Fieldwork among the Dong national minority in Guizhou, China: Practicalities, obstacles and challenges

Abstract

The People's Republic of China (PRC) is increasingly open to foreigners undertaking social science fieldwork; yet obstacles remain. Working with ethnic minorities adds further complexities because of the sensitive topics such research may raise. Based on recent fieldwork among the Dong in southeast Guizhou, as the first foreign researcher to ask for and gain official permission to work in the region, this article exposes some of the challenges, both practical and methodological, of conducting research in the PRC. Gaining access to my field site was a long trek through the hierarchic maze of Chinese administration. While reflecting upon this process, I detail my negotiations with local authorities. I then examine how I found reliable statistical data, was able to access the voices of peasants, acted to protect the anonymity of dissident informants, and negotiated working with local research assistants once in the field. These aspects, in turn, highlighted the importance of considering positionality in the field. Although each person's experiences and routes to fieldwork are unique, there are recurrent issues that shape the research process in the PRC. I reflect upon a number of these here, in the hope that this can smooth the way for future researchers.

Why Did I Not Prepare for This? The Politics of Negotiating Fieldwork Access, Identity, and Methodology in Researching Microfinance Institutions

“…In this case, the injunction was the following: "Do your research but do not disturb us." Others also note that formal access does not guarantee rapport with individual informants (Cornet, 2010;Laurila, 1997;Lee, 1993;Mukeredzi, 2011). Branch managers, as well as loan officers, were powerful gatekeepers to observation of how microfinance actually works in the field.…”

“…Other researchers, however, have highlighted the ethical and methodological challenges involved in working in developing countries (Cornet, 2010;Crossa, 2012;Geleta, 2014;Guevarra, 2006;Kiragu & Warrington, 2013;Mandiyanike, 2009;Rubin, 2012;Sultana, 2007;Turgo, 2012;Visser, 2000). Nonetheless, although these scholars conducted their research in the specific geographic regions, the research contexts and geopolitics of their work vary considerably.…”

Vernacular Landscapes Building and Protection of Meme in the Dong Ethnic Minority Regions

“…Studying the long history of the Dong people, it should be noted that they have a standardized set of symbols, which have a distinctive feature among many other ethnic groups of China (Picard and Wood, ). Absolutely every unit of life is a kind of meme in which certain historical information is encoded (Cornet, ). There are clear associations with the Dong people.…”

Doing fieldwork the Chinese way: a returning researcher's insider/outsider status in her home town

“…Working with local research assistants is a common practice among researchers engaged in cross‐cultural fieldwork. ‘Insider’ assistants who at times perform the role of gatekeepers are able to help ‘outsider’ researchers gain access to information and participants (Cornet ; Middleton and Cons ; Turner ). As a returning researcher able to speak the local dialect of Mandarin and having a certain degree of familiarity with local contexts, I worked alone most of the time during my fieldwork.…”

“…However, I had to work with an assistant when interviewing local villagers who could only speak the Bai language . Unlike Cornet () and Turner () – two Western researchers who were assigned research assistants by local governments when doing fieldwork in China – my insiderness allowed me to select my own assistants in Dali and my work was not controlled by official gatekeepers such as state research assistants.…”