The dilemma of conducting research back in your own country as a returning student – reflections of research fieldwork in Zimbabwe

Abstract

The research process is more like finding one's way through a complex maze. 'Home is where the heart is', but foreign students face a number of problems upon their return home to do research. This paper chronicles the dilemma of a Zimbabwean student conducting fieldwork for his UK-based doctoral studies in his own country. The dilemmas were critical in that the fieldwork was undertaken during the 'Zimbabwe crisis' and the inherent problems of researching government-related organisations. This has a bearing on any research process and invokes use of the etic/emic dilemma. This paper contributes to the gaps and growing literature on methods and techniques for conducting qualitative research in human geography.

Me again: Fieldwork, practice and returning

“…In doing this, I attempt to engage with recent texts in Area that have dealt with a diverse range of issues relating to positionalitythe native returning home for fieldwork navigating an insider/outsider bias (Zhao, 2017) and/or being seen as "suspicious" (Mandiyanike, 2009), the heterogeneity in categories of privilege (Griffiths, 2017), negotiating multiple subjectivities with research assistants (Anwar & Viqar, 2017) and looking beyond existing social categories to other aspects of positionality (Moser, 2008). I examine here the dynamic positionality of "returning," as understood through the changing expectations of colleagues and participants, as well as the impact on ethics and the production of knowledge.…”

“…Projects are often built on existing knowledge of a field, through previous work (either research-related or otherwise), or through existing familiarity with a place that may be seen as "home," which creates its own dilemmas of changing relationships and categories of understanding, and being both an insider and outsider (Ite, 1997;Mandiyanike, 2009;Narayan, 1993;Sultana, 2007;Zhao, 2017). For many researchers, particularly now as funding at universities becomes more scarce, doing fieldwork within short time constraints means needing as many things as possible to be in place beforehand, both in terms of logistics, as well as ideas.…”

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

“…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.…”

Positionality, subjectivity, and race in transnational and transcultural geographical research

“…At that time, however, there was little in the academic literature that I felt I could relate to or which helped me to understand the confusion, frustration, and anger I often felt when referred to as 'white. ' In drawing attention to the relationship between researchers and research participants and the politics of representation, geographers uniformly acknowledge the significance of subjectivity and positionality (for example , Chacko 2004;Dowling 2005;Jazeel and McFarlane 2010;Mandiyanike 2009;Miraftab 2004;Mohammad 2001;Nagar 2002;Nast 1994;Noxolo 2009;Skelton 2001;Sultana 2007). Critiques of ethnographers and ethnographies constituting research subjects as 'other' to the researcher and (unintentionally) reinforcing masculinist, colonialist representations have demanded greater epistemological reflexivity (Nayak 2006), particularly concerning relations of power, ethics, and representation of researchers and the subjects of their ethnographies (Butz and Besio 2009;Nayak 2006).…”