Co-producing fieldwork under fire: collaborating with journalists in Syria and Iraq

Abstract

This commentary discusses the co-production of fieldwork with journalists in conflict zones. Although this type of collaboration can produce rich and novel datasets on the workings of chaos, security and conflict, it has received very little attention within geography and related disciplines. This commentary therefore focuses on the author's experience of cooperating with journalists in March and October 2014 in the Kurdish-held Syrian territories called Rojava (the West), and in June 2014 when visiting the Kurdish Peshmerga forces at the frontlines with the Islamic State (by then still Islamic State of Iraq and al Shams) outside Mosul and Kirkuk, Iraq. Following a brief discussion about the advantages of an academic–journalist co-production of fieldwork, the commentary lists the practicalities of such collaboration based on the experiences made in the field, including a section on more problematic issues encountered. Given the nature of this kind of fieldwork, which is not without risk, the discussion of personal safety plays a central role in the commentary.