district of Turkey populated by Alevis, the Turkish authorities passed a special law allowing persons from Alevi villages to migrate abroad more easily.8 Later, the 1970s witnessed clashes between left and right political movements in Turkey, in which Alevis generally occupied the leftist groups. The 1980 coup d’état terminated the clashes and many were jailed. Some leftists were persecuted in Turkey, while others escaped abroad in search of asylum. Alevis migrating abroad found a relatively freer space to articulate, discuss and take their ideas forward. As the majority of Alevi migrants lived in Germany by then, they were the most politically active among the diaspora: in 1989 they presented the ‘Alevi Declaration’ in Hamburg, which was published in Turkey in the following year (Sokefeld 2008: 58). In numerous towns Alevi cultural centres emerged. While leftist groups among Alevis declined, culture and identity-based associations grew. As one of my interviewees revealed: ‘With the collapse of the Soviet Union, we lost our hope even in our own ideals. We did not know where to put our energies in anymore. Some of us became alcoholic; others were assimilated into rightists’. In 1993, 35 people were killed in the Sivas massacre in Turkey, mentioned in the introduction to this chapter. As people gathered for a cultural Alevi festival, a group of protestors called out epithets such as ‘heretic Alevis’. After hours of circling around the hotel where Alevis stayed, the protestors set the building on fire. Neither the municipality nor the central government helped to evacuate the injured. Paradoxically, this event lit a fire in the Alevi movement which was furthered two years later, after a massacre in Gazi, Istanbul. The number of cultural centres both in Turkey and abroad increased; Alevis started to declare their identities more strongly in public. These events were simultaneously reflected in Germany. Numerous Alevi cultural centres and associations organized panels on ‘What is Alevism?’ For a long time the majority of Alevis supported the secular Turkish Republic since it offered them protection from prosecution but, after the state officials’ reluctance both to prevent the massacres and to open the subject matter into wider public discussion, Alevis started to reconsider their place in the nation (Massicard 2007: 199–206, Schuler 2002, Yalcinkaya 1996: 192–3). Discussions among Alevis grew around whether they should maintain their loyalties to official authorities. Differences in acceptance of state ideology (Kemalist or non-Kemalist) and the syncretistic characteristics of Alevism divided the newly emerging organizations. Disagreements were over republican symbols in Alevi associations (the picture of the founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the Turkish flag and so on) and the position of Alevism within Islam. Divisions among Alevis emerged both in Turkey and abroad simultaneously. This was a dual process: the events in Turkey had an impact on Alevis abroad, while the newly acquired ideas abroad were brought to Turkey. 8  The question remains whether the intention behind this Act was to encourage Alevis to migrate.

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The Researcher in the Field Germany offers a particularly pertinent study as the transnational Alevi movement started there. Before the Alevi movement started in Germany, Alevis were organized in associations with either social aid or leftist objectives. The latter weakened in the 1980s, and the former transformed into Alevi cultural associations. Alevi organizations in Germany therefore emerged with a cooperative relationship between radical leftists and more traditional Alevis. The movement took the shape of a religious movement for two major reasons: 1) the political-institutional structure of Germany privileges religious establishments by giving them incentives in accessing state support. Alevi organizations that were previously organized around cultural issues became aware of these privileges and reshaped their organizational structures accordingly over time; 2) the worldwide growing importance of religion in the world but, particularly in Turkey, has been transferred to Alevis abroad. This is apparent in the name change of the biggest Alevi organization in Berlin from ‘Berlin Anatolian Alevis Cultural Centre’ to ‘Berlin Alevi Community’. Introducing Oneself to the Field as a Researcher Alevis in Germany are generally less secret about their beliefs than their counterparts in Turkey. However, there is still a big number particularly among the older generations who hide the fact that they are Alevi due to the remaining fear from their experiences in Turkey. Moreover, Alevis do not necessarily wear any visible symbols (except some who wear a pendant in the shape of a Zulfikar sword). Therefore, it is not easy to identify whether one is an Alevi, as it is in the case of a veiled Sunni migrant. Because being identified as an Alevi is not an easy claim for many, I had to exercise caution in asking people whether they knew anyone from an Alevi background. I started my research by directly contacting the ‘Berlin Alevi Community’ and advanced using the snowballing technique. I found in daily conservations with migrants from Turkey that many Sunnis did not know whether their friends were Alevi and that this revealed an unequal positioning in relationships. As one lady said in relation to one of her closest friends: ‘I suspect whether she is an Alevi but I am not sure really. I don’t know how you ask about these things. It is rude, isn’t it?’ The language of kindness signalled both respect for each other’s religion but also the imbalanced relationship between the two. In such encounters, even if people did not wear any visible religious symbols, most of the time Alevis did know that the other was a Sunni. The majority of my interviewees never asked about my own religious beliefs. However, some did and in these instances, once I explained my background, they would follow with: ‘Oh you know, it is not important to us. It is to be a human rather than anything else’. However, the fact that I was not Alevi gave the impression that I did not know about Alevism either. For that reason they would explain Alevism to me. While this attempt to articulate what Alevism ‘is’ was a

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reaction to my background, such reactions also related to the broader context as there is increasing pressure on Alevis to define ‘what Alevism is’ both in Turkey and in Germany. In Germany the issue entered the political agenda when Alevi religious classes were offered at schools, while in Turkey Alevis’ religious rights have not been recognized on the basis that their beliefs are heterogeneous and therefore undefinable. Because in Turkey debates have been created about what Alevism is exactly, many of my interviewees tried to respond to the questions that they assumed I had in my mind. Alevism is more of a performative religion without a written book. Most of the beliefs are performed and by doing so are transferred between generations. Since I was from a Sunni family, my interviewees thought I was not able to perform and therefore learn Alevism. The general belief of Alevism in the can [person/soul/spirit/life] and thereupon the equality between men and women eased my introduction to the field as a woman. I was accepted in all parts of religious events and gatherings. However, gender does make a difference in everyday lives. Often when I met women, they invited their other female friends to the interviews or meetings afterwards. I also had a relatively easier access to the domestic space as women invited me to dinners and gatherings in their flats. I found the family dinners much more effective than previously planned focus groups, as they provided me a space to observe the views put forward and how they changed each other’s minds over table conversations. On the other hand, female participants were physically and linguistically closer, changing from siz [formal you] to sen [informal you] more quickly and comfortably. My educational level and the belief in its importance also provided another layer in our communication. Traditionally, education has been the only way for Alevis in Turkey to reach a higher social status. The combination of the fact that I was a PhD candidate and that I was focusing on gender led many to encourage my research. Interestingly almost all my male interviewees, but not the female ones, used the words ‘scientific’ and ‘academic’ in almost all interviews. The gender difference was negotiated through a common appreciation of ‘knowledge’. On one occasion, I met a lady whose husband later wanted to contact me through social media. In his message he wrote: ‘Please do not misunderstand. We are also an academic family. We have lots of networks’. The search for ‘objectivity’ had also to do with being misrepresented for a long time in history. One of the interviewees said: ‘I, as well, work scientifically. I read widely and thoroughly. I look at the truth here’. Being scientific was equated with being objective, in other words with revealing the truth. This led me to question the objectivity of my own research even more and the extent to which a researcher can reach ‘the truth’. I will explain the limitations of this in the following sections, and how partial I have been and will have to be, due to the very nature of re-search. Lastly I should mention that paradoxically, given my research topic, the real issue was not so much religious differences but rather regional ones. Coming from Turkey certainly eased my entry into the field initially, as I could start speaking the nationally taught language, Turkish. It furthermore meant that I knew the

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general situation in Turkey well. However doing research about Turkey within the diaspora poses more complex relationships than within the homeland. Even from those who migrated relatively recently, the first question would be, ‘Did you just arrive?’ The difference between the members of a diaspora and others from the homeland is clearly immense. It is reflected in the way the language is articulated, in the words used and the world-views acquired. Whereas the language in Turkey has acquired new words and usages (now mostly from English), the language in the diaspora is mixed with that of the receiving country, German in this case. This is, however, even more complicated when one thinks of the regional differences: most of the time when my interviewees used ‘Turkey’ in our conversations they did not refer to the entire country per se, but to the locality they were familiar with. That showed that what the interviewees experienced was rather a ‘trans-local’ experience between Germany (or the city they lived in) and the village they came from. Before gaining access to the field, the initial questions always included: ‘Where are you from?’ The question was which city I came from, as that would possibly describe my religious and ethnic backgrounds. In Turkey not only the region, but also the city, and even more the village, constructs your identity. That is in fact the very source of othering in multi-ethnic and multi-religious contexts. The fact that I came from Istanbul did not say much, due to its size and complexity, yet at the same time gave the impression that I was knowledgeable of Turkey’s diversity at the micro-level. Still the question, ‘Where in Istanbul are you from?’ followed in almost all of my conversations, showing the interviewees’ need to define someone based on geographical imprints and corporeal backgrounds. Becoming Engulfed by Emotions in the Field After interviewing members of the Berlin Alevi Community, I was invited to meet other Alevi persons who were not members. I came in contact with many others who did not have any relationship with the community due to personal or political differences. These included persons who did not practise Alevism in their daily lives (such as those who ascribed to a radical leftist ideology) and had been subjected to extreme levels of violence, including torture in prisons. One of my first such interviewees started the interview with: ‘You may be coming from MIT [National Intelligence Organization in Turkey], but that is okay. I can still speak. I said it before. I will say it again’. Research in societies in which ‘fear of the other’ is a means to communicate has idiosyncratic properties. When my interviewees felt that I was becoming too much of an insider, too intimate and knowledgeable about their spaces, they started asking questions, such as ‘Who is funding your research?’ or ‘Was it you who chose the topic?’ In most cases, the fact that my research was based in Australia alleviated their concerns. In Turkey, Australia does not have the same negative connotation as the USA. Apparently the same reasoning (that the national space should be unified against external threats) continued in the diaspora. In such instances, the national identities served to create insider and outsider positions.

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Where fear was the most dominant feeling on the table, as it was in a good number of my interviews, there still was a search for proximity. When the issue came to ‘where I was from’ (in the ‘real’ sense of ‘origin’), my ancestral connection to the Balkans potentially associated me with Pomaks. When I said that I really did not know much about my ancestors, my interviewees were sure that my family belonged to the Alevi Pomaks. The search for intimacy was a search for common blood: as one says in Turkish, ‘if we really look for it, we may in fact be relatives’. The full intimacy was clear when they considered my security in the future. Some said that researching these issues may be too precarious because of the current government’s approach towards Alevis and that I may be in danger later on. Some advised me to stay abroad because things in Turkey were too unsafe. Fear was not only produced by my presence; there was also a fear of each other, within the ‘community’. The interviewees who seemed to feel closest to me revealed ‘the truth’: that man A is working for PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party), B is working for the government and C is ‘who knows who he is’. Suspicion against each other has grown since the 1970s in Turkey where it has been a common practice to control and administer the population through agents (and the very fear of agents). Fear was reproduced among the diasporic communities. In fact creating a society of fear both in and abroad enables a state to administer it more easily. In these cases, fear emerges not because of the ‘the dangerous other’, but rather because of the idea, the very possibility that the other can cause harm. What is the most important in such cases is that the researcher is being transformed by these fears. Hearing that the agents do exist and that they might be controlling the Alevi movement, I inevitably started to assume that some of my interviewees might in fact also be agents. Kleinman and Kleinman note this: the ‘anthropologists’ interpretive dilemma is that they participate in the same process of professional transformation’ (1996: 276). My acquaintance with the presence of fear in the community also affected the way I conducted my research. According to the Ethics Committee of the University of Sydney, before starting the interview the researcher needs to ask for a formal signature from interviewees to indicate consent. This was a deeply alienating moment between me and most of the interviewees, who already suspected that I could be an agent. I found that one needs to look further at the politics of doing research and into the conflict between the rules of the ‘first’ and the ‘third’ world. Giving consent ‘by a written signature’ has epistemological sources of power compared with giving consent ‘by act’. When I was asking one of my interviewees whether he would be interested in doing further research with a colleague of mine, the consent depended on time: ‘Let him come here, sit with us, let us speak first, then decide’. None of these processes would meet with those required by ethics committees in Australia, which clearly needed ‘written’ consent before starting the interview. However, in my circumstances, the consent in almost all of my interviews was given during the interview, and at times afterwards.

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Beyond these experiences of fear, what brought us together was the embodied belonging to the myth of the Turkish nation, that is, the pleasure or the pain incarnated in our reflexes. Kleinman and Kleinman explain that ‘the body is also regarded as the main idiom or medium through which psychological, social and psychosomatic problems are expressed’ (1996: 287). For instance, one of the most challenging interviewees, who did not tell me where he was from after days of communication, finally accepted to meet with me in the Simidtchi tea-shop in Kreuzberg. The smell of the tea and the simit (ring-shaped savoury roll), which I was longing for after some time abroad, brought a natural joy on our faces that potentially, I felt, changed the interview atmosphere. At other times, being enraged while reading newspapers together was a means of communication. Chavez (2008: 474) argues that ‘a researcher is co-participant as she/he positions her-/himself in relation to participants, and participants position themselves in relation to how a researcher is perceived or behaves’. When my interviewee and I heard that a politically active speaker was coming, we stopped our conversation and ran to catch him. As Bolak (1996: 117) suggests, ‘shared frames of reference and consensual meanings make interaction more natural and rapport more thorough in insider research’. After the meeting we continued the interview: the rhythm then completely changed, and the interviewee was more open, correcting his previously stated answers: ‘In fact I am from … we were forced to migrate to … later on’. Emotive and sensory dimensions of both the researcher and the researched have a significant impact on the research process and on the results. Kleinman and Kleinman suggest that ‘emotion means a contextualized response, a response one feels or senses in experiencing the concrete particularity of lived situations … If a person understands other persons’ emotional responses to various circumstances in life, and if he [sic] empathetically can respond to their reactions, then he [sic] is said to “know renqing”’ (1996: 287). The authors follow that ‘the person who knows renqing reads his [sic] and others’ responses to the situation through all the senses: sight, smell, sound, and other sensations, including an inner resonance’. In my case, both feelings of pleasure and fear were transformative during all parts of my fieldwork. Almost every night, I woke up with a nightmare in which one agent was following the other, meshed with stories of torture and massacres. While I had shared emotional reactions with participants in some instances, our experiences were refracted through other dimensions of our social positions. While coming from that country itself, I knew of many events, but not necessarily how they were experienced. Knowing has two connotations in real life. I knew about the events, but I was not born into a religion or social position where one knows it by living it. In other words, coming from the same country I witnessed the pain, but I was not born into it. How then does one define an insider while researching diasporic communities coming from the same nation and ethnicity (half of the cases in my context), yet not from the same religious background? Here the issues of class, gender and educational status are not adequate to fully understand the researcher’s connection to the researched ones.

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The Triadic Nature of Suffering: Victim, Perpetrator and Witness Joan and Arthur Kleinman (1996: 276) suggest that ‘anthropological analyses (of pain and passion and power), when they are experience-distant, are at risk of delegitimizing their subject matter’s human conditions’. As a Turkish national, I witnessed various forms of injustice and pain experienced by other Turkish citizens. However, my experience of them was different to those who were personally and directly affected by such events and instances. Living in the same country, I myself was located as a witness of the Alevi massacres only through the media. From this perspective I have been a complete outsider. The media selects the images and the narrative around them and solidifies the events. The national media where all citizens are informed of each other does not only frame the objects of communication; it gives information, but also distances the other. It puts the other into the position of the victim, and ours into that of the witness. This relationship is not necessarily a dyadic one. Witnessing is more of a personal experience: Michael Humphrey (2002) notes that media spectacles of violence serve to separate rather than bring people closer together. While witnessing the relationship between the perpetrator and the victim, ‘the viewer watches in safety, a voyeur of the most atrocious transgression’ (Humphrey 2002: 95). Watching the spectacle surrounding the Sivas massacre in 1993, the witness’s feelings move between compassion and rage but also joy and approval (Sontag 2003: 18). More importantly, displaying violence as incarnated in a society brings important outcomes: The narrative of ‘ethnic violence’ seems to be suggesting that order is not really possible everywhere. Against the optimism of modernity the persistence of ‘ethnic violence’ declares that we cannot all live together in the same world because we are not all the same. Difference, the celebrated voice of the subaltern, the new possibility of voice and identity for those who previously had no history, is being twisted to mean that some parts of the world will never embrace ‘modernity’. (Humphrey 2002: 96)

The emphasis on violence itself effaces the very politics behind the relationship between the perpetrator, the victim and the witness. The triadic relationship is not a constant one. The order changes, as it changes the insider/outsider positions: ‘The interpretation of some person’s or group’s suffering as the reproduction of oppressive relationships of production, or the symbolization of dynamic conflicts in the interior of the self, or as resistance to authority, is a transformation of everyday experience of the same order’ (Kleinman and Kleinman 1996: 276). The fact that I was coming from a witness position did not mean that my interviewees and I were in absolute and fixed positions. As I stated in the introduction to this chapter, one of my previous interviewees called me as soon as he heard the news of the court decision to share his disappointment and frustration. These instances proved that our relationship

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was not occurring between fixed identities yet was evolving during the period of fieldwork. Conclusion Drawing upon fieldwork with Turkish Alevi migrants in Germany, in this chapter I have discussed how qualitative research is informed by interpersonal interactions between the researcher and research participants and in such encounters, as Stanley and Wise (1993: 157–61) remark, ‘One’s self can’t be left behind … Our consciousness is always the medium through which research occurs’. In migration-related research, personal encounters with the politics of identity reveal that positionings and definitions of insiderness are not clear; one occupies different positions at different times (Wagle and Cantaffa 2008, Hill 2006). From this perspective, I argued that the emotive and sensitive proximity of the researcher to the research and participants generates bodily effects, which vitalize or alienate the researcher within the research process. In the shadow of the politics of identities, my engagement with Alevis in Turkey could have been strained due to my position as a Sunni Turk; as mentioned earlier, Sunni Turks are accorded greater rights than Alevis in Turkey. However, the emotive reactions my interviewees and I had during the research disrupted dominant discourses of religious identities and challenged assumptions that reciprocity between researcher and participants can only be achieved when ethnic and religious identities are matched (Gunaratnam 2003, 2001). By challenging such assumptions, I have sought to explore the politics of identities and have done so by pointing to the triadic relationship between the victim, the perpetrator and the witness. This relationship was the underlying motivation behind this research and it had an impact on the way I wrote and constructed knowledge about a religious diaspora. Any researcher with the claim of being an insider in countries of origin without looking at this triadic relationship would be naïve, if not nocuous. References Abadan-Unat, N. 2011. Turks in Europe: From Guest Worker to Transnational Citizen. New York: Beghahn Books. Acker, J., Barry, K. and Esseveld, J. 1983. Objectivity and truth: problems in doing feminist research. Women’s Studies International Forum, 6, 423–35. Appadurai, A. 1998. Dead certainty: ethnic violence in the era of globalization. Public Culture, 10(2), 225–47. Baca Zinn, M. 1979. Field research in minority communities: ethical, methodological, and political observations by an insider. Social Problems, 27(2), 209–19.

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Banks, J.A. 1998. The lives and values of researchers: implications for educating citizens in a multicultural society. Educational Researcher, 27, 4–17. Bolak H. 1996. Studying one’s own in the Middle East: negotiating gender and self-other dynamics in the field. Qualitative Sociology, 19(1), 107–30. Bridges, D. 2001. The ethics of outsider research. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 35(3), 371. Camuroglu, R. 1997. Some notes on the contemporary process of restructuring Alevilik in Turkey, in Syncretistic Religious Communities in the Near East, edited by K. Kehl-Bodrogi et al. New York: Brill, 25–33. Camuroglu, R. 1998. Alevi revivalism in Turkey, in Alevi Identity: Cultural, Religious and Social Perspectives, edited by T. Olsson et al. Richmond: Curzon, 79–84. Castles, S. and Miller, M. 2009. The Age of Migration: International Population Movements in The Modern World. 4th Edition. New York: Guilford Press. Chavez, C. 2008. Conceptualizing from the inside. The Qualitative Report, 13(3), 474–94. Davies, B. and Davies, C. 2007. Having, and being had by, ‘experience’: or, ‘experience’ in the social sciences after the discursive/poststructuralist turn. Qualitative Inquiry, 13(8), 1139–59. Göner, O. 2005. The transformation of the Alevi collective identity. Cultural Dynamics, 17(2), 107–34. Gunaratnam, Y. 2001. Eating into multiculturalism: hospice staff and service users talk food, ‘race’, ethnicity, culture and identity. Critical Social Policy, 21(3), 287–310. Gunaratnam, Y. 2003. Researching Race and Ethnicity. London: Sage. Harding, S. 1986. The Science Question in Feminism. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Hill, M.L. 2006. Representin(g): negotiating multiple roles and identities in the field and behind the desk. Qualitative Inquiry, 12(5), 926–49. Humphrey, M. 1997. Civil war, identity and globalisation. new formations, 31, 67–82. Humphrey, M. 2002. The Politics of Atrocity and Reconciliation: From Terror to Trauma. London: Routledge. Ibn Alkalimat, A.-l.H. 1969. The ideology of black social science. Black Scholar, December, 28–35. Kleinman, A. and Kleinman, J. 1996. Suffering and its professional transformation: toward an ethnography of interpersonal experience, in Things as They Are: New Directions in Phenomenological Anthropology, edited by M. Jackson. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 275–301. Kondo, D.K. 1986. Dissolution and reconstitution of self: implications for anthropological epistemology. Cultural Anthropology, 1(1), 74–88. Massicard, E. 2007. Turkiye’den Avrupa’ya Alevi Hareketinin Siyasallasmasi. Istanbul: Iletisim.

