Problematising race and gender in everyday research processes : a model of feminist research praxis
Date
2020
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
African Sun Media
Abstract
When researchers do research with human subjects, there is the hope that their
findings will be taken up by, for example, government, to formulate policies; the
public, for a better understanding of social, political or economic processes; or
pharmaceutical companies, for new treatments. The hope is that, in the long run,
everyone would benefit from the findings. But seldom is there a reflection on
exactly what it means to the individuals and communities that were used as research
subject-participants. More often than not, the thinking is that as long as the subjectparticipants
were treated in an ethical way, they had played their role. Rarely is there
any report back of the findings to the subject-participants.
When our the subject-participants become aware of the findings of our research
and what it means for them, we as the researchers become aware of the impact of
our research. This is not the type of impact for the collective good, but the type of
impact that positions the subject-participants in a certain way, especially when the
findings are used to generalise about entire communities. In a country that has only recently emerged from a deeply racialised past, in which
racial categories were imposed on its citizens and where “scientific research” was
used to justify the racial categorisation of apartheid and exclusions based on race,
researchers need to exercise caution when drawing inferences based on racial categories. In South Africa, race is often a useful explanatory variable to understand
exclusions and marginalisation, but context is everything. When race as a variable is
used in an essentialist way (i.e. one that assumes certain unchanging characteristics
of groups and ignores how identities are socially constructed) to argue that it is
the cause of perceptions and behaviour, the findings “freeze” people in their racial
identities, and cause researchers to lose sight of how the treatment of racial groups
through processes of colonialisation, oppression and marginalisation have positioned
them to have certain attitudes or exhibit certain behaviours.
When the controversy around the Sport Science article started on social media,
it was to have serious repercussion for the researchers, the research community at
Stellenbosch University, the women and communities from which the subjectparticipants
were drawn and South Africa as a whole. At the centre of the
controversy sits race and gender. In a sense, social media is a great information
equaliser that can expose those who use it to research that they would not otherwise
know about. It was the wrath of women from communities like the one from which
the subject-participants were selected that made many a complacent researcher sit
up and take note.
Description
CITATION: Gouws, A. 2020. Problematising race and gender in everyday research processes : a model of feminist research praxis, in Jansen, J. & Walters, C. (eds). 2020. Fault lines : a primer on race, science and society. Stellenbosch: SUN PReSS, doi:10.18820/9781928480495/11.
The original publication is available at https://africansunmedia.store.it.si/za
The original publication is available at https://africansunmedia.store.it.si/za
Keywords
Feminist theory, Research -- Moral and ethical aspects, Science -- Social aspects, Feminism -- Research
Citation
Gouws, A. 2020. Problematising race and gender in everyday research processes : a model of feminist research praxis, in Jansen, J. & Walters, C. (eds). 2020. Fault lines : a primer on race, science and society. Stellenbosch: SUN PReSS, doi:10.18820/9781928480495/11.