The continuity of Othering in feminist methodology: activist-scholar and the insider/outsider dynamics

Abstract

In this article, I argue for the need to nuance our understanding of insider/outsider relations and challenge self–other dynamics in the research process. Using my own research field experience to set up how Othering occurs, I engage with the rigidity of the insider/outsider dynamic and the inflexibility arising from how ‘Western’ knowledge production processes ask one to maintain objectivity and, therefore, replicate the power dynamics between the self and Other. The aim here is to unpack how this process related to my own position vis-à-vis the community researched, my positionality, and how this interacts with the practices required to ensure research rigidity in Western academia. Thus, this article argues that redefining the self in an ‘either/or’ form essentially speaks to Western questions of objectivity, cultural difference and homogeneity. This article is an attempt to problematise the Othering nature of the process of defining oneself in relation or contrast to research participants – a method that continues to define the entrenched binaries of a reality dominated by hierarchised opposites.