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Merton, R.K. 1972. Insiders and outsiders: a chapter in sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology, 78(1), 9–47. Nagar, R. and Geiger, S. 2007. Reflexivity and positionality in feminist fieldwork revisited, in Politics and Practice in Economic Geography, edited by A. Tickell et al. London: Sage, 267–78. Naples, N.A. 1996. The outsider phenomenon, in In the Field: Readings on the Field Research Experience, edited by C.D. Smith and W. Kornblum. Westport, CT: Praeger, 139–49. Ohnuki-Tierney, E. 1984. ‘Native’ anthropologists. American Ethnologist, 11(3), 584–6. Scholte, B. 1974. Toward a reflexive and critical anthropology, in Reinventing Anthropology, edited by D. Hymes. New York: Vintage Books, 430–457. Schuler, H. 2002. Turkiye’de Sosyal Demokrasi, Particilik, Hemsehrilik, Alevilik. Istanbul: Iletisim. Sokefeld, M. 2008. Struggling for Recognition: The Alevi Movement in Germany and in Transnational Space. New York: Berghahn Books. Sontag, S. 2003. Regarding the Pain of Others. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Stanley, L. and Wise, S. 1993. Breaking out Again: Feminist Ontology and Epistemology. New York: Routledge. Wagle, T. and Cantaffa, D.T. 2008. Working the hyphens: exploring identity relations in qualitative research. Qualitative Inquiry, 14(1), 135–59. Yalcinkaya, A. 1996. Alevilikte Toplumsal Kurumlar ve Iktidar. Ankara: Mulkiyeliler Birligi.

PART III Producing Self, Producing Others

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Chapter 8

Between Suspicion and Trust: Fieldwork in the Australian-Hungarian Community Petra Andits

Introduction In the course of the latter decades of the 20th century, anthropologists increasingly questioned and criticized the notion of objectivity and moved away from scientific and supposedly dispassionate research toward reflective and reflexive methods and methodologies (Agar 1996, Clifford and Marcus 1986). With this largely embraced reflexive approach comes the recognition that fieldwork is not simply about observation and the recording of ‘facts’ but rather entails a complex interpretive practice. Instead of claiming universal validity for representation of the cultures at hand, anthropologists today acknowledge that the relationship between the observer and the observed significantly influences the emergent ethnography (Jacobs-Huey 2002, Narayan 1993, Okely and Callaway 1992, Abu-Lughod 1991, Kondo 1990, Rosaldo 1989, Clifford 1986). Indeed, some researchers even claim that reflexivity allows us to do more efficient research and as Jean Briggs (1970: 6) argues, her own sentiments, assumptions and actions proved to be ‘invaluable sources of data’. While the trend towards reflexivity has become well established, one area that has been largely neglected is recognition of the emotional aspects of fieldwork. Emotions have tended to be viewed as ‘fieldwork troubles’, obstacles to be overcome or problems to be solved (Fleetwood 2009: 29). As the intellectual mission of ‘classic’ anthropology was to get the ‘native point of view’ without actually ‘going native’ (cf. Behar 1995: 5) emotions were regarded as irrelevant or disruptive of the modern academic agenda and generally were relegated to the personal and private realm of the diary (de Laine 2000: 151). More recently, however, the role that the researcher’s emotions play in research has been brought to the fore (Carden 2003, Hubbard et. al. 2001, de Laine 2000). Researchers have begun to appreciate that emotions are not extraneous to research but are an unavoidable and integral part of social research (Fleetwood 2009: 29). Emotions felt by the researcher and research participants may impact upon the ethnographic process and provide information about the object of study. Indeed, as Arlie Hochschild (1983) has suggested, feelings are important clues to our understandings about our environment, that is to say, a feeling can be seen as a ‘sense, like the sense of hearing or sight’. Inspired by the ‘affective turn’, Spencer (2010: 1) calls for

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the liberation of emotion from the stigma of its associations with anecdote, the irrational, the non-scientific, the extraordinary and the feminine. In this chapter, I argue that it is crucial for ethnographers not to censor the emotional aspects of their fieldwork, especially the ‘inappropriate’ emotions (Chong 2008: 379). By exploring the emotional dimensions of my research, including issues around the researcher’s power and vulnerability, I demonstrate how my own and participants’ reactions to my position as a Hungarian studying the Hungarian diaspora in Australia offered a distinctive prism for interpretation and understanding, and empowered and restricted my research in unique ways. In particular, I focus on the ambivalence of feeling at home and feeling a stranger within the community. Through this discussion, I challenge dogmatic distinctions between insiders and outsiders which assume the existence of a normative understanding of who is an insider and who is not, based on some generalized socio-demographic, racial and cultural attributes (Kusow 2003: 593, see also Parameswaran 2001, Narayan 1993). Dancing Between Involvement and Detachment Anthropologists are increasingly conducting fieldwork in their ‘own’ communities (Jacobs-Huey 2002, Clifford 1997, Garber et al. 1996, Powdermaker 1966). Clifford (1997) notes that traditionally fieldwork has been based on a clear distinction between the researcher’s own home and an exterior place of research. However, lately categories of ‘homes and abroads, community insides and outsides, fields and metropolises [are] increasingly challenged by post-exotic, decolonizing trends’ (Clifford 1997: 53). While it may appear evident that conducting ethnographic fieldwork in one’s own community has many benefits, for example the researcher’s knowledge of the language and familiarity with the given culture are likely to give them better access to the subjects under study than a stranger (Messerschmidt 1981), in recent years the growing body of work in anthropological literature highlights the often unpleasant and contradictory nature of doing fieldwork in one’s own community (for example Hume and Mulcock 2004, Nguyen 2004, Pellatt 2003, Peirano 1998, Reis 1998, Van Dongen and Fainzang 1998, Altorki and El-Solh 1988). Michael Agar (1996: 102) cautions: ‘You might think that doing ethnography in one’s own society would be less stressful. I find it more so’. Indeed, confessions by ‘native’ anthropologists of ‘failures’ in the home-field have become a commonplace phenomenon (Jacobs-Huey 2002: 796–7, Visweswaran 1994). Such ambivalent feelings and tensions characterized my three-year long fieldwork and even from the beginning, I found myself in a particular ‘insider– outsider’ position. I was born in Hungary and lived most of my life there. I arrived to Australia in 2003 to start my PhD within the Hungarian migrant community in Melbourne and Sydney. During my fieldwork, I had several immensely pleasant moments and forged many substantial trusting relationships with my informants. However, I also lived through ‘culture shock’, emotional disturbance and was often

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viewed with suspicion. I assume that a non-Hungarian anthropologist engaged in a project such as this would similarly have both enjoyable and terrible moments; however, they would certainly be different ones. My claim to be Hungarian opened up several doors and closed others. During my fieldwork, I came to the conclusion that while my status as a ‘native’ Hungarian served some advantage, it by no means guaranteed my acceptance as a bona fide insider researcher in the Australian-Hungarian communities. I was a migrant from Hungary researching other migrants from Hungary in a foreign continent and brought with me expectations of what being Hungarian means. The people among whom I worked spoke the same language and participated in the same symbolic system of Hungarian national culture. The similarities between us were significant and I assumed that they were sufficient to guarantee mutual understanding. Yet, I very soon found out that Hungarians in Australia were different. Initially I had difficulties relating to the discourses, narratives, sentiments, surroundings, activities and to the general taste of the community. Rather than finding myself in what I expected, somewhat naively, to be a ‘Hungarian island’ overseas, I found that the diaspora did not reflect my imagination, memories and perceptions of my homeland. We all identified ourselves as Hungarians (or partly Hungarians); however, our life stories differed greatly: I saw myself exclusively as a temporary resident, whose future lies somewhere in Eastern Europe. They saw themselves as Australian-Hungarians, some with shifting, others with more stable perceptions of home. My own Hungarianness, while to a great extent was based on the same web of national discourse, was different from those of informants as it lacked the significant experiences of exile/ migration and the reconstruction of identities in the new homeland that they had encountered (see Mach 1994: 47). As a result, to use Paloma’s expression (2003: 254), I felt I was ‘dancing between involvement and detachment’ in the diaspora. After this ‘culture-shock’, Australian-Hungarians slowly became my ‘strangers’ whom I had to learn to understand (see Mach 1994: 46). I found that one of the major factors which created a gap between AustralianHungarians and myself was their experience of forced/voluntary migration. Based on this major event, they constructed an émigré culture and identity which I had to learn to decode and understand. I found that I was deeply moved by narratives about participants being politically persecuted during the time of the communist regime in Hungary. I felt particularly connected to these participants due to similar incidents occurring in my own family. Sharing and comprehending this suffering created a strong bond between us. However, sad stories about discrimination in Australia against several Hungarians (as Displaced Persons), while touching me, could not create the same intimate bond between us. I could not personally, or through my family history, relate to these sorts of sufferings. These experiences of migration also determined the way diaspora members perceived their former homeland and here I found that my and their images of Hungary differed greatly. Many of my research participants, especially the older generations, idealized the image of the old homeland, it was a place where

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everything was the way it should be. This view involved both the feeling of nostalgia and the mythologization of the past. At the same time, diaspora members often felt betrayed by, and hence bitterness for, their old homeland. The monologue below grasps the complex way several Australian-Hungarians negotiated their feelings of belonging. While such confessions always deeply moved me, at the same time they also underlined the abyss between their and my sense of Hungarianness: I was a refugee, with no hope to return, and that influenced my way of thinking. I wanted to be Australian. It’s better than being in my deteriorated country, which abdicated me […] It’s a love-hate relationship with my mother country. Loyalty, nostalgia, pride, tears, impotent anger, often almost hate … these emotions change each other every day, often every hour … This is our relationship to the mother country. Being a first generation migrant is a lottery. We won’t be home anymore, anywhere, neither here, nor there. (Unpublished note of András, relayed to me in 2005)

Furthermore, while we all claimed to be Hungarian, I also had difficulties relating to the organized community life. For several Hungarians, the sensations associated with being Hungarian (food, music, faces, smells) became attached to particular spaces, such as the churches, social and sport clubs, language schools and community centres. These sites have become unique reservoirs for Hungarians in their search for recognizable features, familiar vocabulary, flavours and music and have protected them from the amorphous sense of vulnerability nurtured by the new milieu. In these institutions, Hungarian culture is simplified to strong and recognizable cultural elements. These are usually associated with folklore, such as folk dances, folk songs and typical Hungarian food.1 I regarded these places as outdated and sites which did not reflect contemporary Hungarian reality. For instance, my participation in the national celebrations did not have the emotional effect I was used to from similar celebrations in Hungary. Although I greatly appreciated the work and enthusiasm that the participants invested in the staging of the performances and programmes, I could not feel emotionally connected to the events. This could be explained by my ‘professional’ approach to the event (that is, I approached every community affair as a fieldwork site, and tried to be fully aware every minute); however, I believe this was more to do with the discrepancy between the discourses, cultural norms and ways of celebrations in Hungary and in the Hungarian community in Australia. Again, this does not mean that I did not appreciate Australian-Hungarians’ identity as Hungarian and their endeavours to retain their sense of being Hungarian. This is far from being true. My point is rather different. I want to emphasize that the Hungarian sites in Australia did not make me feel as though I was a ‘native’ anthropologist. 1  These ways of ‘preserving’ culture are a reflection of the ways in which multiculturalism in Australia functions which places emphasis on tradition as the basis of cultural difference (Ang and Stratton 2001, Stratton and Ang 1994).

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Despite the lack of complete identification, studying Hungarians in Australia, as a Hungarian, had several advantages. My ability to speak the language of the researched community was an invaluable asset in approaching people and understanding their lives. Indigenous anthropologists have argued that their familiarity with the culture enables them to attribute meaning to social phenomena more readily and in greater depth than a non-Indigenous researcher (Agar 1996, Clifford and Marcus 1986). They further claim that sharing the same social and cultural world as their subjects ensures that they can interpret things more sensitively. As a Hungarian, I was able to understand some culturally embedded codes and references that could have sounded meaningless and even bizarre to other researchers. For example, when participants gave voice to their anxiety that ‘communist’ spies tried to demolish their community and power, it was clear to me what they were talking about. This familiarity with the cultural codes became more obvious to me when discussing my research and fieldwork findings with colleagues. While I easily related to these anxieties (although I did not agree with them), my colleagues expressed bewilderment about my participants’ fear of ‘communists’. More importantly, I could genuinely relate to the emotions certain political memories or current events in Hungary evoked among Hungarians in Australia. However, it was not only my emotions, but also the emotions of my research participants that affected the way research was conducted and the data that was gathered. In the next section, I offer a more detailed account of the dominant emotional reactions to my presence as a ‘Hungarian’ among the Hungarian diaspora in Australia that influenced the trajectory of the research process. Dancing on the Fence: Suspicion and Communist Legacies Research participants played an active role in including me in, and excluding me from, the field and in determining the limits of trust and belonging. This positioning had a profound impact upon the data that I gathered. My presence as a Hungarian academic prompted particular reactions of suspicion and mistrust which proved important in highlighting the dynamics and effects of communist legacies among the Hungarian diaspora in Australia. From the beginning, I found that I was as much the observed as the observer, which overturned the classical anthropological assumption about the fundamental distinction between the researcher and the researched. It was not only I who set the parameters for my fieldwork; participants’ attitudes towards me also played an important role. This affirms that power is not exerted simply one way in the field, highlighting that the observed can wield a great deal of influence over the researcher (De Andrade 2000, Adams 1999, Hsiung 1996, Abu-Lughod 1988, Kondo 1986). Indeed, research participants may control the research in substantial ways by having influence on the people and places ethnographers have access to during fieldwork. Since fieldwork is an interactional process (Mannheim and Tedlock 1995, Mascia-Lees and Cohen

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1991), I conceptualize ethnographic research as a performative encounter, in which the research subjects themselves shape the way they will be understood and represented in anthropological writing (see Goldstein 2002: 486). While I had assumed that my nationality would give me fairly easy access to the field, I soon discovered that consent within the Hungarian immigrant community is a lengthy and negotiated process. While many expressed curiosity and sincere desire to help a Hungarian student in need, their suspicion was the key emotion that affected my interaction with respondents. Suspicion on behalf of Australian-Hungarians was an integral part of my field experience despite my best efforts to try to make the research as transparent and accessible as possible and my constant reassurance that all data would be kept securely confidential and individuals’ anonymity would be protected. It was precisely my nationality that was inextricably linked to the mistrust several Hungarians expressed towards my research. The fact that I am Hungarian, who received a scholarship from Australia to conduct a PhD about Australian-Hungarians, often aroused serious suspicion within the community. People frequently asked to see the criteria of the scholarship and they wanted to know why the university and the government (‘or we really do not know who’) requested a report on Hungarians. Although I always clarified the misunderstandings, my arguments were often discarded or forgotten. Further, people often enquired about my past, where I had worked or studied before and what kind of links I had in Hungary. They were ‘obviously’ (to me) highly suspicious that the study was to be written ‘in response to a political directive’ from Hungarian ‘ex-communist forces’. The example below helps to highlight this distrust. Midway through my fieldwork I asked one participant to introduce me to Gabor, a prominent person in the Melbournian Hungarian community. This participant had been hesitant to do so for several weeks and always found excuses to prevent the meeting. The following conversation took place between us: RP: Gabor would like to see the contract you have with the Australian Government. Me: But I don’t have any contract actually. (and I explained that I got the PhD grant from the university) RP: There must be a document stating what your tasks are and what you have to report to the government. Me: I can ask the Graduate Student Office to provide me with one, if that would suit you, Gabor and the others. RP: (small break, she is thinking) Also Gabor was asking me about your connection to the university in Budapest. We hear very bad things about them, they are all red! Well, we need to know more. Gabor is thinking to investigate your issue in Hungary a bit more. (2004, Melbourne)

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My political identity and preferences became one of the keys for exclusion or inclusion for many people. In this particular research setting, I could not rely on the conventional ethnographic practice of ‘cultivating strangeness’ (Coffey 1999: 23), where the role of a distant outsider would serve as an advantage. My nationality was a fact, and within this configuration the only way to proceed was to assure my participants that we shared similar political beliefs. Ironically, and sadly, suspicions were raised, despite the fact that we shared the same basic political background. Several of my informants had been political refugees during the time of the dictatorship and most of the people I frequently encountered expressed intense disdain for, and antipathy against the communist (and, indeed, any kind of) dictatorship. I come from a family whose members were labelled ‘class enemies’, and were killed, deported and victimized in various ways during the communist regime. Although I personally did not experience the hardship and persecution that my parents and grandparents suffered, a strong sense of dismay towards the regime is carved into my personal history. I assumed that this very basic shared belief would lead to a direct trusting relationship between me and my research participants, and open up the doors for my investigation. Despite the fact that I deliberately revealed the traumas my family had to bear, my political identity was often questioned. Levels of distrust or suspicion fluctuated during the course of my fieldwork experience. It would be an exaggeration on my part to claim that the suspicion was an everyday phenomenon. Rather, suspicion was always somewhere hanging in the background, often raised in certain sensitive situations. Australian-Hungarian communities are fraught with mostly communal tensions and conflicts. These conflicts inevitably affected my relationship with the research participants. As Lofland et al. (2006: 25) note, association with one faction or group ‘may not only preclude access to other groups or divisions within the setting, but may even get one labelled as an adversary’. I found that distrust arose more frequently in situations of group conflicts. Conflicts within the Australian-Hungarian community, even the smallest fights, were linked to the greater political landscape in Hungary. Accusations of collaboration with ex-communist forces in the homeland are commonplace in the diaspora. The following two conversations shed light on the effects of the ruptures within the community on my access to the field: RP1: Zoltan advised me not to give you the interview you asked for. Me: Hmmmm … What did he say? I mean so many people know me here, I regularly meet Vera, Eva etc … they are also your and Zoltan’s friends. RP1: Well … (hesitation) … Yes, but even here among us there are so many hostile elements, who collaborate [with the post-communist Hungarian government of the time] … you think they work for Hungarianness and you find out that they have connections to the government. And I know that you talk also to these people Petra, we know. Maybe you should dissociate yourself from them. (2004, Melbourne)

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Mistrust within the community was deeply rooted in historical experiences and diasporic narratives. Several scholars have argued that distrust is one of the most widespread emotions in the Eastern European post-socialist political climate (Kalb and Tak 2006, 1999, Misztal 1996). In Eastern Europe, distrust is directed particularly towards the state and its institutions, which are perceived as inherently dictatorial and alienating (Kalb and Tak 2006: 198, Sztompka 1999). Part of the syndrome, Sztompka (1999) writes, can be attributed to the legacy of the communist dictatorship. However, the situation post-1990 also played a role in further eroding the public’s trust in the state. The feeling of distrust towards the Hungarian state in the Australian-Hungarian diaspora stems from the same ground as in the homeland, often coupled with personal experiences of political persecution. By the time I was conducting my fieldwork (2004–07), while community members were aware that communism was dead as a system of rule in Hungary, they nevertheless felt haunted by its encumbering legacy. A popular fear dominated the diasporic discourses, fed on the climate of distrust towards the new authorities that ‘seemingly-democrats-in-reality-communist’ forces would spy on the diaspora and try to destroy its homogeneity and power (Andits 2010: 55). The emergent distrust towards homeland institutions played an important part in the perception and shaping of homeland relations and the orientation of diaspora politics. The monologue below demonstrates how I, as a Hungarian researcher, got involved in the above mentioned anxieties: RP: You know here people are really trying to do something. Like now we are preparing the Trianon demonstration. We are trying to work for our homeland. And we are afraid that the authorities in Hungary will try to block us. We are not welcome at home, in their eyes we are pariah, because we are trying to preserve Hungarianness and help our brothers in the diaspora in Romania, Serbia etc. You understand? I personally know that you are a real Hungarian and I trust you. But you see some don’t, and can you really blame them? They [the postcommunist government at the time] have been trying to infiltrate us ever since. (2005, Melbourne)

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Before proceeding, two important points need to be mentioned. First of all, suspicion was understandable in the sense that I was conducting research mostly among politically/oriented émigrés2 and, strictly speaking, political refugees. However, this was not the only determining factor since the issue of suspicion was non-existent among my respondents in Sydney. There is no doubt that a central reason for this was due to my mother’s connections to one of the gatekeepers in the Hungarian Sydney community. Through this prominent person I gained immediate and unproblematic entry to the political émigré circles in Sydney. Even there, I occupied varying positions of threatening insider as well as a trusted insider, and it is this experience that I turn to next. Trust and Authority While my nationality and position as potential subversive insider resulted in reactions of suspicion and distrust, my nationality and role as a potential authoritative insider also positioned me in a trusting relationship with participants. In the case of the majority of the people with whom I established friendships it is inaccurate to talk about feelings of suspicion or distrust towards me. However, even those who fully trusted me were conscious of the potential consequences of my printed work. For some research participants it was never fully possible to forget that anything they might say could end up in print (see Goldstein 2002: 487). Others often had different views about the ideal format and objectives of my work. While I was writing up the thesis, several people called and asked me not to include this or that detail. They were concerned about various aspects of my research in print. First and foremost they feared that the then-governing ex-communist Hungarian cabinet would use it against them or others in the community. At the same time research participants regarded my ethnography as a resource that they could utilize for their own purposes, and tried to influence the ways in which they would be represented (Goldstein 2002: 487 see also, Garcia 2000, Warren 1992). This sometimes meant that some inflated the positive, and/or minimized the negative characteristics of the community. I often felt pressured by gatekeepers and also ordinary members of the community who attempted to control the results of the research. In these negotiations, my nationality again played a crucial part as community members often tried to put pressure on me by drawing on my duties as a Hungarian, thus implicating me in a role as an insider with obligations and responsibilities to members of the community. Research participants hoped that my printed work could be an opportunity to break out of the condition of invisibility that Hungarians occupy in Australia. Invisibility is often coupled with the anxiety that Hungarians have about being categorized as Eastern/ Balkan immigrants. They claimed that the only way to break out of the role of 2  Research participants were gathered through the snowball technique.

