Parallel Paradoxes and Useful Uselessness

Paul Draus,Juliette Roddy,Kanzoni Asabigi

doi:10.1177/2158244016679684

Abstract

This article explores potentially productive parallels between ethnographic interviewing, mindfulness-based practices, and recovery processes. First, we consider ethnographic interviews as dialogic and affective encounters that reflect and complement the recovery process, paradoxically enhancing agency by illuminating one’s lack of control. For individuals in recovery from substance abuse and associated trauma, the ethnographic interview may provide an opportunity to examine past events and gain insight into factors that contributed to risky situations and behaviors. We propose that the dialogic space created by the ethnographic interview resembles the moment-to-moment awareness cultivated by mindfulness practices and may have individual-level benefits for similar reasons. We briefly explore the relevance of recent research on epigenetic and neural plasticity. Finally, the potential for greater awareness of these mindfulness mechanisms to enhance ethnographic interviews is discussed.

Highlights

In sociology, most interviews begin with a period of awkwardness, as investigators well know
In our interviews with recently arrested street sex workers, I remember the early morning chill arriving at the jail; the slow process of moving through layers of security and the physical barriers of gates opening and closing; yelling “Hit!” to the correctional officers inside the plate glass to activate the door; waiting outside the cells for women to come out while my colleague entered the “pod” to meet with them and offer the opportunity to participate in our research
There we went through the lengthy process of informed consent that paved the way for the interviews at the core of our research design

Summary

Introduction

Most interviews (and the in-depth, undirected interview in particular) begin with a period of awkwardness, as investigators well know. In the pages that follow, we propose that these interviews functioned as dialogic encounters, which may enhance processes of recovery, in part because they promote a nongoal-directed state of mindfulness.

Results

Conclusion