Reflexiones colectivas para continuar la construcción de sujetos

A farewell to the lone hero researcher: team research and writing

“…The academic field continues to remain mainly closed for people who are not scholars (Bourdieu, 2008), and there is arguably an extractivist element in the way researchers use people's lives and narratives (Alonso et al, 2018;Sinha & Back, 2014). This well-known critique should invite reflection over alternative methods to do and write up research in criminology.…”

“…Such approaches can arguably empower social actors, challenge the borders between scholars and research subjects, and question the alienating distinctions between academic and other forms of knowledge. Issues such as positionality, power imbalance, and questions about dissemination and ownership have been debated widely in methodological and colonialism literature (Alonso et al, 2018;Leyva et al, 2018;Spivak, 1988). This is a valuable and pertinent criticism; however, it does not always come with constructive alternatives.…”

On Conversation and Authorship: Legal Frameworks for Collaborative Methodologies

“…Another concern (Alonso et al, 2018;Leyva et al, 2018;Trentini & Wolanski, 2018), perhaps more founded, is that collaboration can be a mere simulation; that the people involved in social movements or organizations are incorporated in the research as mere apprentices, or even used instrumentally without really being taken into consideration. In the work I carried out in Cherán, the community was concerned that researchers go to the community with an agenda and that they take their observations in a biased manner without truly listening.…”

“…This means that the people involved in social processes are not considered external, passive, or lacking of agency for the construction of knowledge. Critiques argue that the category of research subjects should be dismissed when it limits or reduces people to nameless, generic and indeterminate forms (Alonso et al, 2018; Leyva et al, 2018). Thus, participatory research requires understanding that the voice of social actors has value in itself; that there is no need for someone else to speak for the subject as they can do much more than give an account of their experience: they can analyze it.…”

“…The second way in which collaborative methodologies challenge positivistic views of social science is through the political commitment of the scholar toward the social process she studies. This methods have been known as militant research, activist research, co-labor, situated, engaged or decolonial research (Alonso et al, 2018; Aragón Andrade, 2019; Hale, 2006; Held, 2019; Sieder, 2013). All these concepts carry different meanings and set forward their own kind of agenda, commitment, techniques and epistemic guidelines.…”