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invisible immigrants is to exhibit the real side of Hungarianness. At the same time, they also perceived my work as a chance to achieve the long-desired change of positionality vis-à-vis Hungary. They claimed that if represented in an appropriate manner my printed work could give them a chance to be acknowledged in Hungary. The field notes below underscore these aspirations and the responsibility I had to deal with as a native anthropologist: RP1: No, don’t write this down, I don’t want that the Australians to think that we are always fighting between each other. Write about our traditions, about our unique language, about our great history and civilization! Australians have to get to know us, so that they don’t think we are from the Balkans. This is a great possibility. You have to show our good side. You are a Hungarian, we have the same heart, you have responsibilities for your fellow-countrymen. (2005, Melbourne) RP2: [to the other community members] This young Hungarian lady arrived to our emigráció [emic term depicting the diaspora] and now she is going to spread the word about us. [to me] It’s very important that finally Hungarians at home wake up and recognize that they have incredible human, intellectual and political capital outside of the homeland. I mean the emigráció. We have plenty of intellectuals, we are well connected, and it’s a goldmine! But they don’t know about it in Hungary! You have to write it, you can tell them! (2006, Melbourne) RP3: I want you to write how we here for decades have been preserving Hungarianness. We fought for it! And at home they don’t know about our efforts, although we deserve some acknowledgements! (2006, Melbourne)

These citations above highlight that native anthropologists are often confronted by a contradiction between the expectations of the given community and their duties as researchers (Kusow 2003: 595). I was often torn between my own intellectual principles and the aspirations of my researched community with regards to the written material. In particular, I had to ensure that my written work would not alienate my research subjects on the one hand, and myself within my specific disciplinary cohort on the other (Jacobs-Huey 2002: 798). Goldstein (2002: 511) in his reflections on his fieldwork notes that, ‘local people thus recognize what anthropologists themselves often seek to deny: the power the anthropologist holds over the people being studied, evidenced in the last instance by his or her control over the textual representation that is fieldwork’s final product’. In this context of unequal power relations, what I perceived as mistrust might have been, for them, a statement of dissatisfaction with their powerlessness facing my research (see Goldstein 2002: 511). Or, as Jacobs-Huey (2002: 797) put it: ‘[We] ethnographers must also look for agency and resistance in participant silence or “refusals to speak”’.

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Roles and Responsibilities in the Field For most ethnographers, role-taking is part and parcel of fieldwork and is seen as crucial for navigating relationships that will lead to the successful gathering of information. Research participants may also ascribe to researchers particular identities and cultural roles (for example Smith 1999, Harrison 1997, Kondo 1990, 1986, Whitehead 1986). Apart from sometimes being perceived as an instrument of publicity, as the field notes above demonstrate, the community also saw a different resort in me. As a result of the rapid rate of assimilation and the ageing of the émigré population, Hungarian community centres in Australia are experiencing declining membership. The general decline in community participation and the lack of interest of the young Hungarians in community institutions causes intense anxiety among Hungarian community leaders and members of the first generation. Being on the threshold of disappearing has become a powerful discourse in the last decade. In addition to seeking to utilize my status as a Hungarian academic and hence an ‘authoritative’ insider, participants also positioned me as a young Hungarian. Thus, due to my young age, several Hungarians saw the saviour in me who would influence the second generation to participate more in organized activities and revitalize community life. In this way they put a lot of trust in me by hoping that I would be able to convince them to carry on the community activities started by their parents. The task of converting the young second generation was particularly significant, as in the imagination of the older diaspora members the integrated youngsters had the potential to raise the Hungarian community to the level of a transnational and powerful diaspora. I found, however, that my suggestions regarding the assimilation problems were sometimes disregarded. For example, when I suggested that the cultural repertoire of the institutions would need to be updated to reflect contemporary Hungary and hence to attract young people, several people opposed the idea in one way or the other. Nevertheless, this role gave me access to distinct circles and information, as I was frequently invited to meetings and other occasions. Interestingly, while they assigned me the task of assisting them in their struggle to revitalize the Hungarianness of youngsters, research participants often felt the need to become my cultural mentors and introduce me to the real Hungarian culture (see also Kondo 1990). They felt that as I grew up in communist and post-communist Hungary I was not aware of the real Hungarian culture and history. Several people gave me long lectures about the concealed aspects of ancient Hungarian history and the origins of the Hungarian alphabet. While this information was not relevant for my research per se, these fieldwork experiences constituted valuable data regarding diaspora members’ identity and relation to Hungary, and gave me the opportunity to increase my proximity to individuals. The examples demonstrate that age has a bearing on the kinds of relationships established with the participants (Hammersley and Atkinson 2007: 76). Aside

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from age and ethnicity, my gender was also a meaningful element in defining my positionality within the diaspora. While some radiated distrust towards me, at the same time I was often perceived as a slightly trivial phenomenon, based on the fact that I was a female researcher in my mid-to-late twenties when conducting fieldwork. Several Hungarians referred to me as the ‘young lady’ or even the ‘little girl’. Again, such an approach affected my potential for gaining inclusion into certain circles. I argue that being a young female perhaps communicated a nonthreatening identity, which might have eased or counter-balanced the suspicions of many of the participants. Furthermore, given that vulnerability gives authority, as it can be seen as a verification of honesty and commitment, my young age and my gender probably placed several participants into a more comfortable position (Behar 1995). My gender and young age helped me to adopt the ‘acceptable incompetent’ (Lofland and Lofland 1995: 56) position within the community. I gladly accepted this role of a learner, first as I hoped this would ease the suspicion toward me, and second because this was not a difficult stance to maintain as I was there to listen, observe and to understand (see Chong 2008: 377). Conclusion This chapter has demonstrated how I occupied a precarious position as a native anthropologist and experienced a mix of both intimacy and unfamiliarity within the diaspora. These encounters reveal how the insider/outsider dichotomy lacks the acknowledgment that roles are often situational, depending on the given social, political and cultural context. Insider status cannot be treated as self-evident or ‘ingrained’ on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender or sexual preference (Duneier 1999: 354). I argue that ‘insider status’ emerges from the interaction between the researcher and the participants, thus is socially constructed and therefore constantly in flux (Kusow 2003: 597, Griffith 1998, Holstein and Gubrium 1995). In other words, to claim insider status it is not enough to be a member of a socially defined group. Rather, as Merton (1972: 36) puts it, it depends on the researcher’s ability to participate fully in the lives of those s/he studies. In this regard, I find Styles’s words highly accurate. He notes: Insider and outsider myths are not empirical generalizations about the relationship between the researcher’s social position and the character of the research findings. They are elements in a moral rhetoric that claims exclusive research legitimacy for a particular group. (Styles 1979: 148)

From my research I have learned that my nationality, political orientations and age were employed by participants to define my degree of acceptance and belonging, rather than giving me instant and unproblematic access to the community. While it is crucial to be self-reflexive about one’s ‘situated perspective’ we must also, just as critically, take into account the emotions we experience

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throughout the research process. This is important because this ‘emotional knowledge’ (Chong 2008: 384) is a crucial source of knowledge about our understandings of the researched site. In my case, the emotions experienced during fieldwork have highlighted that participants are not simply powerless victims of the ethnographer’s machinations; they have the power to impose their own interpretations and imaginations upon our identity and actions and have their own reasons to cooperate with us. Indeed, in being aware of the ways participants positioned me along a continuum of trust and suspicion, I became aware of particular dynamics in the community. ‘Dancing on the fence’ (Wilcox 2002 cited in Ganiel and Mitchell 2006: 6) is maybe the most appropriate metaphor to characterize my research in Australia, shedding light on the challenges of managing ambivalence within relationships involving simultaneous confidence and distrust. No surprise then that during my time in the field I went through a range of emotional responses. The overriding feelings during much of my fieldwork were gratitude, excitement and a sense of fulfilment on the one hand and vulnerability and frustration on the other. Due to the constant fluctuation of trust, I could never take my access to the communities wholly for granted, but always had to uphold my presence as a credible researcher. This uncertainty gave rise to an ongoing sense of insecurity and frustration in relation to the broader community. At the same time, the valuable connections I forged with several members and the trust we established against all odds filled me with positive emotions such as gratitude, joy and a sense of solidarity. Rather than emotions being ‘fieldwork troubles’, they were an important ingredient in highlighting my position in relation to the community but also in highlighting the wider discourses of Hungarian encounters with trust in a post-socialist context. References Abu-Lughod, L. 1991. Writing against Culture, in Recapturing Anthropology: Working in the Present, edited by R.G. Fox. Santa Fe: School of American Research Press, 137–62. Abu-Lughod, L. 1988. Fieldwork of a dutiful daughter, in Arab Women in the Field: Studying Your Own Society, edited by S. Altorki and C. Fawzi El-Solh. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press, 139–61. Adams, L. 1999. The mascot researcher. Identity, power and knowledge in fieldwork. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 28(4), 331–63. Agar, M. 1996. The Professional Stranger: An Informal Introduction to Ethnography. San Diego, CA: Academic Press. Altorki, S. and Fawzi El-Solh, C. 1988. Arab Women in the Field: Studying Your Own Society. Syracuse, New York: Syracuse University Press. Andits, P. 2010. Bridges of Ambivalence: Australian-Hungarian homeland-related discourses post-1989. MTA, Budapest: Politika Tudományi Intézet.

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Mascia-Lees, F.E. and Cohen, C.B. 1991. Fieldwork as cultural process. Reviews in Anthropology, 19, 223–30. Merton, R. 1972. Insiders and outsiders: A chapter in the sociology of knowledge. American Journal of Sociology, 78(1), 9–47. Messerschmidt, D. 1981. On anthropology at home, in Anthropologists at Home in North America: Methods and Issues in the Study of One’s Own Society, edited by D. Messerschmidt. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1–14. Misztal, B.A. 1996. Trust in Modern Societies: The Search for the Bases of Social Order. Cambridge: Polity Press. Narayan, K. 1993. How native is a native anthropologist? American Anthropologist, 95, 671–85. Nguyen, T.H. 2004. A Great Loss of One’s Own Worth: Case Study of Rape in Present-day Vietnam through the Victim’s Eyes. Master’s thesis. The Netherlands: University of Amsterdam. Okely, J. and Callaway, H. 1992. Anthropology and Autobiography. London: Routledge. Page, H.E. 1988. Dialogic principles of interactive learning in the ethnographic relationship. Journal of Anthropological Research, 44(21), 163–81. Paloma, M. 2003. Main Street Mystics: The Toronto Blessing and Reviving Pentecostalism. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press. Parameswaran, R. 2001. Feminist media ethnography in India: Exploring power, gender, and culture in the field. Qualitative Inquiry, 71, 69–103. Peirano, M.G.S. 1998.When anthropology is at home: The different contexts of a single discipline. Annual Review of Anthropology, 27, 105–28. Pellatt, G. 2003. Ethnography and reflexivity: emotions and feelings in fieldwork. Nurse Researcher, 19(3), 28–37. Powdermaker, H. 1966. Stranger and Friend: The Way of an Anthropologist. New York: W.W. Norton. Reis, R. 1998. Resonating to pain: Introspection as a tool in medial anthropology ‘at home’. Anthropology & Medicine, 5, 295–309. Rosaldo, R. 1989. Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis. Boston: Beacon Press. Smith, L.T. 1999. Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples. London: Zed Books. Spencer, D. 2010. Introduction: emotional labour and relational observation in anthropological fieldwork, in Anthropological Fieldwork: A Relational Process, edited by D. Spencer and J. Davies. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 1–47. Stratton, J. and Ang, I. 1994. Multicultural imagined communities: Cultural difference and national identity in Australia and the USA. Continuum: The Australian Journal of Media & Culture, 8(2), 124–58. Styles, J. 1979. Outsider/Insider: Researching gay baths. Urban Life, 8, 135–52. Sztompka, P. 1999. Trust: A Sociological Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Chapter 9

Interrupting Anonymity: the Researcher in an Expatriate Community Angela Lehmann Introduction In 2002, I first arrived in Xiamen, China. I went with the intention of teaching English but soon after arriving found a job working with a local newspaper editing their English language section. My aim was to use the time to see a different culture and learn some Mandarin. Two years later, I returned to Australia to begin a PhD project to research people who decide to leave home in the developed ‘West’ to live and work in China. In 2005, I was back in Xiamen, this time under the guise of a ‘sociologist’. I was to study those who, like me, had found themselves living and working in this second-tier East-coast Chinese city. My research aimed to provide an ethnographic perspective on transnational workers from the West, a mobile group who have been arguably neglected by the grassroots methodological approach within the dominant literature (Yeoh and Willis 2002, Sklair 2001). The study was conducted in Xiamen, a costal sub-provincial city in SouthEastern Fujian province with a registered household population of 2.3 million at the time of the research (Xiamen Municipal Government 2006). Xiamen became one of the first five Special Economic Zones in China in 1984, which means that the government encourages foreign direct investment and provides assistance and support for transnational corporations choosing to base their operations in the city. Xiamen (known to the West as ‘Amoy’ during the colonial era) has a history of foreign presence within the city, and is one of the original Treaty Port cities following the Opium Wars between Britain and China in the 19th century. The foreign presence left after 1949, although since the 1980s it has been returning in a ‘global’ rather than a ‘colonial’ guise. Nevertheless, unlike more global cities such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, Xiamen did not have an organized and established expatriate community at the time I conducted my research. It was because of this that Xiamen made an ideal location for a community study of a city and a migrant community at a point of change. I had realized that the numbers of people who describe themselves as being from the ‘West’ were increasing. Rather than defining what the ‘West’ meant at the outset, this project sought to uncover and pull apart what this term meant at the ground level by those who defined themselves with this label. I aimed for the research to be participant-led. In this vein, throughout this chapter I employ the terms that participants used to define themselves including Westerner, Xiamener, foreigner and laowai (Mandarin for foreigner or literally ‘old outsider’).

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The increase in migrants in Xiamen from the ‘West’ was reflected in the city landscape; new housing facilities aimed at the transnational population abound. New coffee shops, bars, pubs and restaurants cater for the Chinese middle classes and also for the increasingly multicultural make-up of the city. As a result, the city is being viewed by both its local and migrant residents as increasingly ‘global’ or ‘cosmopolitan’. This made for an interesting research site that was on a point of change in the consciousness of those who live in and move through the city landscape. Despite this potential for future global status, at the time of the research there was a comparatively small Western population in Xiamen. This made for a quite neatly contained case study with a manageable and visible Western community. Xiamen was also an ideal location for my research because I had established relationships there and had access to the population I wished to study. The interviews and observations conducted in Xiamen informed my study into the impact of global mobility on notions of community, identity and what it means to be ‘from the West’ in a contemporary context. My research was conducted in familiar spaces and within already established networks. So, not long after arriving back in Xiamen, it became apparent that my presence as a researcher was the topic of some gossip around town. An extract from my field diary illustrates a conversation at a dinner party: After we’d eaten everyone was standing around the table and started asking a multitude of questions about my research. All those dreaded questions such as ‘what is the main point you are trying to get across?’ and ‘what is your thesis statement?’ Somebody said that apparently Paul is suspicious of my research and has been looking it up on the Internet to find out if it is legitimate. Apparently a lot of the Italian crowd are suspicious too. Roy joked that I am probably just writing for Dolly magazine. (Field Diary, 15 July 2005, Xiamen)

It became clear that not only was my research beginning to be a topic of conversation but that some were uncomfortable with the idea of being watched. Why were they ‘suspicious’ of someone asking questions about their lives in China? What, if anything, had my embodiment as a white woman to do with the way people reacted to my research? This chapter addresses how my status as an insider was at times frustrating and at first glance appeared to hinder the research process. However, on further reflection, I found that it was the tension created by my insider status that made visible the three key findings. First, Westerners living in Xiamen sought a degree of ‘escape’ and ‘freedom’ from home. I was an insider studying people who sought an element of ‘outsiderness’ and as such my research disrupted anonymous lives away from the gaze of home. Second, notions of race and gender were being negotiated and constructed simultaneously and my position as a white woman led me to experience different degrees of ‘insider’ status. Third, the level of consideration that interviewees seemed to have given to the issues I was asking about led to a definition of transnationals as ‘reflexive outsiders’

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who are involved with ongoing ‘internal conversations’ or interpretations of self (Archer 2007, Appiah 2006, Taylor 1985). Before elaborating upon each of these findings, I will first offer a brief description of the research project. Studying Migrants and Migration The study discussed here is about migration. However, it is telling that people from the ‘West’ who live in developing countries are seldom referred to (by themselves and others) as migrants. Instead, the term ‘expatriate’ is used complete with its uncomfortable colonial baggage. The word ‘expatriate’ is troublesome on multiple levels. The term assumes a person’s stable and unitary identification with a nation-state. It assumes a temporary, contracted period of time in the host country, usually with a two- or three-year endpoint. Furthermore, the term often implies that a work ‘posting’ was made to the host country while at home. The term also carries associations of power; the ‘expatriate’ is imagined to stand apart from and above the local host environment and occupy a position within a privileged form of international mobility. Each of these assumptions and connotations do not adequately encapsulate the contexts and diversities of the lived experiences of today’s skilled global workforce. Today’s ‘expatriates’ are frequently what could be better described as ‘middling migrants’ (Conradson and Latham 2005, Smith 2001). More often than not, skilled workers from Western countries do not occupy the elite level characterized in notions of the Transnational Capitalist Class (Sklair 2001) nor are they underprivileged or forced labour migrants. Those leaving home in the developed West on a permanent or semi-permanent basis are generally relatively well educated, relatively young and often find work on the ground rather than being recruited from home (Hugo 2006, Fullilove and Flutter 2004, OECD 2004, Hugo, Rudd and Harris 2003). Such expatriates increasingly act as individuals, seeking opportunities wherever they happen to be rather than travelling for a corporate or diplomatic posting. More and more of these self-driven, middling migrants are headed from the floundering economies of the developed West to rapidly developing economies, most notably to China (Ning 2011). The numbers of this group of migrants are only likely to increase in the coming years (Koser 2009), becoming a potentially important and still under-researched migration type. This chapter is based on research conducted into one city in mainland China where numbers of these transnational workers are increasing in order to further understand the ways identities and communities are shaped within such migration futures. For this study, I interviewed 36 people from Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, Britain, the Netherlands and France who identified themselves as being ‘Western’. I asked about the reasons they came to China, and to Xiamen more specifically. I asked about their lives in Xiamen and how it compared to their lives at home. I also inquired into their experiences of returning home and about their attitudes toward nationality. Participants came from a variety of

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socioeconomic backgrounds, occupations and lengths of stay in China. A majority were trade entrepreneurs (30 per cent) or people who worked on their own or in a small business exporting goods made in the local factories to the West. There were many who were employed as teachers (29 per cent) and those involved with marketing, charity work, hospitality or consulting made up 17 per cent of respondents. ‘Trailing spouses’, or partners of people who work in any of these roles but who do not work themselves, made up 14 per cent of the respondents. Lastly, traditional ‘expats’ on large corporate packages with a contractual stay in China with multinational companies who employed them at home constituted 9 per cent of the interviewees. This significantly smaller sample reflects a global trend towards employing better-educated, local middle management for lower salaries and conditions (Selmer 2004). The participants varied in their lengths of stay in Xiamen. I differentiated between the new arrivals (less than 18 months, 26 per cent), mid-term (less than three years, 40 per cent) and long-term stayers (more than three years, 34 per cent). This breakdown reflects a common perception among the community that was expressed to me on several occasions in Xiamen that ‘people either stay three months, three years or forever’ (Field Diary, 18 August 2005). These temporal markers provided a useful tool for mapping the way that transience is perceived by those experiencing it. The interviews were semi-structured and lasted for between one and one-anda-half hours. I aimed for the interviews to flow in conversational style and to be largely participant driven, while ensuring that certain topics were covered. Each interview began with the story of how the participant came to be in Xiamen. I then went on to ask about what life was like in Xiamen and about perceptions of the foreign community. After asking about nationality, I asked about the experience of returning home. The interviews, thus, formed a somewhat temporal narrative. These interviews complemented participant observation in bars, restaurants, expatriate club meetings, religious group meetings and at social events. Through interviews and observations I hoped to understand how discourses of globalization, community and identities were constructed and contested. I wanted to know how transnationality and mobility were understood and experienced by people who labelled themselves as ‘Westerners’ and whether or how a migrant community developed in this context. When I began my fieldwork, I justified my choice of research setting as a strategic return to a place where I had already conducted a phase of ‘pre-research research’ (Johnson 1975). At first I tried to minimalize the significance of my prerelationships within the city with regard to writing field diaries and extrapolating on interview data. I was what Taylor (2011) refers to as an ‘intimate insider’, or a researcher whose pre-existing friendships (close, distant, casual or otherwise) evolve into informant relationships. In a way, I felt uncomfortable with the sense that I was perhaps betraying my friends and relationships in the field by writing about their everyday lives and goings-on for eventual scrutiny and publication. Kusow (2003: 595) describes insider ethnographers as facing an ‘inherent contradiction

