Working Within Hyphen-Spaces in Ethnographic Research: Implications for Research Identities and Practice

Ethnographers often find themselves wrestling with choices about their relationship with respondents: choices experienced by researchers engaged in many other methodologies. This article examines the agentic and political nature of those relationships using the notion of hyphen-spaces: a concept tha...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Organizational research methods 2013-07, Vol.16 (3), p.364-392
Main Authors: Cunliffe, Ann L., Karunanayake, Geetha
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Choices
Ethics
Ethnography
Fieldwork
Fluid dynamics
Fluid flow
Fluids
Plantations
Recognition
Research methodology
Researchers
Social identity
Sri Lanka
Tea
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Summary:Ethnographers often find themselves wrestling with choices about their relationship with respondents: choices experienced by researchers engaged in many other methodologies. This article examines the agentic and political nature of those relationships using the notion of hyphen-spaces: a concept that offers a way of recognizing their complexity, making choices about how to position ourselves and work within them, and understanding the implications for research identities and practice. Drawing on Fine’s notion of “working the hyphens” and personal experience of ethnographic fieldwork in a tea plantation in Sri Lanka, we propose four hyphen-spaces of insiderness-outsiderness, sameness-difference, engagement-distance, and political activism–active neutrality. We believe an understanding of these relationships will help us become more informed and ethical researchers interested in engaging in different methodologies. Finally, we emphasize the fluid and agentic nature of researcher-respondent identities and the implications for practice.
ISSN:1094-4281
1552-7425
DOI:10.1177/1094428113489353