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between community expectations and their role as credible researchers’. I felt this tension in my day-to-day interactions with people with whom I had developed close relationships prior to conducting research into their lives. I was negotiating a somewhat blurred ethical line between my friendships and my informants. However, it was because of my being part of the community as an insider that some of the key research findings became evident. What I perceived as hurdles to be overcome in order to conduct sociological research became findings in themselves. Disjuncture and sites of tension or frustration within the research setting can often highlight social phenomena which would not have been visible had the researcher not had the status of insider. The ways that people responded to my research were often as interesting and relevant to my findings as the content of the interviews themselves. It was because I was an insider that my presence as a researcher had the effect that it did. It was also because I was an insider that I was able to be aware of the impact of my own research on the very phenomena I was studying. Gossip, Rumour and Anonymity Hesitancy, curiosity and gossip about my presence as a researcher led me to look at the role of the regulatory ‘gaze’ of home and the experience of feeling free from certain power structures associated with the familiar West. A perceived break from social structure and expectations allowed the Xiameners to exhibit actions which would be constrained at other times and places. As a researcher from home or the ‘West’, I represented a reminder of that which was perceived to be absent, that is, the social expectations and regulatory mechanisms of the social institutions of home. I noted in my field diary: Fred has been in and out of Xiamen from Melbourne for six years. I’ve known him since shortly after I arrived in Xiamen in 2002. At the moment he is teaching English although he is trying to gain momentum in his plans to export children’s toys to Australian retailers. We ran into each other at a bar and chatted over a cold Tsing Tao and a bowl of chilled green beans. ‘Sorry, I can’t help with your research’, he said. ‘I just don’t think I want to talk about everything. It’s my business, you know? I trust you but I just feel like I don’t want everyone knowing my business. It’d be too hard to explain everything properly anyway’. Fred said this before I’d even asked him for an interview or discussed my research with him. He’d obviously heard I was looking for interview subjects and had made this decision without really knowing what my research was about or what it involved. (Field diary, 19 November 2005, Xiamen)

At the time, the incident described above frustrated me. I was annoyed that Fred made his mind up about participating in my research without first speaking to me about the project. I was also perturbed that my aims to keep my research in the background were being thwarted. I was concerned that if I began asking

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people to be interviewed, some would feel awkward around me in social settings and others would feel embarrassed speaking with me for fear that they would have to turn down my request for an interview. I felt that this could negatively affect the participant observation I was conducting and so aimed to focus on the ‘naturalness’ of the interaction between myself and the participant and waited for a chance conversation to lead to a possible interview. These everyday conversations and interactions with people in Xiamen were an essential part of my research and these non-academic relationships were considered sacrosanct over acquiring an interview. Fred’s pre-empting of my approach dismissed these aims. It felt like my sourcing of interviews had taken on a life of its own and I became aware that I could hardly control the circuits of gossip about the research project. Instead, gossip about my research led me to ‘see’ and understand an important facet of the transnational experience. On arrival in Xiamen, many of those with whom I spoke described the experience of a heightened sense of freedom, culminating in celebrations of hedonism and a holiday atmosphere. This observation mirrors the findings of other research on expatriate communities which describe the centrality of alcohol and what could be considered wild or extreme behaviour at home (for example, Farrer 2011 and Fechter 2007). All interviewees spoke openly and sometimes passionately about differing standards of behaviour that foreigners adopt upon arrival in Xiamen. Callum had arrived from Scotland two years before and ran the Chinese arm of a trading business. I met him and his partner for lunch in a Singaporean restaurant: Foreigners behave massively differently here than they do at home. We often talk about this. Everybody here behaves the way that they would if they were back home and they were on holiday in Spain for two weeks and it didn’t matter, they could do anything that they wanted, they knew it was going to stay here and it didn’t matter, it wouldn’t effect anything else in their life. And so they go bananas. Everybody here thinks that they can get away with everything and anything and it doesn’t matter. (Interview, 7 August 2005, Xiamen)

Upon arrival in Xiamen, the experience of being an outsider or a ‘stranger’ (Simmel [1907] 1950) was linked to feelings of invisibility and anonymity. Perceiving themselves to be stripped of social signifiers of identity and belonging (such as cultural tastes, fashions, accents, regional dialects and family histories), Xiameners often experienced a sense of being distanced from the social gaze of home (Foucault 1975). The perception that no one from ‘home’ could ‘see’ them and therefore regulate their behaviour according to accepted norms led to this sense of ‘freedom’. Here they were outsiders, and as such, the lack of the social context of home meant the Xiamener, as a stranger, felt unknown and to some degree unknowable in this setting. A 45 year-old Canadian teacher said: ‘No one knows anything about you here and you don’t have to tell them. People want to know where you come from first of all but people don’t really talk about their lives at home. None of it matters to anyone here’.

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The stranger was anonymous – an individual’s past and their identity were unknown to those with whom they interacted. As a result of this perceived freedom the after-effects of action no longer appeared to apply as much in Xiamen. Aguilar’s (1999: 119) study of Filipino migrant workers described a similar experience of social invisibility of the internationally mobile: The international labour migrant’s social and spatial dislocation transports the worker into a temporal limbo of sorts. Without a past, the migrant contract worker also has no future there … His/her sense of place has no fixity and the worker joins other labour migrants in constituting a category of people who, betwixt and between in the structural position they occupy relative to the local population’s conception of that society, are collectively marginalized into social invisibility.

Unlike Aguilar’s migrant contract workers, the skilled Western transnationals I spoke to considered themselves as actively choosing this time of ‘temporal limbo’. Rather than considering themselves marginalized or bound by restrictions (whether bureaucratic or cultural), the Xiameners saw themselves as being freer from such restrictions than they would be at home. The difference between Aguilar’s migrant workers and those I interviewed was one of perceived agency that led to a sense of freedom. However, the Xiameners were also experiencing a process of perceived ‘invisibility’, reinforced by a local urban environment which they found difficult to decipher. Thus, the Xiameners experienced a sense of being free from the social structures of home and embraced a sense of anonymity or invisibility that was reconfirmed to them through the urban environment which was considered difficult to decipher and transgress. It was my presence as a researcher that highlighted this sense of freedom and anonymity both to myself and to others. As a researcher, I interrupted the experience of liminal freedom by being a reminder of home. The ‘suspicion’ with which the dinner party guests approached rumour about my research was perhaps an indicator of a desire to protect this sense of freedom and anonymity from what was considered to be the ‘eyes of home’. Gossip and rumour about my research served to highlight the renegotiation of a structured community in Xiamen. One of the aims of my research project was to explore the idea that transnational workers represent a form of ‘cosmopolitan rootlessness’ wherein notions of place-based community are no longer said to hold value (Beck 2006, Bauman 2000). Instead, it was gossip and rumour about my own research which demonstrated the formation and constructions of social bonds and community in Xiamen. While at first a source of consternation, it called to my attention the social role that gossip and rumour play within such emergent communities. Gossip was rife between and among Westerners in Xiamen. Gossip and rumour functioned as latent reminders of the social ‘rules’ of home and community. As such, gossip can be seen here as an example of community self-regulation. It indicated the emergence of a local, place-based community of Westerners in

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Xiamen. As an English participant told me: ‘It’s becoming like a global network and if you make an idiot of yourself to everyone that’s here then, every one of us has got friends, contacts, business relations, whatever, in different countries …’ The presence of such gossip indicated that a social gaze was again perceived to be regulating behaviour, albeit at times geographically distanced from where the action takes place. While the chains of gossip potentially expanded globally, the consequences were local. This highlighted the continuing significance of local relationships for those with global careers. Gossip is evidence of the existence of a community as it sets the norms of membership in a group in a diffuse way that is beyond the control of private individuals. Gossip, says Warner (2002: 59), is always about particular people and related to particular people. It is a dividing practice which enables the production of status as a relationship which both constructs and is constructed by individuals. What you can get away with saying depends very much on with whom you are speaking and what your status is in that person’s eyes. ‘The right to gossip about certain people is a privilege extended to a person when he or she is accepted as a member of a group or set. It is a hallmark of membership’, writes Gluckman (1963: 313). My presence as an insider researcher instigated a performance of such community membership. It highlighted the emerging divisions, connections and hierarchies within a locally developing community. This is because gossip is never a relationship among strangers. It necessarily involves shared meanings, values and divisions (Warner 2002: 59). This community and its divisions were connected to both the local Xiamen context and to forms of social structure at ‘home’. Gossip was a means of re-engaging with forms of social structure which were conceptualized at once as both ‘elsewhere’ and ‘here’. For these Westerners, community was being both constructed and contested in the form of a desire for freedom and anonymity. It was gossip about my research which led to me to ‘see’ this formation of community and social regulation in Xiamen. In a similar vein, it was the different ways men and women reacted to my research that led me to question and explore the way notions of race and gender were being rethought and reconstructed as the community developed. Inside Race and Gender As the interviews progressed, it became clear that it was my position as a Western female that was prompting both the hesitation of Western men to speak about gender with me, and the openness of Western women. My belonging to a gendered and racialized1 group clearly influenced the way in which people interacted with me and responded to my research questions. 1  Along with other chapters in this volume, it is not my intention to discuss the validity of a notion of ‘race’. Instead, I use the term to indicate a social construction which functions as a technology of power (Pierson 1998: 2).

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The interview with Greg had been going well. We’d been chatting for over an hour and it seemed he was enjoying the chance to explain his life and his experiences. Now, however, I was asking him about differences between the way Western women and Western men experience Xiamen. He shifted in his seat and paused, awkwardly. ‘Do I have to answer that?’ he pleaded. ‘You know what I mean?’ He laughed and suggested instead that we discuss the weather in Winnipeg. After some thought, Greg eventually explained what he meant: ‘Well, OK, yes. I do think there is a difference between the ways Western men and women experience Xiamen in a way. You see here quite often 70-year old Western men with 20-year old girlfriends, which would never happen at home’. He leans forward, as if he is telling me something in confidence. ‘I mean, it happens to superstars. Maybe Clint Eastwood could do it. But for the ordinary Joes like me and those guys, that would never happen in our culture’ (Interview, 30 September 2005, Xiamen). The hesitancy of Greg and many other Western men whom I interviewed to respond to questions about gender differences strongly contrasted with Western women, who spoke often at length about gender issues. In these situations it was apparent that such conversations were not only about my gender, but also about my being ‘Western’. Stephen (29) from the USA, for example, answered my question about different gendered experiences for Westerners in Xiamen by speaking from the perspective of his friend: An American girl I know, she said, you men are great in Chinese girl’s eyes. It’s easy. You love it because of all the girls here. I didn’t realize that before and so I said, have you never fancied a Chinese guy? And she said never, it never happens. I said really? I don’t know, I don’t watch men so I don’t really know about that. (Interview, 18 August 2005, Xiamen)

As a male, Stephen felt he wasn’t in a position to speak about gendered differences. Like Greg, there was hesitancy in his response. Nevertheless, Stephen clearly separated four groups of people within this short quote – the ‘American girl’, ‘Chinese girls’, ‘Chinese guys’ and himself – he did this separation as both a male and someone who identified with the West. During such interviews with Western men, I often felt I was asking inappropriate questions about the inside dealings of a group to which I wasn’t a member. I was constructed in such interactions as both insider and outsider. In this sense, the notion of ‘Western-ness’ clearly referred to a perceived racial category. Indeed it has been noted that the term ‘Western’ often stands for a synonym for ‘white’ (Fechter and Walsh 2010, Hunter, Swan and Grimes 2010, Jackson 1998, Bonnett 1997). It was my being not only a woman but a white woman that was central to these interactions. While Western men hesitated to discuss gender differences with me, Western women often needed to be almost encouraged to talk about something else. In these settings I was presumed to be an insider. It was assumed that I shared common experiences and phrases such

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as ‘you know what I mean’ were common in interviews with women. An excerpt from my field diary demonstrates: After we got to the questions about gender, Josie laughed. ‘Well, you know how it is, right?’ She automatically assumed that I knew what she was going to say. ‘What do you mean?’ I prompted. ‘Well, you know … we’re like a third gender over here. Western women, I mean. There are the men, there are the Chinese women who they see as being really feminine and soft and then there is us. We’re not like women here. It’s like the men think we are one of them and they expect us to keep up with their drinking, be one of the boys, listen to their worries about their Chinese girlfriends. But then, we’re not really allowed to join them as well. It takes a lot of getting used to, the way they are’. She continued talking about these differences for quite a while. I wanted her to keep talking about them but was also conscious of making sure I covered the other topics I had hoped to get through. (Field diary and interview, 5 August 2007, Xiamen)

Josie’s accounts of her changed perceptions of gender during her time in Xiamen reflect a poignant part of her experience of transnationality which emerged as the heightened experience of the racialization of her gender. She was in the process of rethinking through both her femininity and her whiteness in this environment. It was my perceived shared status in both racial and gendered categories that allowed her to respond to my questions as she did. Josie’s changed perception of what it meant to be female was also recounted by many Western women in Xiamen. While most Western men were perceived to be only interested sexually in Chinese women, Western women were perceived to be remote from the sexual gaze of both Western and Chinese men. This desexualization of Western women often led to a reconsideration of gendered roles and expectations at home and sometimes a sense of liberation from what were seen as dependent gender relationships at ‘home’. Gail from New York, for example, reflected that: ‘The life of a Western woman is most definitely different from a Western man. You make your own life. This is one place you don’t depend on a man for anything. There aren’t any!’ This quote demonstrates that the experience of the sense of freedom described earlier was a gendered and racialized experience. Gail felt a sense of liberation from gendered norms and expectations. Likewise, Marion (37, USA) felt that a heightened sense of freedom was also a gendered experience: ‘I know that women have their freedoms at home now and so on … but you know what it is like … if you’re here you can just go around and you can just be yourself’. My embodiment as a white female researcher meant that within interviews I could be viewed as both an insider, an outsider or simultaneously as both, depending on the question being asked. This mirrors Kusow’s (2003) claim that the insider/outsider dichotomy as methodologically distinguishable categories is rendered empirically problematic. It was the manner in which participants responded that told the story of researcher positionality which in turn informed

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the research findings themselves. The differences in the fluidity of responses to questions about gender were as important as what was actually said. This performance of a bond based on our belonging to perceived shared social groups showed that not only was a sense of solidarity being constructed in Xiamen but that this sense of shared experience was embedded with power dynamics. This research found that historical legacies of discourses of the ‘East’ and ‘West’ as gendered concepts (Leonard 2008, Levine 2004, Clancy-Smith and Gouda 1998, Said 1978) were alive and well in a contemporary setting which is characterized as a global rather than postcolonial context (Farrer 2010). I was implicated in such findings as an embodied part of this discourse. In discussing gender difference with me, the interviewees were actively reconsidering what it meant to be ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’ when in Xiamen. The interviews, therefore, formed part of a reflexive process for the participants whereby their position within both the local environment and wider notions of globality were being renegotiated. The ‘Reflexive Outsider’ In interpreting an environment perceived as culturally and linguistically unfamiliar, Westerners were involved in a ‘dialogue with difference’ whereby they were reconsidering their own positionality in cultural space. As a fellow Westerner (and in the case above as a fellow Western woman) living in this environment, I was assumed to be undergoing a similar process of self-interpretation. Melissa (from the USA) had been in Xiamen for three years when I interviewed her. She had been in other cities in China for another two years prior to arriving in the city. I asked her about what she thought about the expatriate community in Xiamen: There are some people, and they tend to be in the 40–50 year-old male Western sector – they are so bitter and condescending and so judgmental and they don’t make any effort to understand the culture that they are living in or try to even rationalize the differences. You know, why does China not do things the way we do it? Well, because they’ve only been industrial ten to fifteen years and they don’t have the infrastructure. Why is the traffic so bad? Well, because its infrastructure, education … They don’t make attempts to understand. They are really just here to make a buck and marry a Chinese woman who will take care of them the way their Western wives that they have divorced however many times didn’t take care of them. (Interview, 8 October 2005, Xiamen)

This excerpt shows an example of how, for many interviewees, they were vocalizing ideas and thoughts they had been considering in some detail before the interview. Such considered responses led me to explore a notion of the expatriate as ‘reflexive outsider’.

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In addition to the content of the interview responses, it was the ways in which the responses were given that guided the research findings. In this case, it was the way that the participants appeared to have considered the issues I asked about at quite some length that was cause for sociological query. The carefully considered responses to questions about life in China led me to think that I was not the only social scientist in Xiamen. Each Westerner, faced with perceived difference, was at a position of perceived distance from the environment they were seeking to understand. Each participant was, in a sense, undertaking a form of anthropology while on daily basis attempting to interpret and understand not only China but also other Westerners and, in turn, their own selves. Faced with a local environment which was unfamiliar, participants were involved in a process of becoming aware of what was previously not ‘visible’, and questioning the common-sense ‘rules’ and social norms of home. In this vein, the transnationals I studied in Xiamen were also lay sociologists, interpreting and analysing difference. They were asking themselves, why do things not work the way they work at home? How do things work at home? How did I come to think the way I do and how is that different to the way people think here? For example, Craig from the USA said: That’s what I love about China. You can have the manhole off the sidewalk. You walk down Zhong Shan Street and you see all this debris and everything everywhere. There could be a big manhole and you could fall in it and break your leg. But there’s no court here. It’s your fault. You should have watched where you were going. I really like that about the Chinese versus our way … In America there is too much red tape. In China it is the handshake. And they all, pretty much, will stay to their word as long as they’re not being walked on. They still have the handshake type of agreement and you kind of start thinking, maybe there is something to that. (Interview, 26 August 2005, Xiamen)

In this sense, migrants can be viewed as tourists whose ‘assumptions about reality and everyday existence are thrown into new relief’ (Robinson and Phipps 2003: 2) because of the different social worlds they inhabit. This notion of the transnational as a ‘reflexive outsider’ allows us to consider that our research participants are also involved in a process of interpretation and self-analysis and prompts one to consider the implications this may have for understanding the migratory experience. Conclusion It was the manner in which people responded to my research that guided my findings of the relationship between the interpretive self and the expatriate community. Considering the different ways in which people react to the presence of the researcher is an important facet of ethnography which can illuminate subtle community dynamics, power relationships and positionality within the

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local environment. These different responses may at first blush be a source of frustration and angst for the researcher, particularly if they seem to stall the progress of interviews or interrupt participant observation. But it is possible that such disjuncture or tensions could be the sites of the most interesting revelations about power, identity and community. In this case, different reactions to my presence in Xiamen as a social scientist led me to consider the role of gossip as an important indicator of the development of community and the importance of notions of anonymity and escape. Different reactions to my embodiment as a white female researcher led me to consider the continued relevance of discourses of race and gender in the constructions of ‘East’ and ‘West’. Finally, it was the level of detail and consideration given to interview responses that led me to consider the notion of migrants as ‘reflexive outsiders’ who are involved in a process of self-interpretation and analysis. References Aguilar, F. 1999. Ritual passage and the reconstruction of selfhood in international labour migration. Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia, 14(1), 98–139. Appiah, K. 2006. Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers. London: Penguin. Archer, M. 2007. Making Our Way through the World: Human Reflexivity and Social Mobility. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bauman, Z. 2000. Liquid Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press. Beck, U. 2006. Cosmopolitan Vision. Cambridge: Polity Press. Bonnett, A. 1997. Geography, race and Whiteness: Invisible traditions and current challenges. Area, 29, 193–9. Clancy-Smith, J. and Gouda, F. eds. 1998. Domesticating the Empire: Race, Gender and Family Life in French and Dutch Colonialism. Charlottesville, VA: The University Press of Virginia. Conradson, D. and Latham, A. 2005. Transnational urbanism: Attending to everyday practices and mobilities. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 31(2), 227–33. Farrer, J. 2010. ‘New Shanghailanders’ or ‘New Shanghainese’ Western expatriates’ narratives of emplacement in Shanghai. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 36(8), 1211– 28. Farrer, J. 2011. Global nightscapes in Shanghai as ethnosexual contact zones. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 37(5), 747–64. Fechter, A. 2007. Transnational Lives: Expatriates in Indonesia. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing. Fechter, A. and Walsh, K. 2010. Examining ‘Expatriate’ continuities: Postcolonial approaches to mobile professionals. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 36(8), 1197–210.

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Foucault, M. 1975. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. London: Penguin. Fullilove, M. and Flutter, C. 2004. Diaspora: The World Wide Web of Australians. Paper No. 04. Sydney: Lowy Institute for International Policy. Gluckman, M. 1963. Gossip and scandal. Current Anthropology, 4(3), 307–16. Hugo, G. 2006. Expatriates, in Sociology: Place, Time and Division, edited by P. Beilharz and T. Hogan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 357–61. Hugo, G., Rudd, D. and Harris, K. 2003. Australia’s Diaspora: Its Size, Nature and Policy Implications. Information Paper No. 80. Canberra: Committee for Economic Development of Australia. Hunter, S., Swan, E. and Grimes, D. 2010. Introduction: Reproducing and resisting whiteness in organizations, policies and places. Social Politics, 17(4), 407–22. Jackson, P. 1998. Constructions of ‘whiteness’ in the geographical imagination. Area, 30(2), 99–106. Johnson, J. 1975. Doing Field Research. New York: MacMillan. Koser, K. 2009. The Global Financial Crisis and International Migration: Policy Implications for Australia. Sydney: Lowy Institute for International Policy. Kusow, A. 2003. Beyond indigenous authenticity: Reflections on the insider/ outsider debate in immigration research. Symbolic Interaction, 26(4), 591–9. Leonard, P. 2008. Migrating identities: Gender, whiteness and Britishness in postcolonial Hong Kong. Gender, Place and Culture, 15(1), 45–60. Levine, P. (ed.) 2004. Gender and Empire. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ning, Y. 2011. Numbers of expatriates on the increase. China Daily, 17 October 2011. Available at: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2011-10/17/ content_13909617.htm [accessed October 18, 2011]. Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development. 2004. A New Database on the International Mobility of the Highly Skilled and Policy Options. Paris: OECD. Pierson, R. 1998. Introduction, in Nation, Empire and Colony: Historicizing Race and Gender, edited by R. Pierson and N. Chaudhuri. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1–20. Robinson, M. and Phipps, A. 2003. Worlds passing by: Journeys of culture and cultural journeys. Tourism and Cultural Change, 1(1), 1–10. Said, E. 1978. Orientalism. New York: Pantheon. Selmer, J. 2004. Expatriates’ hesitation and the localization of Western business operations in China. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 15(6), 1094–107. Simmel, G. [1907] 1950. The metropolis and mental life, in The Sociology of Georg Simmel. Glencoe, Illinois: Free Press, 409–24. Sklair, L. 2001. The Transnational Capitalist Class. Oxford: Blackwell. Smith, M. 2001. Transnational Urbanism: Locating Globalisation. Oxford: Blackwell. Taylor, C. 1985. Human Agency and Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Taylor, J. 2011. The intimate insider: Negotiating the ethics of friendship when doing insider research. Qualitative Research, 11(3), 3–22. Warner, M. 2002. Publics and counterpublics. Public Culture, 14(1), 49–90. Yeoh, B. and Willis, K. 2002. Gendering transnational communities: A comparison of Singaporean and British migrants in China. Geoforum, 33(4), 553–65.

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Chapter 10

Black on Black: Insider Positionality and the Black African Migrant Research Experience in Australia Virginia Mapedzahama and Kwamena Kwansah-Aidoo

Introduction This chapter stems from a conversation that ensued after a fieldwork interview that we had conducted in the city of Adelaide, Australia, in 2011. After the interview, our participant commented on how ‘refreshing’ it was to be able to talk about their experiences to people who understood exactly what it was like being a black African migrant in Australia. Any other researcher, the participant maintained, would not understand unless they were black and a migrant, especially ‘the part’ about racism. In Australia, the participant commented, the belief is that racism does not exist, but we, as black researchers, know that is not true. The participant revealed that they probably would not have talked about racism in the interview ‘the way they had’, had it been ‘any other researcher’. What followed our participant’s comments was an exchange between the three of us, of instances of racism that we had encountered, how we had felt and responded in those instances. We talked about the burden that our blackness placed on us in spaces imagined and constructed as white, though claimed as multicultural (Kwansah-Aidoo and Mapedzahama 2011a, Mapedzahama et al. 2011). It was only after this post-interview exchange with our participant that we, as researchers, started to question the implications of our black embodiment for the research and interrogate our presumed taken-for-granted positioning as ‘racial insiders’ (Twine 2000). Had the participant meant, for example, that they would not have talked about racism the way they had, if it were a non-black African researcher? In retrospect, we now acknowledge that we had not thought about our race critically until that point, because we had taken it for granted. Indeed, as Gallagher (1999: 166) notes, we were ‘unburdened by [our race and] color’ in our research, because we are black continental Africans interviewing other black continental Africans. This paper is our attempt at a reflexivity that seeks to make sense of the meanings and implications of race1 in our research as 1  Suffice to mention here that it is not our intention in this paper to enter into debates about whether or not race exists, or even whether ‘Africans’ are a race. Such a discussion

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black, skilled African migrants researching other black, skilled African migrants in Australia. ‘Reflections on how personal biography influences the research process is a well traveled road’ (Gallagher 1999: 165–6). Much of the earlier analyses about race were, however, preoccupied with ‘difference’, that is, the power dynamics inherent in research processes when whites research ‘other’ non-white groups (for example: Lather 2004, Dyck, Lynam, and Anderson 1995, Nattrass 1995). In recent times, however, the complexity of race in/for the research process has been gaining attention in ‘insider research’ (see, for example: Young 2003, Duster 2000, Twine 2000, Gallagher 2000, 1999). Blee (2000: 93, citing DeVault 1995) notes for example that, ‘race and ethnicity are often relevant to the research enterprise, even when not explicit’. As a result, current analyses are beginning to acknowledge the challenges, complex negotiations and racial dilemmas that arise when researching one’s own ‘race’ (Young 2003, Twine 2000, Gallagher 1999). This paper follows in a similar vein by interrogating the impact of our race/insider status on the data collection and analysis process. This is done in light of our findings that racism became the central theme in almost all our interviews even though the project was not about racism. The main question informing our reflexive processes is: how did our blackness – which we claim ascribed us ‘racial insider’ positionality – shape the research process and our research experience? In other words: what does our black embodiment and migrant subjectivities – our core commonalities with our participants – do to the data we collect and analyse? In being ‘open about the motivations and assumptions from which [we] are proceeding, and … openly wrestling with the ways in which [our] … race … impact[s] the scene about which we write’ (Ramanathan 2005: 291), we are necessarily claiming ourselves as situated rather than detached researchers. We ‘enter the field’, not as ‘all-seeing and all-knowing’ (Rose 1997: 305) distanced researchers with a set of preconceived ideas of what we will discover, but as situated knowing subjects, who ‘see the world from specific locations, embodied and particular, and never innocent’ (Rose 1997: 308). Hence our knowledge production is a ‘partial perspective’ (Haraway 1991: 183) located in our own positionality as black diasporic Africans in Australia. Still, our discussions in this chapter are not a ‘confessional act, a cure for what ails us or a practice that renders familiarity’ (Pillow 2003, cited in Ramanathan 2005: 292), but a critical reflexivity that situates our research findings not as objective truths or knowledge, but as unavoidably located in our ‘social landscape and research motivations’ (McCorkell and Myers 2003: 220). As Rose (1997: 307) notes: … all knowledge is marked by its origins, and … to deny this marking is to make false claims to universally applicable knowledge which subjugate other goes beyond the scope of this paper (see for example: Andreasen 2005). As such, we engage in the analysis here on the premise that there is a socially constructed (though not homogenous) black/African ‘race’.

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knowledges and their producers … knowledges … are limited, specific and partial.

As situated knowers, our reflexive process is informed by Critical Race Theory’s ‘unique voice of colour thesis’ (Delgado and Stefanic 2001). The voice of colour thesis holds that, … because of their different histories and experiences with oppression, black, Am Indian, Asian, Latina/o writers and thinkers may be able to communicate to their white counterparts matters that the whites are unlikely to know. Minority status in other words brings with it a presumed competence to speak about race and racism. (Delgado and Stefanic 2001)

We write as the ‘different voice of colour’, with ‘experiential expertise’ in racism (like our participants), and therefore whose ‘message’ (unlike that of racial outsiders) ‘is [not] easy to reject’ (see McCorkell and Myers 2003: 225). As racial minority researchers, we ‘bear a “presumed competence” to discuss matters of race and racism’ (Horsford and McKenzie 2008: 445), yet in this chapter, we ‘subject ourselves to the same analytical scrutiny’ (McCorkell and Myers 2003: 206) that we apply to analyses of racism. In subjecting ourselves to analytical scrutiny through unpacking the question at the core of this chapter, we seek to make an important contribution to situated research by showing how the subjective positioning of the researcher can be used to enhance data gathering, analysis and interpretation. Also through such interrogation, the chapter shows how participants in the research process can play an active role in determining the boundaries of insider positionality within situated research. Before addressing our central question, we consider in the following section, the complexities of ‘insiderness’. Although this chapter is about the processes of our research, we also use some excerpts from our interviews to illustrate the points we make. For that reason, a brief description of the research which informs our reflexive processes is warranted first, to help contextualize the discussion. The Study The research project focused on identity and belonging among skilled ‘black’ African2 migrants in Australia with the specific aim of investigating and 2  The target population for our research is people of African descent who migrated to Australia from Africa. We use ‘African’ over other ethno-national markers on the premise that while Africa as a region has great diversity in the structure of the population, consisting of numerous people belonging to different ethnic, social and economic groups (see for example: Ufomata 2000), it is nevertheless a group with many commonalities of needs, interests and diasporic experiences: enough parallels to justify reference to it as a socio-analytic category.

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understanding the experiences of this group that is gradually becoming a visible part of the Australian sociocultural and economic landscape. Attention centred on first generation black continental Africans who have immigrated since the abolition of the White Australia policy in the early 1970s with ‘traceable genealogical links to the continent’ (Tettey and Puplampu 2005: 13) and how they experience life as individuals and professionals within their communities and workplaces. The project was conceived in part as a result of our first-hand experience as skilled black African migrants in Australia and our aim to provide a sociological analysis of: (a) how individuals in this group interpret their own cross-cultural experiences; (b) how they negotiate their professional and black diasporic identities; and (c) how their cross-cultural experiences and the way in which they negotiate their professional and black diasporic identities combine to inform/ influence their construction of themselves as professionals. Our choice of research topic as well as our analytic concern for this research did not arise out of a mere naive curiosity (Mapedzahama 2007a: 14). It has a personal as well as academic genesis (Magwaza 2003, cited in Mapedzahama 2007a). Part of the initial motivation for engaging in a study into the experiences of skilled African migrants is rooted in our own experiences. However, the study also arises out of the significant gap in African migration research in Australia. In spite of the significant increase of the ‘black’ African community in Australia, not much attention has been paid to this group as a focus of academic inquiry. Whatever work has been done on this group has largely concentrated on examining issues facing African youth (and African youth identity), refugees and the refugee experience and human rights (Matereke 2009, Fozdar 2008, Zwangobani 2008, Schweitzer, Greenslade and Kagee 2007). As yet, no aspect of this limited research has looked at the experiences of first generation skilled migrants in this group, whose migration pathway, initial resettlement and employment pathways in Australia would be notably different from those of African refugees, second or 1.5 generation African migrants. Interviews were conducted with a total of 24 skilled African migrants in Sydney, Adelaide and Canberra between November 2009 and December 2011. Participants were from wide-ranging cultural backgrounds with many of them having higher degree qualifications, including PhDs. The professional backgrounds included academia, medicine, nursing, statistics, engineering, finance, accounting, ICT and many more. Participants came from varied countries such as Cameroun, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria. It is important to note at this point that the Australian context in which this research is set is a white hegemonic society at whose core is a white racial frame (Feagin 2010) operating as the overarching worldview. Such a context is not only characterized by white dominant power but also hegemonic white ways of thinking, knowing and seeing the world: ways that are normalized, unproblematized and reproduced in the ‘normal’ functioning of things. Once imagined (albeit not claimed) as the norm, whiteness then operates as the invisible and unproblematized hegemony, one that perpetuates discourses that deny contemporary racism in Australia (Dunn and Nelson 2011: 589). Despite the fact

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that Australia has a racist past etched in colonization and racist colonial policies which makes racism ‘foundational to [Australian] society/ history’ (Feagin 2010), racism in Australia is at best seen as an anomaly, the extraordinary. It is never viewed as the norm, or something inherent in the regular functioning of a system built on racism. Within such a context, where discussions of racism are silenced, the interview situation perhaps provided the impetus to discuss racism and also the space where such discussions of race, racialization and racism were ‘permitted’. Black on Black: Presumed Insiders? We started this chapter with the post-interview exchange that got us thinking critically about the ways in which our bodies are coded, and the dominance of race as a marker, particularly when researching one’s own race. If insiders, as Merton (1972, cited in Griffith 1998: 363) notes, are ‘simply’ ‘members of specified groups and collectivities or occupants of specified social statuses; [whereas] Outsiders are the nonmembers’, then our claim as insiders based on shared race cannot be easily dismissed. We claim membership to the ‘skilled black continental African migrants in Australia’ group because it is precisely our knowledge, experiences and positioning as members of that group that ‘provided the initial questions and research interest’ (Griffith 1998: 365). This claim to racial insiderness, therefore, is grounded in the recognition of continental black Africans as a distinct identifiable group in Australia. Our post-interview exchange with the participants highlighted that in the interview context the participants were not conversing with us as ‘simply’ person to person, or interviewee to interviewer, but rather as black African to another. Race transcended all other markers and in retrospect we recognize that indeed our participants related to us as racial insiders. Interviewees control the information that they share based on whether they perceive the researcher as insider or outsider. Considering that race and experiences of racism came to dominate our discussions, our contention is that the participants perceived us as ‘fellow’ black continental Africans, with whom they can identify on the grounds of shared experiences of racism and racialization (see Song and Parker 1995). While our shared racial background did not eliminate the power play inherent in the interview relationship, it was able to create the semblance of a level conversational field, reducing to a large extent the symbolic violence that is usually exerted during the research interview because of the imbalance in the social and power dynamics (Rudge et al. 2012, Bourdieu 1996). Our assertion here is based on the fact that after most of the interviews, participants spoke of how beneficial the interview had been for them in providing a space where they could comfortably talk about issues of race and racism. Some of them spoke of the interview as being ‘cathartic’. Notwithstanding, we question whether it is enough to say we are insiders just on the basis of our race and consider the role of other markers such as our gender, age, ethnicity, profession. While we claim ourselves as racial insiders for purposes of this discussion, we remain aware of the limitations of that claim since as Griffith

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(1998: 363) argues, ‘groups or collectivities that claim Insider status are not themselves homogeneous groups’. As such, other markers position us differently from our participants and shape our experiences in Australia: how we experience Africanness, migration and blackness. Hence, while race and skilled migranthood are ‘the basis for [our] claims to an Insider’s status and more thorough knowledge of the group’ we research (Griffith 1998: 365), other markers may assign us the outsider label. As Denton and Deane (2010) argue, ‘race is not the only social signifier and it is not necessarily true that race will trump all other social statuses in all situations’. Gallagher (2000: 69) supports this view in his observation that: ‘being an insider because of one’s race does not mute or erase all other social locations which serve to deny access, create misunderstanding, or bias interviews with those of the same racial background’. In claiming insider positionality we remain aware that ‘one is never always an insider or outsider in any research situation given the multiple axes of differentiation along which individuals identify’ (Mohan and Chambers 2010: 261). On that basis, we recognize that other categories such as gender, religiosity, class, profession and age would be significant in our positioning and experience of the interview situation, as well as how these might intersect in an interplay of possible influences and contradictions to affect the way we interpret the data. However, as we will outline, we did come to claim ourselves as racial insiders, but in doing so question whether this mean our analyses and interpretations are themselves ‘raced’. Further, we question if Childs (2006: 472) is correct in arguing that our (social) location in the research ‘speaks to the approach[es] that … [we] take in analyzing qualitative data’, and consider how our racial assumed commonality played into the data analysis. The Challenges of Racial Insider Research In considering the implications of insider positionality and claiming racial insider status, we question what it meant ‘being black researching other blacks’ about identity and how our mere presence as black African researchers impact upon what participants chose to discuss in the interview. Did we, like Jacob (2006: 451), ‘[choose] to racialise our own identit[ies] as researcher[s]’? Mohan and Chambers (2010: 261) note: … a researcher’s proximity to participants potentially influences participants’ engagement with and responses to the research questions, the researcher’s ability to gain access to and build a rapport with participants, and the quality of the data and interpretations.

We entered the interview context with an assumed high level of proximity. Hence, it is possible that our shared blackness that fed this level of proximity may have

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meant that some participants would be more forthcoming on the basis of a shared identity. As Gallagher (1999: 167) observes: The legitimacy of one’s role in the research process may be questioned, but because race and racial divisions are so central to how we structure every aspect of our lives, the belief in a common perspective or narrative of [blackness] may guide research assumptions and the interaction between respondent and researcher.

Racism is a very contentious topic, an accusatory category even (Hage 1998), and the fact that our participants not only spoke freely about racism and racial discrimination, but centred those experiences in their narratives, made us question: was our blackness a constant reminder to our participants that they have to go to race in their narratives? Or, did our blackness, in this interview space, ‘serve as common currency’ (Gallagher 2000: 70) that allowed for discussion of racism? We questioned, why did they keep coming back to race in their narratives, was racism foremost in their minds or was our black embodiment a visual reminder or cue to talk about racism? Did they talk about racism because they assumed that it was what we wanted to hear, even though we did not ask any questions about it or was it because they assumed that being skilled black African migrants ourselves, we would have first-hand knowledge, experience and ‘implicit understandings’ (Young 2003: 197) of racism and racial discrimination? And further, was there a certain level of assumption about the commonality of our experiences of racism and racial discrimination? The exchange below from one of our interviews illustrates this sense of commonality of experience and ‘implicit understandings’: Even from my own perspective the level at which I am now I feel I should be higher but it’s hard to … like I said it’s almost like you have to prove yourself beyond what people of the same level have to do. I think you understand. So there is some discrimination there. (Marijata, 12 October 2011, Adelaide)

For us, that the participant states: I think you understand, rather than ask if we understand, highlights the assumed commonality of racism and racial discrimination on the part of the participant. What makes us ‘safe’ in the interview is not only that we are black, but also that we are first generation skilled African migrants, assumed to have gone through similar identity reformation processes. Song and Parker (1995: 250) note that assumptions of shared racial discrimination as a ‘point of commonality [can have] a consistently positive effect in terms of establishing a sense of trust and understanding’ during the interview. Our main concern in this context becomes: did our assumed commonalities shape the interview/data gathering process, ‘in predictable and systemic ways’ (Song and Parker 1995: 248)?

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Upon reflection we acknowledge that the way the research topic was constructed already presupposed a connection with participants – skilled black African migrants. Also, if participants responded to our call to participate on the basis of such criteria, then they already embraced this identification in some way. Consequently, it would be fair to surmise that we did not openly ‘claim commonality as a strategy for access’ (Song and Parker 1995: 247), because perhaps we had already assumed our Africanness would grant us access to this group. According to Gallagher (1999: 166), ‘assumptions about access to others because of one’s race are often perceived as a methodological given’. Looking back, we also realize that our participants never assigned ‘difference’ to us. For example, our separate genders were never called into question in the interviews. So strong were our assumed commonalities that we did not experience ‘persistent tension between feelings of commonality and of difference’ (Song and Parker 1995: 246) that other researchers report. The challenges of assumed commonalities for racial insider research are threefold: first is the risk of ‘over-identification between the interviewee and the interviewed, such that the interviewee feels there is no need to explain things that the interviewer should know based on a common racial identification’ (Denton and Deane 2010). This is exemplified in the following quotation from Kosoko, one of our participants: You just see the undertones [of racism] and all that. I guess I can say there are times that you go to let’s say a restaurant for example and the moment you get in every one turns around and starts looking at you. It is as if they are saying ‘we didn’t expect you to come here’. You know what I mean. (5 December 2009, Sydney)

The above quote as in the earlier one (from Marijata), is a good example of overidentification. In stating: ‘you know what I mean’, the participant makes the assumption that the interviewer knows what they are talking about and does not go on to explain. In this case it is, ‘taken for granted that [we] should already know “these things”’ (Mapedzahama 2007b; see also, Young 2003). This situation in itself raises a number of questions for the interviewer about the research process such as: how does one react to a voiced assumption on the part of the interviewee, and what are the implications of acknowledging or denying knowledge/understanding and will this risk in upsetting the assumed commonalities? If the interviewer responds in either way, how does this influence the remainder of the interview and or the research process? Second, is the risk of the interviewer assuming that they know the experiences of those they are researching: for example, in the quote above when Kosoko said: ‘you know what I mean’, our response was not ‘No, we don’t’, neither did we probe the participant to explain further; instead we just nodded and he continued his story. We did so because we believed, rightly or wrongly at the time, that we knew exactly what he was talking about. The fact is, in reality, we have both been

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to places where we have been looked at with what we believe were questioning eyes from white people. But, does that mean that we know exactly what Kosoko was talking about? Or better still, was it a case of ‘unfinished discussion’ (Young 2003: 195). If we had responded with a ‘No’, what would have happened? Young (2003) recounts instances of interview situations where he had asked questions that the participants believed he should already have answers to as an insider, resulting in agitation, puzzlement and ultimate refusal by the participants to provide further information on the specific subject. He concludes thus: In neither case did the interaction seem to involve significant risks or threats to the overall research endeavor, yet each provided a moment to critically reflect upon how a rupturing of rapport can result from an apparent insider’s denial of what should be taken as implicit understandings. (Young 2003: 197)

Finally, there is the risk of ‘not adequately interrogating’ (Childs 2006: 472) participants’ stories because the researcher has assumed knowledge of those they research. In the Kosoko interview excerpt above, for example, that we did not probe the participant about ‘what they meant’ illustrates not only our acceptance of this assumed commonality, knowledge and ‘implicit understandings’, but also how that acceptance impedes our ability to delve deeper; to go beneath the surface of the participants’ narrative and find out what more there might be. This inadequate interrogation is not necessarily the result of a desire not to rupture the established rapport. Racism in the Data or Race/ing the Data Dnalysis? Our claimed insider position raises a number of questions regarding the place of race and experiences of racism in the process of data analysis. What did we, as insiders, do to racism in the data analysis? Was it there? Did we make it up? If we did, why did we? Was race significant in the data analysis or did we ‘race’ the data – make it about race – because of our racial insider position? The process we followed in doing the data analysis will help shed some light on some of these concerns. Given that at the core of our study was understanding personal experiences of continental Africans in Australia, our study was grounded in (qualitative) narrative inquiry. Narrative inquiry is informed by postmodern debates that argue knowledge is value-laden, and reality is based on multiple perspectives with truth grounded in everyday life involving social interactions among individuals (Mitchell and Egudo 2003). We therefore followed the processes of narrative inquiry and thematic analysis, engaging in ‘an exhaustive examination’ (Manning 1982: 280) of data as proposed by proponents of analytic induction, while at the same time ‘staying close to the data’ (Jankowski and Wester 1993: 67) in accordance with aspects of narrative inquiry. This thematic analysis process

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involved several key steps. Stage one involved the process of data reduction; which identified key themes and patterns in the data collected (identifying recurring themes and ideas from the transcribed interviews). From these, detailed thematic notes were created that provided a second layer of analysis. The next stage involved allocating specific codes (single word labels) to all items on the list. These codes/labels were further sorted and grouped under ‘broader, higher order categories or “main themes”’ (Ritchie et al. 2003: 221). The final stage of ‘data interpretation’ involved selecting core themes, which we felt were key to the research, and systematically relating them to other themes to create a ‘big picture’ story outline (O’Dwyer 2004: 394). The project, as previously indicated, was about identity and belonging, and we found that without being prompted most of our participants talked at length about racism: in the workplace, and in society ‘at large’. Hence, in following the data analysis process described above, we found that racism as a theme came up in almost all the interviews/cases. Indeed, analysis showed that there was not nearly enough on the central themes of identity and belonging; racism and racial issues took centre stage and pushed the core concerns of the study to the fringes. This finding should perhaps not be surprising, given that racism by its very nature is excluding, thereby producing a ‘lack of belonging’. Ultimately then, our findings revealed a negation of belonging orat best, significant barriers to belonging as a result of racism; a clear indication that the themes of racism and belonging go together. In accordance with Patton’s (1990: 400) suggestion that ‘sufficient description and direct quotations should be included to allow the reader to enter into the situation and thoughts of the people represented in the report’, we provide the following sample quotes that, though lengthy, are both indicative and illustrative: … it is supposed to be a multicultural society but I tell you I belong on the fringe. First many of the issues I make reference to here or allude to even after here … some of these things cannot be classified as racism because racism can be defined only by the person who is experiencing it; it cannot be defined by the person doing it to you or the system which is doing it to you. But unfortunately the system defines racism and unless you can provide evidence of all that is happening, you have no case. So the system doesn’t think there is racism. Some of my experience clearly is racism because we have gone past the period where you will be openly abused as a Black person or as an African. No, nobody does that any more. But there are much subtle, much more sinister ways of doing these things; there are much more devastating ways of doing these things. So it doesn’t have to be physical. Anyway, 400 years ago it was physical; 100 years ago it was physical but there is just as much pain in the totality of your being as there was then. So for me I have even ceased to try to label it racism or give it any name because that – Maybe these are my own ways of dealing with the pain … I mean let me be frank with you that is not just a perception, it is well established. (Lasisi, 11 December 2009, Sydney)

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… the other thing I need to mention as well is the fact you keep on coming across a lot of racial undertones … It comes through a lot when you are talking to people at the work place and all that. And no matter how well you perform or what level you get to, people still manage to question the intelligence of people from your background … And it is not only through that as well, I think it is also the way people accept your opinions. So typically you may be in a meeting with people and you may give a suggestion as to how to move things forward and all that and your idea will be brushed aside as if it is nothing. It is just a silly idea. And then maybe within five minutes somebody will take the same idea in a slightly different way and everyone will say: ‘Wow, that’s a brilliant idea’. And then you tell yourself, this is exactly what I said five minutes ago and nobody really wanted to hear about it. You know, so you come across this in a lot of other ways. (Kosoko, 5 December 2009, Sydney)

The quotations above provide a window into the issue/s of race/racism as raised in the study. Yet, upon reflection, we still ask the question: is the data speaking for itself? As Hegelund (2005: 657) has argued: [T]o say, innocently, ‘The data themselves do not lie’ is much too simple a way of looking at data. Even if one is not willing to accept that the data are ‘infected’ (the softer version), one should at least realize that the selection of what to count as relevant data (it does not need to be theoretical sampling as such) is, to a large extent, guided by one’s theories, tacit knowledge, worldview, and so on. In this way, the data are not really neutral, as they have been selected (from an infinite amount of potential data) according to one paradigm and not another.

As black African migrants, who can identify with both Lasisi and Kosoko’s experiences described above, we have found ourselves in situations similar to the ones they describe. The question remains then: are we as insiders able to separate our experiences in Australia from the data that we are analysing? Even as we adhered to the principles of narrative inquiry and thematic analysis, were we able to separate what we think/thought we know from what was said? Or, better still, is it even desirable for us to seek to completely separate our racial experiences in Australia from the data we are analysing? While these questions we raise above are valid, finding meaningful responses to them is by no means an easy task because at the core of these questions lie deeper issues of ontology and epistemology that go beyond the confines of this paper. What is worth noting in this regard though, is that: (a) every researcher (insider or outsider) goes to the interview/data analysis situation not as tabula rasa, but rather as someone with a history of knowledge, experiences, values, training and so on, which may have varying degrees of influence on what they do in these situations; and (b) it is impossible to delineate the point at which a researcher’s previous knowledge and experience of a subject/ subject matter starts and/or ends and when knowledge and understanding of current material begins. In other words, the two processes are not mutually exclusive.

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Here, we claim that we did not ‘fixate on racism … [rather], the pattern that emerged [in our analysis] was that … [our participants] discussed how they experience racism and discrimination daily, in so many ways [original emphasis]’ (Childs 2006: 474–5). These consistent and persistent experiences of racism, racialization and racial discrimination shape and inform how they experience being skilled African migrants in Australia. We did not ‘race’ our data, and in staying true to the participants’ voices, we interpret the narratives of our participants as constructed within a discourse of ‘everyday racism’ (Kwansah-Aidoo and Mapedzahama 2011b), noting that their blackness constitutes a burden for their daily realities in Australia (Kwansah-Aidoo and Mapedzahama 2011a). Interpretation is an important part of qualitative research and as Denzin (1994: 504) notes, ‘is a productive process that sets forth the multiple meanings of an event, object, experience, or text. Interpretation is transformative. It illuminates, throws light on experience. It brings out and refines … the meanings that can be sifted from a text, an object, or a slice of experience’. Consequently, through our interpretation, we shed some light on the experiences of research participants. In doing so, our subjective position, social location and a Critical Race Theory lens, inform our analytic tactic: our interpretation and analysis of the data. By sharing similar subjectivities as the participants and being able to identify with their stories and experiences, we are able to bring a certain depth of understanding that comes from being an insider to the interpretation process that helps to refine and throw more light (Denzin 1994) on the racism and racial narratives that our participants recounted. Choice of research topic, target group and research methodology (especially our analytic and interpretive tactics) is inescapably rooted in our positionality and situatedness. Since our research deals with social phenomena, which has at its core human beings, their lives and the complexities that are very often their lived realities, we have sought to capture these in our search for knowledge and, following Patton, our intention has been to maintain ‘the intrinsically social nature and human purposes of research’ (1990: 55), and to make it beneficial to our subjects – the researched, ourselves – researchers and the academy, and society at large. As Busia (1960 cited in Assimeng 1995: 12; italics added) so eloquently espouses: The social sciences are human sciences. In the search for laws and systems, for concepts and objectivity, we do well to remember constantly that our studies concern human beings; that they deal primarily with men and women, with their happiness and suffering; with harmony and discord in human relations; with peace and war. Should the social sciences become only a matter of the head, obsessed only with the search for abstract theories and intellectually satisfying systems, and without the human heart that shares human love and suffering, they will fail to serve mankind.

Accordingly, in light of the critical role of interpretation in qualitative research (Denzin 1994), we argue that the depth of understanding and illumination that our subjectivity enables us to bring to the data is more enriching and beneficial

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than what any claims to or attempts at positivist objectivity, or what Busia (1960) calls ‘intellectually satisfying systems’, might yield. While we did not ‘race’ our data, we claim, as McCorkell did, that if another researcher, regardless of their racial background were to replicate our study, they may not necessarily, ‘make the same discoveries’ or come to similar conclusions as we did. Like McCorkell we argue that our ‘findings are unique because they are ultimately based on a standpoint that was multilayered and a set of relations that were complex, shifting, and dynamic’ (McCorkell and Myers 2003: 223). In the end, this chapter makes an important contribution to understanding knowledge as situated and adds to the value of situated research (see for example: Williams 2006, 2005, Griffith 1998, Haraway 1991). Conclusion If this line of research [racial insider research] is to move from description to one concerned with rethinking and dismantling how racial categories are constructed and made static, then assumptions about access, rapport, and automatic insider status based on one’s race needs to be revisited and reconceptualized. (Gallagher 1999: 165–6)

Our reflexive process in this paper has attempted to answer Gallagher’s call above. We have raised issues aimed at refocusing attention on debates about the fluidity of insider positionality. In that regard, we note that in our own case we claimed insider status because we are skilled black African migrants researching people who identify the same. We also acknowledge that there were other markers such as gender, age, ethnicity and profession that could have affected our insider positionality but were of hardly any consequence. Thus, our research participants were particularly active in determining the criteria for ‘insiderness’ by actively ignoring all other markers in favour of ‘race’ and ‘skilled migranthood’. This process highlights both the negotiations associated with insider positionality throughout the research process and the complexity and multiplicity of those negotiations. Perhaps the idea, as Merton (cited in Griffith 1998: 364) suggests, is to ‘transcend one’s status as Insider’, by acknowledging the complexities of insider research, and how the researchers’ positioning within the research process informs what they see in the data, how they see it and report it. Our reflexive processes have raised a myriad of ethical and methodological questions, which we have presented in this paper: questions to which we do not and cannot claim to have complete answers. What stood out for us in the reflexive process though, is that, our subjective positioning in this research is a valuable tool for our interpretation of the data. We therefore do not reject our subjective racial insider status/situatedness; instead we claim its power while staying alert to its weaknesses and challenges. As Griffith (1998: 362) rightly claims:

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Where the researcher enters the research site as an Insider – someone whose biography (gender, race, class, sexual orientation and so on) gives her [sic] a lived familiarity with the group being researched – that tacit knowledge informs her research producing a different knowledge than that available to the Outsider.

The questions we have raised in this paper are for us not just ethical, methodological or reflective questions; they are also attempts at forging ahead with our research, which now specifically centres on analyses of African migrants’ conceptualizations and experiences of racism. Our aim as we listen and relisten to our participants’ stories is to write ourselves into the research, so that ‘far from coming out as the “knowledgeable researchers”’ (Mapedzahama 2005), we recognize ourselves as situated researchers, who, though following the principles of qualitative narrative inquiry, are also close to the phenomena and group that we investigate. Rose (1997: 309) notes that ‘the task of situating knowledge is “to shed light” on the research process’. And so, as agents of knowledge, our views are (to modify Haraway’s [1991] own phrase) ‘from somewhere’; the (academic) knowledge we produce is informed by our positionalities both as privileged knowledge producers and racial minorities who navigate issues of race and racism on a daily basis. In claiming ourselves as racial insiders and voices of colour in this chapter, we have endeavoured to engage in ‘reflexivity [that] looks both “inward” to the identity of the researcher, and “outward” to her (sic) relation to her research and what is described as “the wider world”’ (Rose 1997: 309). Our reflexivity has also been guided by our subjective positioning that acknowledges that as researchers studying social phenomena, we ‘are dealing with human beings, who also happen to be the most variable of all variables’ (Kwansah-Aidoo 1999: 150). Ultimately, our claim here is not that our reflexive processes provide us with all the answers that we seek, but rather that those processes allow us to remain true and answerable to both the people we research and members of the academy. References Andreasen, R.O. 2005. The meaning of ‘race’: Folk conceptions and the new biology of race. The Journal of Philosophy, 102(2), 94–106. Assimeng, J.M. 1995. Salvation, Social Cross and the Human Condition. Accra: Ghana Universities Press. Blee, K.M. 2000. White on White: Interviewing women in US White supremacist groups, in Racing Research, Researching Race: Methodological Dilemmas in Critical Race Studies, edited by F.W. Twine and J.W. Warren, New York: New York University Press, 93–109. Bourdieu, P. 1996. Understanding. Theory, Culture & Society, 13(2), 17–37. Childs, E.C. 2006. Can we ignore the perspective Of Black women on their own experience?
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Delgado, R. and Stefanic, J. 2001. Critical Race Theory: An Introduction. New York: New York University Press, Kindle edition [accessed 12 November 2012]. Denton, N.A. and Deane, G.D. 2010. Researching race and ethnicity: Methodological issues, in The SAGE Handbook of Race and Ethnic Studies, edited by P. Hill-Collins and J. Solomos, London: SAGE Publications, Ltd, ebook, DOI: 10.4135/978-1-4462-0090-2,http://sage-ereference.com/view/ hdbk_raceethnicstudies/n4.xml [accessed 2 May 2012]. Denzin, N.K. 1994. The art and politics of interpretation, in Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.S. Lincoln, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 500–515. Dunn, K. and Nelson, J.K. 2011. Challenging the public denial of racism for a deeper multiculturalism. Journal of Intercultural Studies, 32(6), 587–602. Duster, T. 2000. Foreword, in Racing Research, Researching Race: Methodological Dilemmas in Critical Race Studies, edited by F.W. Twine and J.W. Warren, New York: New York University Press, xi–xiv. Dyck, I, Lynam, J.M. and Anderson, J.M. 1995. Women talking: Creating knowledge through difference in cross-cultural research. Women’s Studies International Forum, 16(5), 611–26. Feagin J. 2010. The White Racial Frame: Centuries of Racial Framing and Counter-Framing. New York: Routledge. Fozdar, F. 2008. Discrimination and well-being: Perceptions of refugees in Western Australia. International Migration Review, 24(1), 30–63. Gallagher, C.A. 1999. Researching race, Reproducing racism. The Review of Education/Pedagogy/Cultural Studies, 21(2), 165–91. Gallagher, C.A. 2000. White like me? Methods, meaning and manipulation, in Racing Research, Researching Race: Methodological Dilemmas in Critical Race Studies, edited by F.W. Twine and J.W. Warren, New York: New York University Press, 67–92. Griffith, A.I. 1998. Insider/outsider: Epistemological privilege and mothering work. Human Studies, 21, 361–76. Hage, G. 1998, White Nation: Fantasies of White Supremacy in a Multicultural Society. Annandale, NSW: Pluto Press. Haraway, D.J. 1991. Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: the Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge. Hegelund, A. 2005. Objectivity and subjectivity in the ethnographic method. Qualitative Health Research, 15(5), 647–68. Horsford, S.D. and McKenzie K.B. 2008. ‘Sometimes I feel like the problems started with desegregation’: Exploring Black superintendent perspectives on desegregation policy. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 21(5), 443–55. Jacob, M.M. 2006. When a native ‘goes researcher’: Notes From the North American Indigenous Games. American Behavioral Scientist, 50(4), 450–61. Jankowski, N.W. and Wester, D.R. 1993. The qualitative tradition in social science inquiry: Contributions to mass communication research, in A Handbook of

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Chapter 11

Academic Intercultural Encounters and Cosmopolitan Knowledge Translation Liudmila Kirpitchenko

Introduction In this chapter I offer an insider’s perspective on contemporary intercultural encounters in academia in the context of an ever-growing global academic mobility. Academic mobility is one of the continuing changes in the teaching and learning processes that academic institutions are undergoing globally. These changes are often termed ‘internationalization of education’ and they are expressed in the transformations in both the curricula and the recruitment practices of students and staff. Internationalization of education responds to the need of preparing graduates for a globalized society and it inevitably alters the ways knowledge is transferred, exchanged and created nowadays in academia. This research presents an insider’s viewpoint on the experiences of academic migrants and mobile academics who have been perceived as important agents of intercultural knowledge flows. The purpose of this chapter is to explore academic interactions involving diverse cultures as opportunities for altering our understanding of the processes of knowledge exchange and transfer, and ultimately knowledge creation. Internationalized education signifies that teaching and learning become not only multicultural by inclusion, but also intercultural by increased interaction. Intercultural education opens the doors to intermixing, combining and interchanging multiple cultures. Intercultural encounters inevitably involve knowledge translation, which means much more than a one-way linear diffusion of knowledge. Successful knowledge translation includes interactive practices, such as collaboration, linkages, sharing and exchanges of cultural perspectives. To become engaged in these interactive practices, I have been a part of academic mobility as a participant and a researcher for many years. My international experiences have allowed me to develop an insider’s viewpoint on the intricacies of knowledge mobility and intercultural dialogue. As an academic migrant and an insider researcher, I found out that for both of these roles I acted as an intercultural intermediary, as a translator of cultural meanings. In this way, academic migrants can be compared to insider researchers – both are perceived as the influential agents of knowledge translation. Similarly to mobile academics who transfer and adapt their knowledge in culturally diverse environments, insider researchers act as translators of cultural meanings between

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their native and a scholarly community. I explore some of the advantages and benefits of participating as an insider in the experiences of the researched. I argue that active participation in the lived experiences of the research field led me to identify beneficial ways of interchanging knowledge which are termed cosmopolitan dispositions. I discuss cosmopolitan ‘long-lasting dispositions of the mind and body’ (Bourdieu 1986: 243) as emerging opportunities for intercultural knowledge exchange and knowledge creation. Meanings of Insiderness in Research As a participant, observer and researcher of academic mobility and intercultural encounters, I aim to be cognizant of my standpoints toward knowledge production on this topic. My academic interest in insider and outsider research methods can be explained by my keen awareness of the researcher’s influential role in the processes that lead to construction of knowledge. Within the complex processes and mechanisms underlying knowledge creation researchers tend to give due recognition to the role, positioning and prior experiences of the researcher who is ultimately the author of research and creator of a new knowledge. The identity of the author has been an interesting subject to bring to light since a person’s identity bears not only personal characteristics, but also their own assumptions, beliefs and expectations. The prior knowledge, experiences and conjectures of the researcher form a grid for a particular standpoint in knowledge creation. Insiderness in research means that all steps of the research project – from conceiving, conducting and recording research to writing and creating of knowledge – are influenced by the researchers’ point of inspection. Researchers’ sustained attention to the topic of insiderness/outsiderness in research can also be explained by our acute awareness that knowledge created by insider researchers may be different from knowledge created by outsider researchers. ‘Insiderness’ to a particular group has been traditionally defined in terms of longstanding social groups, such as gender, ethnicity, age, religion, social class, culture, sexual orientation and so on. Additionally, insiderness can be gained and delineated by the sum of lived experiences that pertain to a particular group or community. Given the specificities of insider experiences, does it mean that the knowledge created by an insider researcher will be more understandable by this cultural community group? Does it mean that an outsider researcher will create knowledge that will be more graspable by the outsider general scholarly community? It is also worthwhile considering whether insider researchers are able to create knowledge that will be comprehensible by outsiders and vice versa. There has been a strong tradition in early anthropology to recognize the distinction of insider and outsider research and identify the benefits insider research could bring. Boas argued for a true proximity of the researcher to the research population: ‘If it is our serious purpose to understand the thoughts of a people the whole analysis of experience must be based on their concepts, not ours’

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(quoted in Harris 1976: 338). Sapir questioned outsider research and believed that an outsider cannot produce a description that ‘would be intelligible and acceptable to the natives themselves’ (quoted in Harris 1976: 338). Outsiders are believed to have limited abilities in accessing, gathering and interpreting data. Gamst holds that ‘many areas of information are absolutely closed to outsiders’ (1980: 23). Likewise, Michael Polanyi (1962) has been a strong advocate of personal insider knowledge and has cautioned against attempts to objectify knowledge and thus separate knowledge from the knower. The debate on insiderness/outsiderness received a very important impetus with the emergence of two terms: etic and emic. The linguist Kenneth Pike (1967) was the person who first coined the terms emics and etics in the 1950s. These terms were derived from the suffixes of the words phonetics and phonemics. Linguists distinguish between phonetic voiced sounds and phonemic implicit sounds. While phonetic sounds are generally recognizable, phonemic sounds are distinguished mostly by the native speakers who use them unconsciously to assign meaningful connotations. Pike was a pioneer in transferring these linguistic terms into the other social disciplines to note the linkages between languages, cultures and human behaviour. Pike (1967) defined etic units as cross-culturally valid and emic units as culturally specific, applied to one language or culture at a time. These terms received wide recognition, and by the 1980s were recorded by Headland, Pike and Harris (1990) as being used in many other disciplines, even distant to linguistics and anthropology. Marvin Harris was the first loyal follower of Pike as he used the neologisms of etic and emic to distinguish between the knowledge of ethnographic observers and the knowledge of native informants. Harris (1976: 331) noticed that scientific observers often use operational principles that ‘may in fact be contrary to the principles elicitable from the actors themselves with respect to the manner in which they organize their imaginations, concepts, and thoughts in the identified domain’. In Harris’s (1976: 334) definition, ‘emic statements refer to logicoempirical systems whose phenomenal distinctions or “things” are built up out of contrasts and discriminations significant, meaningful, real, accurate, or in some other fashion regarded as appropriate by the actors themselves. Etic statements depend upon phenomenal distinctions judged appropriate by the community of scientific observers’. Using the analogy with actor and observer, Harris expressed one of the possible interpretations of the etic–emic distinction. This interpretation is linked to a juxtaposition of the concepts that are culturally general with the concepts that are culturally particular: ‘Emics are the study of concepts peculiar to particular cultures. Etics on the other hand, are the study of concepts for the study of culture in general – panculture’ (Naroll quoted in Harris 1976: 341). The debates between the emicists and eticists have proved to be productive. Subsequently, researchers have raised many questions about the identity and sum of the experiences of the researcher and their corresponding ability to create knowledge. Research writings created by those whom we label ‘insiders’ often touch on some issues of the subjectivity or objectivity of the presented

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interpretations. Indeed, questions of insiderness/outsiderness in research are commonly linked to questions of objectivity or subjectivity of knowledge. Insider knowledge is believed to be more intimate, more specific to a particular group, more characteristic of a singular community and therefore more subjective. At the same time, outsider knowledge is perceived to be more general, more transmissible, more transferrable and therefore more ‘objective’. Feminist research has shifted our understanding of the validity of habitually juxtaposing the notions of objectivity and subjectivity. Feminists have suggested that traditional positivist methodologies strived to generalize human experiences, depriving them of individuality and therefore denying the power of diversity. Feminist research shed doubt on the possibility and even desirability of objectivity. As Gilbert observed, ‘feminist research is differentiated from nonfeminist research in terms of its critiques of universality and objectivity and its emancipatory purpose’ (1994: 90). Indeed, feminist research methodologies demonstrated many advantages of freeing humanity from the imposition of expressing seemingly universal and objective truth by showing the value and allure of individual, unique and subjective experiences. In this way, purposefully objective empirical data gathered in the field become as valuable as rich descriptions of the subjective experiences of an insider researcher. It can be explained by an observation that insider researchers are writing the stories of their social groups through the lenses of their personal story. From the non-positivist point of view, researchers’ personal stories are as trustworthy and cherished as the empirically based and often generalized and therefore standardized stories of the researched. Significantly, the debates between the emicists and eticists are still ongoing, as they touch on the original preconceptions that form the building blocks of knowledge creation. As Pelto (1970: 82) observed, these debates pertain to ‘the single most important theoretical disagreement [in anthropology] – one which involves the foundations of all our methodological procedures’. The overarching themes of the current debates tend to be recognition of flexibility and fluidity of a researcher’s positioning and therefore acknowledgement of many shades of insiderness or outsiderness. Exemplarily, Alcoff (1995: 106) notes that ‘location and positionality should not be conceived as one-dimensional or static but as multiple and with varying degrees of mobility’. While many scholars acknowledge the value of the insider’s experiences in getting close to the researched group, they also recognize a need for operational distancing, othering and objectification of the researched. As Eppley (2006: 5) suggests: ‘There is othering in the very act of studying, a necessary stepping back or distancing in varying degrees. There can be no interpreting without some degree of othering’. In this way, scholars admit that there could be no rigidly defined boundaries between insider and outsider positions. Eppley (2006: 5) writes that ‘researchers, then, can be neither Insider nor Outsider; they are instead temporarily and precariously positioned within a continuum’. Ganga and Scott (2006: 3) use the term ‘diversity in proximity’ to describe many complexities and contradictions of insider research, and they further admit that this phenomenon ‘has a particular resonance for qualitative migration researchers’.

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Mobility and migration researchers, in particular, are in a good position to relate to the multiple levels of proximity to the experiences of the researched. Multiplicities of mobile experiences are vivid in my case: being an academic migrant of Ukrainian background, I have had educational and professional work experiences in such divergent national and cultural settings as Ukraine, Canada, Cuba, Egypt, Italy and Australia. It is important for my decision to explore the experiences of mobile academics from the inside, that my insider’s status is determined not only through prescribed characteristics or birthright, but also more importantly through active participation in the lived experiences of the group. This stance echoes Griffith’s observation that ‘it is not enough to be a member of a socially-defined group. Rather … research (particularly qualitative research) relies on the researcher’s ability to participate fully in the lives of those he [sic] studies’ (1998: 366). I agree with Gamst who similarly stresses that ‘full, or near full, participation adds to social science the penetrating focus of first-hand involvement in the dynamics of interpersonal relations of subjects, and adds greater comprehension and appreciation of their attitudes and behaviour’ (1980: 24). Lived experiences have a huge effect on how people view themselves or the world (Ringberg et al. 2010). Open exposure to experiences and full immersion in the cultural environments of the researched provide the researcher with tacit or implicit components of knowledge (Polanyi 1962) about the group which may be unreachable otherwise. It has been my experience that the richness of my participation in the events, activities and experiences of the researched community has had a huge influence on how my research project has been moulded at every stage. As Griffith (1998: 367) puts it: ‘The who of research – the social relations of the researcher’s biography – shapes the topic of research, the methodology used and the knowledge gained’. To be an insider researcher to the group has been interpreted in a variety of ways and approximations. For example, Sikes believes that to be qualified as insider research it is enough to be ‘investigating topics in which one has a personal interest’ (2008: 145). In my case, on top of my ‘personal interest’, my profuse participation, lived experiences and my prior knowledge about the researched community allowed me to assume an insider’s stance. This stance, which was a culmination of many experiences, events, and understandings, significantly affected and sculpted every stage of my research project, from its inception to the conclusion. For instance, my autobiographic experiences were instrumental in the selection of research questions, organizing of fieldwork, analyzing of empirical material, identifying themes and topics, emphasizing perspectives and thus creating new knowledge. Academic Mobility This research stems from my autobiography and is preconditioned by my insider’s experiences. It focuses on academic mobility and academic migration, which are growing phenomena worldwide. Skilled migration and academic mobility

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are the most visible manifestations of globalization and internationalization of education today (Agoston and Dima 2012). To provide a brief statistical overview, in 2010 close to 4.1 million tertiary education students were enrolled outside of their country of origin, up from 3.7 million in 2009 and 3.5 million in 2008. The number of international students increased from 2.1 to 4.1 million during the 11year period from 2000 to 2010, representing an average growth of 7.1 per cent per year (OECD 2012). International flow of highly skilled migrants including international students has been steadily high in the last decades, and research on academic mobility is gaining in importance and urgency worldwide (Kenway and Fahey 2006, 2009). Academic mobility in Europe may not be a new phenomenon, but it has become more evident after mobility programs were introduced within the evolving and expanding European Union. Erasmus is the most prominent and widespread of the numerous programs for academic mobility. Standing for EuRopean Community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students, it started as a program for student exchange in the united Europe in 1987. With its newer addition, Erasmus Mundus, it extends beyond Europe and now truly involves a global academic community of students and staff. My academic mobility experience as an Erasmus Mundus Postdoctoral Research Fellow has been associated more closely with this international program and its community. I have been fortunate to participate in this program on a postdoctoral exchange from Australia to Italy. If we look at the numbers of academic exchanges, in the last reporting year 2009/10, there were 213,266 Erasmus student mobilities of which 177,705 students were studying abroad and 35,561 students were doing traineeships (placements) abroad (EC 2011a). Among staff, there were 37,776 Erasmus staff mobilities of which 29,031 held teaching assignments abroad and 8,745 staff had training periods abroad. In total, 2,982 higher education institutions sent students and staff on Erasmus mobility. The total number of Erasmus student mobilities for studies and placements combined in 2009/10 was 213,266, an annual increase of 7.4 per cent. In 25 years of the program’s existence, from its inception in 1987 to 2012, over 3 million students have benefited from the Erasmus program. Almost all of the 32 participating countries experienced an annual growth in the number of incoming students for studies and placements. Erasmus supported a total of 37,776 mobility periods for teaching and non-teaching staff from higher education institutions, and staff from enterprises (EC 2011a). This represents an annual increase of 3.8 per cent from the previous academic year. Among them, 76.9 per cent of the staff mobilities supported were for teaching assignments. Italy has been an active participant in the student and staff mobility program from the outset. In the last decade the number of mobilities from Italy almost doubled from 13,253 people in 2000/01 to 21,039 in 2009/10. The Erasmus Mundus program has gradually involved Australia in what was previously a uniquely European scheme. Australian scholars have been slowly developing their participation in this program. According to the EC statistics, 86 people (65 men and 21 women) participated in the exchange in the six-year

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period from 2004/05 to 2009/10. In 2004/05, 9 people (all men) participated in this scheme, 8 people (7 men and 1 woman) in 2006/07, 11 people (9 men and 2 women) in 2007/08 and the numbers have jumped to a relatively high 25 exchanges (20 men and 5 women) in 2008/09 and 33 people (20 men and 13 women) in 2009/10. There is a consistent gender imbalance – male academics considerably predominate in every academic year, although women made a significant breakthrough in the last reporting year (EC 2011b). The global scale of academic mobility opens up prosperous opportunities for intercultural knowledge interchange, knowledge creation and knowledge enrichment, all leading to the broadening of cultural imagination and creation of shared cultural meanings. Knowledge workers are very valuable actors in today’s knowledge economy and international knowledge mobility is actively sought for and encouraged by many talent-attracting nation-states (Kuptsch and Pang 2006). While acknowledging an existing potential to devalue migrants’ skills and undervalue their experiences – what is sometimes termed ‘brain abuse’ (Bauder 2003) – in this study I am interested in researching optimal conditions and favourable environments for enabling knowledge transfer and creation. EUI and LUISS as Case Studies For my empirical research on academic hyper-mobility I selected the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence and LUISS Guido Carli University in Rome, both in Italy, which are perfect case studies for examining the experiences of mobile academics in modern times in a cosmopolitan milieu. Both the EUI and LUISS are geared to attract large numbers of international students and staff. The EUI is a distinctly international institution, currently hosting a community of more than 1,000 scholars from over 60 European and non-European countries. LUISS currently has 120 cooperation agreements for student exchange programs with university partners in 30 countries. From 1990 to 2009 LUISS hosted close to 2,500 international students, and over 2,700 LUISS students took part in the international exchanges in the same period. These two universities have active and growing programs to attract visiting professors and researchers, which represents a vivid example of liquid academic mobility internationally. Their cosmopolitan academic environments provide an excellent opportunity to explore the ways social and intercultural interactions develop among academic professionals. My lengthy stays as a Visiting Researcher at the EUI and as a Postdoctoral Fellow at LUISS provided me with ample opportunities to gain insider’s knowledge by participating in all types of educational activities: lectures, classes, seminars, conferences and recreational events. I was offered unique advantages in experiencing academic research environments enriched from cross-fertilization of research traditions and unique academic approaches. The EUI and LUISS are leading research and teaching institutions devoted exclusively to social sciences.

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They especially emphasize comparative studies and international links which are of particular interest for academic migrants. Both are renowned academic institutions that promote academic mobility by recruiting their full-time teaching staff, fellows and research students from all countries of the European Union and many other parts of the globe. Overall, many participants described the EUI and LUISS environments as cosmopolitan. This environment created a supportive milieu so that many participants enjoyed intercultural communication which made knowledge sharing successful. As a crucial part of my fieldwork I conducted insider’s research by partaking in diverse doctoral and postdoctoral training activities as a participant, observer and researcher. I gathered plentiful qualitative data on students’ learning experiences by participating in academic seminars, presentations, discussions and debates. The EUI and LUISS presented exceptional environments for exploring opportunities for knowledge creation from the inside through first-hand face-to-face interaction with mobile academic participants – postgraduate researchers, postdoctoral fellows and professors from many countries who became directly engaged in my fieldwork research. Academic Agents of Knowledge Creation My research focuses on the first-hand experiences of a particular skilled immigrant group: academic migrants. I define academic migrants as professionals whose academic careers span diverse international settings and ethno-cultural environments. This group includes undergraduate and postgraduate students, doctoral and postdoctoral researchers, and academic and professional staff employed at academic institutions. This is a group that shares intrinsic professional preconditions, intercultural experiences, international encounters, global outlooks, far-reaching expectations and imaginative intercultural perspectives. It is predisposed to developing intercultural views and cosmopolitan dispositions (Kirpitchenko 2011). It has been important for me, as an insider researcher not only to be a member of this group, but also to be actively engaged in all types of activities that may be characteristic of this mobile group, such as learning and teaching events, academic conferences, policy seminars, targeted training programs, visiting fellowships, exchange programs, extracurricular cultural activities and social events. It has to be admitted that academic migrants have more opportunities, propensities and inclinations for being mobile in today’s changing world. This is a group of people who effectively portray a paradigm shift in understandings of contemporary mobility, where ‘flexibility, migration, and relocations, instead of being coerced or resisted, have become practices to strive for rather than stability’ (Ong 1999: 19). Academic mobility creates additional possibilities for knowledge mobility, knowledge translation and knowledge transfer. Williams, for example, argues that ‘international migration is a particularly important, potential source

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of knowledge creation precisely because it involves transversing boundaries’ (2006: 593). Williams further suggests that: ‘There is a very fine line between knowledge translation and creation. Migrants bring knowledge with them to a new setting, where it may be integrated with other knowledge through participation in various formal and informal practices’ (2006: 593). Academic migrants become very important agents of knowledge transfer and knowledge creation because they benefit from both crossing national boundaries and participating in the knowledge practices of the local communities. In this way, academic migrants are comparable to insider researchers and these two groups are likely to be perceived as prominent agents of knowledge transfer and knowledge translation. Academic migrants enter into contact with diverse cultural models and academic traditions and are set to transfer their knowledge in culturally diverse environments. Similarly insider researchers possess tacit knowledge of a particular cultural group and act as translators of knowledge between this group and a wider academic community. Translation of knowledge inevitably involves translation of cultures (Asad 1986), that is, translation of cultural imaginations. Therefore, knowledge translation is done in imaginative ways that are able to transcend boundaries. Intercultural imagination presupposes not only transferring meaning, but also building on the original meaning by adding new levels of cultural knowledge. While knowledge tends to be defined in restricted terms as ‘a set of organized statements of facts or ideas’ (Bell 1973: 41), it is cultural imagination that transcends the boundaries of ‘organized statements’. It was Albert Einstein who observed that ‘Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress and giving birth to evolution. It is, strictly speaking, a real factor in scientific research’ (1931: 97). That is to say that knowledge translation relies on the processes of creative interpretation and arriving at shared cultural meanings and thus is inevitably accompanied by knowledge creation. It is widely acknowledged that intercultural encounters of academic migrants bring into contact different ethno-cultural perspectives and diverse imaginative interpretations of knowledge. Current debates within modernity and postmodernity theories bring to light an increased diversity and plurality of viewpoints. As Anthony Giddens puts it, ‘The post-modern outlook sees a plurality of heterogeneous claims to knowledge’ (1990: 2). Intercultural encounters may fuel conflicts, but they also create opportunities for a harmonious creation of shared intercultural meanings. In order to contribute to a better understanding of the ‘symbolic process in which people from different cultures create shared meanings’ (Taylor and Osland 2003: 213), this research engaged academic migrants in imparting their experiences, views and perceptions of intercultural interactions. It was revealed that certain cultural dispositions act as enabling factors for knowledge transfer and creation of shared cultural meanings. These cultural dispositions can be more closely described as cosmopolitan, drawing from the current scholarship on cosmopolitanism.

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Cosmopolitan Opportunities for Knowledge Creation My positioning as an insider researcher and insider mobile academic helped me to identify conditions and opportunities within academic mobility that may lead to knowledge transfer, knowledge translation and knowledge creation. My own accounts and the accounts of my research participants demonstrate that cultural ‘long-lasting dispositions of the mind and body’ have a propensity to either promote or hinder intercultural communication. My research found that cosmopolitan dispositions displayed by mobile academics tend to facilitate and promote intercultural dialogue. In fact, my insider’s participation showed that cosmopolitan values present the crucial components of successful intercultural dialogue. Participants of my research spoke of cultural openness and acceptance of diversity, willingness to engage and minimal power distance as being important components of intercultural encounters. In this way, cosmopolitan dispositions are seen to present necessary stepping stones for effective knowledge flows. An objective of this discussion is to examine empirical evidence of the growing cosmopolitan values and dispositions in everyday social interactions. In this study, cosmopolitanism is understood as an ‘orientation, a willingness to engage with the other … intellectual and aesthetic openness toward divergent cultural experiences, a search for contrasts rather than uniformity’ (Hannerz 1996: 104). Similarly, Skrbis and Woodward believe that ‘cosmopolitans espouse a broadly defined disposition of “openness” toward others, people, things and experiences whose origin is non-local’ (2007: 730). Calcutt, Woodward and Skrbis add that ‘cosmopolitanism includes Kantian universalism, cross-cultural competence, and either a willingness to tolerate or engage with otherness’ (2009: 172). While the idea of ‘tolerating otherness’ brings to mind conflicting relations and unequal power positions, the notions of ‘engagement with otherness’ and ‘openness to diversity’ have much more resonance for my research. Being attuned to different cultures on many levels has been considered a necessary cultural attribute in the contemporary age. Cultural openness involves ‘the search for, and delight in, the contrasts between societies rather than a longing for superiority or for uniformity’ (Urry 2000: 7). Cultural openness is the main characteristic of a cosmopolitan standpoint – a stance that tends to be conducive to generating new forms of critical knowledge (Hannerz 1996: 103–9). My research findings directly support these observations. The central argument of my research is that various expressions of cosmopolitan dispositions are desirable preconditions for successful creation of shared cultural meanings. I will briefly discuss some cosmopolitan dispositions that became salient in my empirical research. They can be framed as openness to cultural diversity or intercultural acceptance. My participants described many situations where they encountered different visions of cultural imaginations. Louisa’s story can serve as an example. Once while sitting an exam Louisa talked to her Russian girlfriend and they helped each other with the exam questions. After the exam Louisa received an email sent to

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everybody at the department saying that some students were ‘pissed off because other students were helping each other’. This message also warned that next time the students would go to the professors. Louisa commented that ‘It was a great shock. We also realized that it was the opinion shared by many’. Louisa explained that exam results would determine the amount of scholarship you get, therefore exams were very competitive and friendship was pushed to second place. She said that in her native country ‘something like that would be unimaginable and no thought like that would cross our mind. Our students would not write such a letter to their fellow students and threaten to go to the professors with something like that. But here it was seen as something ordinary and possible’. It was especially surprising for Louisa because she remembered that students did help each other and did their homework together: ‘But when it was time for an exam or a test, everyone was for himself or herself. There was no longer cooperation, but severe competition …’ (Florence, November 2007). This example draws attention to the differences in cultural models which often require imaginative translations. Cultural models describe schemas for organizing cultural knowledge and are more commonly discussed within cognitive psychology and cultural linguistics (Holland and Quinn 1987). Some of the best known cultural models have been defined as collectivism and individualism (Hofstede and Hofstede 2005). The example above illustrates the need to translate the implicit assumptions commonly shared by collectivists. Interpersonal relations tend to be valued by collectivists and therefore any form of collaboration and cooperation is readily recognized and accepted. Conversely, any form of competition is not habitually condoned. As Storti observes: ‘In cultures where people identify more with a primary group than with the self, competition may threaten group harmony, and that, in turn threatens the very survival of the group’ (1994: 57–8). The abovementioned example of collaboration reveals the gap that needs to be bridged by knowledge translation and cultural acceptance. Without cultural interpretation this example might have a shocking effect for individualists, yet go without saying for collectivists. Severe competitive relations are generally seen by collectivists as counterproductive, and they are culturally predisposed to thrive in the more collaborative and mutually supporting environments. These encountered differences in cultural models highlighted the importance of the key cosmopolitan disposition termed ‘openness to cultural diversity’. This disposition can also be described as intercultural acceptance. Openness and acceptance of cultural diversity is what was demanded of early anthropologists who entered into contact with Indigenous cultures distant to theirs. Intercultural acceptance is equally called for in the midst of modern encounters between diverse cultures. Among my participants, there was a sense of global openness to world diversity, awareness of global opportunities and responsibilities, along with globally shared collective futures. Very high hopes and aspirations about new possibilities opening up in new countries are what usually drive people to move from their home countries into the unknown. Stefan could not hide that he ‘was

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very fascinated about going to study [abroad]’. Ted was equally enthusiastic: ‘My expectations were terrific and just unbelievable. I was going there with a lot of enthusiasm and great hopes. It was my first experience and I liked it … Everything was new and unusual and I enjoyed it’. When Diane went abroad for the first time she described her prospects in even more brilliant terms: ‘My expectations were amazing. I thought that it was very important and it can even change my life, something along these lines’ (Florence, October 2007). Many respondents believed that their stays abroad will provide them with additional chances to be immersed in cultural diversity which will help them to learn more about the diversity of cultural manifestations. Jessica admitted that she was motivated by her curiosity to learn about the educational systems abroad: ‘I wanted to learn something that I have not encountered before. It was always my main motivation. And I always wanted to compare both [educational] systems’. Louisa also was driven by the new challenges and wanted to ‘try other instructional and methodological approaches different from ours’. Louisa was thinking about her professional career opportunities: ‘I expected and hoped that there would be more opportunities opening to me in terms of finding an employment afterwards’. Sophie expected: ‘the usual stuff – better life, better education, a new world, and new friends’. Chantal also had a number of professional and personal hopes: ‘So that I will be able to develop myself not only in the academic sense, but also in the cultural sense’ (Florence, November 2007). Cultural acceptance presupposes recognition of a plurality of viewpoints. It is an acknowledgement of ‘the otherness of others’ and commitment to be reflexive about diverse cultures, no matter how entangled they may be in the cosmopolitan milieu. Mobile academics encounter an increased diversity of viewpoints and it was remarkable that many participants found it very satisfying to be students of cultural diversity. Thus, Louisa described enjoyment in interacting with people from different cultures: ‘Their worldviews are different and you have to adjust to different viewpoints and it takes time to figure out that people are different. But it is also interesting to see how different viewpoints can be’. Jane was fascinated to study cultural multiplicities: ‘it was genuinely interesting … to hear someone speaking who experienced [diverse] societies and realities’. Similarly, Nick enjoyed new cultures very much: ‘everyone is very open and they are much more social and agitated people’. Ted also noted that preserving one’s own cultural distinctiveness could be a great advantage. Alex agreed that ‘being different is not necessarily your drawback … and the differences can play on your behalf’. He continued: ‘I cherish these differences … I am actually curious about cultural differences … It is like languages – whenever you learn another language it enriches you’. Alex said that he felt ‘totally happy’ precisely because the academic culture was so open. Jessica noted that there would always be cultural differences, but what mattered was which of them had any significance. Cosmopolitan dispositions for recognition and acceptance of these cultural differences through the processes of self-reflection lead to the creation of shared understandings of interpersonal encounters.

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Conclusion As a participant and researcher of intercultural encounters, I find it telling that the emic/etic distinction originated inside the discipline of linguistics. This origin can be perceived as an indication that there are differences in languages spoken among insiders and outsiders. Linguists argue that ‘reality is constructed through the use of language. As such, language is not just a simple medium for transporting meaning but rather a medium that activates unique meaning systems that govern our social world’ (Ringberg et al. 2010: 78). Insider researchers often act as translators of insider knowledge and ‘unique meaning systems’ to the outside community. In this respect they can be compared to academic migrants who need to transfer and translate their knowledges in a new environment. Both groups are perceived as influential and imaginative agents of knowledge translation and accompanying knowledge creation. In this chapter I have presented an insider’s perspective on the cosmopolitan opportunities for knowledge translation that arise in the midst of intercultural encounters in academia. Knowledge translation entails entering into the conversation with the other and creating a dialogue with diverse cultures. Ulrich Beck considers that we live in a new world order ‘in which it became necessary to understand, reflect and criticize difference, and in this way to assert and recognize oneself and others as different and hence of equal value’ (2006: 89). The cosmopolitan world order goes even further by embracing alterity and stressing cultural commonalities, shared understandings and internalizing of what was previously viewed as mutually exclusive certainties. The central defining characteristic of a cosmopolitan perspective is a ‘dialogic imagination’. It means not only openness and acceptance of otherness, but also appropriation and internalization of cultures and rationalities within one’s own life, and thus creation of the new entity – an ‘internalized other’ (Beck 2002). Writing about a postmodern cosmopolitan society, Beck suggests the idea of ‘internalization of difference, the co-presence and coexistence of rival lifestyles, contradictory certainties in the experiential space of individuals and societies’ (2006: 89). Intercultural encounters of mobile academics represent this ‘experiential space of individuals’ where rival ways of life and distinct individual experiences are discussed, compared, reflected upon, criticized, combined and internalized. While the accounts of my participants and their openness to differences may be perceived as joyous reminiscences of travellers and temporary sojourners, I argue that in this process we can discern an emerging ‘new world order’. In this new world embracing distinct cultures is a gradual process that starts as a traveller acquires prolonged cultural exposure to otherness. Language learners can testify that cultural immersion is the only way to acquire and internalize linguistic and cultural knowledges. Further engagement with cultural diversity leads to the deepening of intercultural knowledges and internalizing of differences. While the external factors of mobility and exposure are important, in my research it is the personal values and attitudes of the academic migrants that predetermine their success to a greater degree.

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The central argument of this research is that various expressions of cosmopolitan dispositions are desirable preconditions for successful knowledge exchange, knowledge transfer and knowledge creation. It was my insider’s position that led me to the observable conclusions on academic success. Whether mobile academics were effective in knowledge exchange depended to a great extent on their internal habitual dispositions, propensities and inclinations, rather than external situations presented to them. Emerging cosmopolitan values, such as willingness to engage, deeper interpersonal engagement and openness to intercultural diversity, are salient in my empirical research as preconditions for triumphant translation of knowledges. Acknowledgements I am grateful to the Erasmus Mundus Postdoctoral Fellowship, Monash European and EU Centre, Monash University, EUI and LUISS for supporting this research. References Agoston, S. and Dima, A.M. 2012. Trends and strategies within the process of academic internationalisation. Management and Marketing Challenges for the Knowledge Society, 7(1), 43–56. Alcoff, L. 1995. The problem of speaking for others, in Who Can Speak? Authority and Critical Identity, edited by J. Roof and R. Wiegman. Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 97–119. Asad, T. 1986. The concept of cultural translation in British social anthropology, in Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography, edited by J. Clifford and G.E. Marcus. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 141–64. Bauder, H. 2003. ‘Brain abuse’, or the devaluation of immigrant labour in Canada. Antipode, 35(4), 699–717. Beck, U. 2002. The cosmopolitan society and its enemies. Theory, Culture, Society, 19(1–2), 17–44. Beck, U. 2006. The Cosmopolitan Vision. Cambridge: Polity Press. Bell, D. 1973. The Coming of Post-Industrial Society. New York: Basic Books. Bourdieu, P. 1986. Forms of capital, in Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, edited by J.G. Richardson. New York: Greenwood Press, 241–58. Calcutt, L., Woodward, I. and Skrbis, Z. 2009. Conceptualizing otherness: an exploration of the cosmopolitan schema. Journal of Sociology, 45(2), 169–86. EC. 2011a. Lifelong Learning Programme – The Erasmus Programme 2009/2010: A Statistical Overview. Luxembourg: European Commission. EC. 2011b. Statistics By Country – Erasmus Mundus Scholars Selected Each Academic Year, 2004–05 to 2009–10. Luxembourg: European Commission.

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Einstein, A. 1931. Cosmic Religion: With Other Opinions and Aphorisms. New York: Covici-Friede. Eppley, K. 2006. Defying insider-outsider categorization: one researcher’s fluid and complicated positioning on the insider-outsider continuum. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 7(3), Art. 16. Gamst, F.C. 1980. Toward a method of industrial ethnology. Rice University Studies, 66(1), 15–42. Ganga, D. and Scott, S. 2006. Cultural ‘insiders’ and the issue of positionality in qualitative migration research: moving ‘across’ and moving ‘along’ researcher– participant divides. Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 7(3), Art. 7. Giddens, A. 1990. The Consequences of Modernity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Gilbert, M.R. 1994. The politics of location: doing feminist research at ‘home’. The Professional Geographer, 46(1), 90–96. Griffith, A.I. 1998. Insider/outside: epistemological privilege and mothering work, Human Studies, 21, 361–76. Hannerz, U. 1996. Transnational Connections: Culture, People, Places. New York: Routledge. Harris, M. 1976. History and significance of the emic/etic distinction. Annual Review of Anthropology, 5, 329–50. Headland, T.N., Pike, K.L. and Harris, M. 1990. Emics and Etics: The Insider/ Outsider Debate. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Hofstede, G.H. and Hofstede, G.J. 2005. Cultures and Organizations: Software of the Mind. New York: McGraw Hill. Holland, D. and Quinn, N. 1987. Cultural Models in Language and Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kenway, J. and Fahey, J. 2006. The research imagination in a world on the move. Globalization, Societies and Education, 4(2), 261–74. Kenway, J. and Fahey, J. 2009. Academic mobility and hospitality: the good host and the good guest. European Educational Research Journal, 8(4), 555–9. Kirpitchenko, L. 2011. Academic hyper-mobility and cosmopolitan dispositions. Journal of Intercultural Communication [Online], 27. Available at: http://www. immi.se/intercultural/nr27/kirpitchenko.htm [accessed: 18 February 2013]. Kuptsch, C. and Pang, E.F. 2006. Competing for Global Talent. Geneva: International Institute for Labour Studies. OECD. 2012. Education at a Glance 2012: OECD Indicators. Paris: OECD. Ong, A. 1999. Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationality. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Pelto, P.J. 1970. Anthropological Research: The Structure of Inquiry. New York: Harper and Row. Pike, K.L. 1967. Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structures of Human Behavior. The Hague: Mouton. Polanyi, M. 1962. Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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Ringberg, T.V., Luna, D., Reihlen, M. and Peracchio, L.A. 2010. Biculturalbilinguals: the effect of cultural frame switching on translation equivalence. International Journal of Cross Cultural Management, 10(1), 77–92. Sikes, P. 2008. Researching research cultures: the case of new universities, in Researching Education from the Inside: Investigations from Within, edited by P. Sikes and A. Potts. London: Routledge, 144–58. Skrbis, Z. and Woodward, I. 2007. The ambivalence of ordinary cosmopolitanism: investigating the limits of cosmopolitan openness. Sociological Review, 55(4), 730–47. Storti, C. 1994. Cross-Cultural Dialogues: 74 Brief Encounters with Cultural Difference. Yarmouth, ME: Intercultural Press. Taylor, S. and Osland, J.S. 2003. The impact of intercultural communication on global organizational learning, in Blackwell Handbook of Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management, edited by M. Easterby-Smith and M.A. Lyles. Oxford: Blackwell, 212–32. Urry, J. 2000. The Global Media and Cosmopolitanism, Transnational America Conference, Bavarian American Academy, Munich, June. Available at: http:// www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/sociology/papers/urry-global-media.pdf [accessed: 18 February 2013]. Williams, A.M. 2006. Lost in translation? International migration, learning and knowledge. Progress in Human Geography, 30(5), 588–607.

Index

Aboriginal 8, 21, 22–34, 42, 74 Albania/Albanian 76, 87, 94–97 Alevi vi, 117, 119–127, 129–130 activist 10, 11, 25, 90, 91, 93, asylum, asylum seeker 23, 32, 60, 123 Ataturk, Mustafa Kemal 123 Australia 21, 22–28, 31–34, 40, 45, 48, 74, 88, 89, 90, 94–99, 122, 126, 127, 135–145, 153, 155, 157, 169–173, 177, 179, 180, 191, 192 Darwin 8, 21–26, 28–34, 47 Melbourne 22, 28, 33, 136 Sydney 23, 24, 127, 136, 143, 172 authority, authoritative 2, 3, 4, 12, 13, 14, 27, 30, 41, 63, 64, 77, 78, 93, 112, 143, 145, 146 autoethnography 88, 89, 115 Bauman, Zygmunt 159 Beck, Ulrich 159, 199 Belgium 9, 10, 60, 69, 73, 76, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 109, 111, 112, 122 Antwerp vii–ix, 69, 73–74, 82, 103 Brussels 10, 103–109 belonging viii, xiii, 2, 7–11, 13, 40, 46, 70, 95, 98, 103, 105, 107, 122, 128, 138–139, 146, 158, 160, 163, 171, 178 Black (African) vi, viii, xiii, 12, 22, 78, 119, 169–185 blackness 169–170, 174–175, 180, 184 Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bosnia, Bosnian 10, 77, 87, 89, 91, 92, 94, 97, 98, 99 Bourdieu, Pierre 173, 188 British 4, 22 capital 1, 144 capitalist 155 China viii, xiv, 12, 59, 153–156, 163–164 Xiamen viii, xiv, 12, 153–165

Christian 121 citizenship 9, 61, 71, 81, 122 collectivism/individualism 197 colonial, colonialism 8, 41, 46, 153, 155, 173 communist 137, 139–145 cosmopolitan, cosmopolitanism 38, 41, 44, 49, 58, 59, 119, 154, 159, 187, 188, 193–200 cosmopolitan dispositions 188, 194–198, 200 Denzin, Norman K. 64, 180 diaspora 11, 87, 89, 98, 109, 114, 123, 126, 130, 136, 137–139, 141, 142, 144, 145, 146 displacement 10, 32, 89, 91, 93, 108 distance xiii, 2–4, 6, 9, 10, 11, 13, 40, 41, 43, 60, 70–72, 74, 76–81, 89, 93, 106, 118, 120, 129, 158, 160, 164, 170, 190, 196 Dutch 73, 74, 75, 79 east, eastern 41, 143, 163, 165 Eastern Europe fn 104, 137, 142 Middle East 23, 25, fn 120 Eastwood, Clint 161 emic/etic 88, 90, 98, 99, 100, 144, 189, 199 emotion(s), emotional, emotionally xiii, 22, 25, 33, 58, 90, 92–93, 99, 103, 126, 128, 135–136, 138–140, 142, 146–147 empathy 27, 42, 44, 47, 71, 99 essentialism, essentialist, essentialize 6, 7, 9, 31, 32, 41, 42, 47, 122 ethics, ethical, ethically v, 1–2, 7, 9–12, 21–22, 24, 27, 29, 33, 40, 43, 45, 54–55, 62, 64, 78, 80, 87, 90–93, 100, 105, 110–112, 114, 127, 157, 181–182

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ethnicity viii, 6, 8, 37, 39, 42, 49, 70–71, 75–77, 79–82, 117, 119–122, 128, 146, 170, 173, 181, 188 ethnography 44, 72, 87, 88, 89, 91, 112, 135, 136, 143, 164 European University Institute (EUI) 193–194, 200 exclusion 11, 38, 41, 141 expatriate vi, viii, xiv, 12, 97, 107, 153, 155–156, 158, 163–164 feminist 22, 27, 41–43, 47, 53, 62, 190 ‘field’ xiv, 3, 8–9, 11–14, 53–54, 56, 70–71, 73–74, 82, 87–88, 90–91, 93, 99–100, 106–115, 124–126, 136, 139–141, 145, 156, 170, 173, 188, 190 fieldwork vi, xiii. 3, 10, 14, 21, 23–24, 26, 28, 33, 54, 58–59, 63–64, 69, 72–74, 76–77, 80–81, 87, 92, 96–97, 100, 106, 109, 111, 113, 117, 119, 121, 128, 130, 135–147, 156, 169, 191, 194 field(work) site(s) 1, 3, 6, 138 field notes 70, 73, 144–145 field(work) diary/notebook 113, 154, 156–157, 162 fractal 37, 48 Ganga, Deianira 71, 190 genocide 89–93, 99 Germany 8, 11, 53–62, 64, 117, 119, 121–126, 130 Glick Schiller, Nina 6, 58 globalization, globality vii–viii, 44, 48, 156, 163, 187, 192 Hage, Ghassan 22, 99, 175 Haraway, Donna 29, 42, 56, 170, 182 Harris, Marvin 88, 189 ‘home’ v, 3, 5, 7, 9–10, 21, 25, 28, 85, 88, 103–106, 108–109, 112, 114–115, 136–138, 153–162, 164, 197 research at home 103, 106, 108, 112, 114–115 homogeneity, homogeneous xiii, 2, 4, 6–7, 10, 56–57, 119, 121, 142, 170, 174 hooks, bell 4, 41

humanity 93, 190 human rights 90, 91, 93, 172 Hungarian vi–vii, 11, 135–147 implicit 38, 41, 112, 175, 191, 197 India, Indian 8, 21, 22, 23, 25, 28, 30, 31, 33, 40, 42, 46, 171 inclusion vii–viii, 9, 11, 22, 38, 69, 141, 146, 187 indigenous 21, 24, 27, 32, 33, 34, 38, 40, 41, 139, 197 integration 2, 11, 22 intercultural vi–ix, 21, 24, 26, 29, 57, 69, 187–188, 193–197, 199–200 international students 8, 53–68, 192–193 internationalization of education 55, 187, 192 interpretive, interpretation xiii, 12, 28, 46, 54, 60, 63–64, 92, 94, 118, 127, 129, 135–136, 139, 147, 155, 163–165, 171, 174, 178, 180–181, 189–191, 195, 197 interviews, interviewing 2, 3, 9, 14, 22, 25, 26, 28, 30, 33, 44–47, 54, 56–64, 73, 74, 76, 79, 80, 81, 99, 104, 109, 110, 121, 125–127, 154, 156, 157, 158, 160–163, 165, 169–176, 178 invisible, invisibility 144, 172 Jamaican 22 Jewish, Jews 10, 103–109, 111–114 knowledge 147, 170–171, 173–177, 179–182, 187–200 knowledge creation vii, 187–189, 190–191, 193–200 knowledge exchange/interchange 187–188, 193 knowledge flow 187, 196 knowledge production 2, 11–12, 62, 170, 182, 188 knowledge sharing 194 knowledge transfer 187, 193–200 knowledge translation 187, 194–200 knowledge worker 193 emotional knowledge 147 situated knowledge 13, 42, 50, 56, 66, 118, 170–171, 181–182 tacit knowledge 182, 191, 195

Index Kosovo 87, 89, 94, 95, 96, 97 language xiii, 6, 9, 28, 29, 30, 34, 44, 54, 56, 58, 59, 61, 62, 64, 71, 74, 75, 80, 81, 87, 88, 92, 94–98, 104, 107, 108, 121, 122, 125, 136, 137, 139, 144, 153, 189, 198, 199 Malinowski, Bronislaw 4, 88 Maori 8, 38–42, 45–47 massacre 117, 120–121, 123, 128–129 Merton, Robert 40, 43, 71, 118, 146, 173, 181 methodological nationalism 6, 13, 117 middle-class 40, 42, 47, 81, 154 migration v, vii–ix, xiii–xiv, 1–4, 6, 8–10, 12–13, 39, 49, 56, 60–62, 69–72, 75, 87–90, 98–99, 104–105, 117–119, 137, 155, 172, 174, 190, 191, 194 academic migrants/migration 12, 187, 191, 194–195, 199 irregular migration 56 forced migration/exile vii, 87, 89–90, 122, 137, 155 labour migrants/migration 60–61, 69, 122, 155, 159 skilled migrants/migration viii, 23, 61– 62, 155, 159, 170–176, 180–181, 191–192, 194 mobility v, vii–ix, xiii, 1–2, 4, 6, 12–13, 23, 33, 53, 59–60, 62, 154–156, 187–188, 190–194, 199 academic mobility vii, 12, 187–188, 191–194, 196 knowledge mobility 187, 193–194 student mobility v, ix, 53, 60 Erasmus program 192, 200 moral 22, 49, 110, 146 moral duty 71 moral responsibility 78 Morocco/Moroccan 69, 73, 75–79 multicultural 22, 23, 33, 79, 95, 138, 154, 169, 178, 187 Narayan, Kirin 5, 10, 72, 78, narrative, self-narrative 12–14, 54, 62, 88, 98, 99, 107, 129, 137, 142, 156, 175, 177, 179, 180, 182

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native 4, 5, 44, 59, 76, 77, 88, 98, 118, 122, 135, 137, 138, 144, 146, 188, 189, 197 nativeness 5 nativization 5 National Intelligence Organization in Turkey (MIT) 126 nation-state 58, 121, 155, 193 New Zealand 37–42, 45, 155 objectivity; objective; objectively 2–3, 45, 48, 71, 89, 91, 112, 115, 125, 170, 190 other 2–5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13, 14, 38, 40, 41, 49, 60, 87, 88, 91, 92, 106, 108, 115, 118, 126, 127, 129, 170, 196, 199 othering 126, 190 otherness 7, 22, 23, 25, 26, 106, 196, 198, 199 Pakeha 8, 38, 39, 40, 42, 45–47 pain 33, 99, 128–129, 178 participant observation 103, 107, 108, 121, 156, 158, 165 Pike, Kenneth 88, 189 phonemic 88, 189 Poland, Polish 9, 69, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77 positionality 8, 57, 62, 144, 146, 162, 163, 164, 169, 170, 171, 174, 180, 181, 190 positivism, positivist 2, 13, 118, 181, 190 postcolonial, postcolonialism 41, 163 power 8, 12, 13, 22, 24, 27, 30, 39, 44, 46, 47, 63, 64, 72, 74, 93, 127, 129, 136, 139, 142, 144, 147, 155, 157, 160, 163, 164, 170, 172, 173, 181, 190, 196 disempower 21, 26, 27 empower 33, 136 proximity 6, 7, 9–11, 58, 70–72, 118, 127, 130, 145, 174, 188, 190, 191 qualitative xiii, xiv, 2, 53, 54, 56, 65, 69, 70, 72–74, 81, 82, 130, 174, 177, 180, 182, 190, 191, 194 quantitative 1, 2, 69, 73 race, racial v, vii–viii, xiii, 3, 8, 12, 21–22, 37–39, 42–43, 45–47, 49, 136,

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146, 154, 160–162, 165, 169–177, 179–182 racialization 22, 25, 27, 31–32, 160, 162, 173–174 racism 12, 13, 46, 47, 48, 169, 170–173, 175–180, 182 reflexivity 12, 13, 22, 43, 54, 57, 58, 69, 82, 118, 135, 169, 170, 182 refugee xiii, 3, 9, 32, 48, 87, 89–91, 93, 138, 141, 143, 172 religion 76, 79, 120, 121, 124, 125, 128 Catholic 9, 74, 76, 77 Islam 79, 120, 121, 123 Muslim 76, 79, 94, 95, 97, 104, 119, 120 Orthodox 104–105, 107, 120 Said, Edward 41 Serbia, Serbian 87, 89, 93, 94, 96, 97, 142 Simmel, Georg 43, 69, 158 Scott, Sam 71, 190 solidarity 94, 147, 163 Soviet Union 77, 123 spy, spies 91, 139, 142 stereotype 22, 25, 29, 33, 48, 78, 95 stranger 27, 29, 38, 43, 44, 71, 107, 136, 137, 158–160 strangeness 38, 141 Stolen Generation 31, 33 subjectivity 4, 7, 23, 40, 56, 59, 71, 89, 92–93, 115, 170–171, 180–182, 189–190 intersubjectivity 5, 9, 13, 57, 58, 64 survey 2, 14, 29, 69, 73, 76

trauma, traumatic 31, 141 transnational, transnationalism 10, 12, 58, 99, 106, 124, 145, 153, 154–156, 158, 159, 162, 164 trust, trusting, trustworthy vi, 13, 22, 27, 31, 71, 79, 90, 94, 120, 135–136, 139–147, 157, 175, 190 distrust, mistrust 79, 139–144, 146–147 Turkey 10, 56, 60, 61, 117, 119–130 Istanbul 119–120, 123, 126 universities 55, 57, 193 victim, victimization 10, 118, 129–130, 141, 147 violence vii–viii, 87, 91, 93–95, 121, 126, 129 symbolic violence 173 visible 6, 25, 26, 59, 93, 124, 154, 157, 164, 172, 192 west 4–5, 41, 153–157, 163, 165 western 12, 41, 57, 91, 95, 122, 154, 159, 161–162 westerner 12, 153, 160, 163, 164 white, whiteness 4, 8, 13, 21–23, 25, 29, 31–34, 38, 40, 42, 45–47, 57, 154, 161, 162, 165, 169–172, 177 youth 23, 27, 73, 77, 80, 172 Yugoslavia xiii, 10, 87, 89, 92, 93, 94, 95 post-Yugoslav 89, 93, 95