What did I say that was wrong? Re/worlding the word
ISSN: 1443-9883
Article publication date: 23 February 2018
Issue publication date: 10 May 2018
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to interrogate practice of research and discursively problematise the role of the researcher in relation to the ways in which knowledge is constructed and represented in and as a centre/periphery relation. It considers the ways in which research practices can refocus attention on claims made about knowing and speaking about the lives of Others and within the academe.
Design/methodology/approach
Underlying this interrogation is Spivak’s (1998) work “Can the Subaltern Speak?” Methodologically, I reflect on, and address my experiences of research in the context of re-reading ontology as a signifying presence from which to address, contest and rearticulate the methodological norm in qualitative enquiry.
Findings
The paper suggests that it is relevant to attend to the ways, in which qualitative researchers, in the process of making the Other culturally intelligible and subsequent representation, acknowledge the process and product as a contested epistemic space.
Originality/value
The paper problematizes the notion of “giving voice” to ontological understandings of being and speaking as a unified subject.
Keywords
Citation
Vicars, M. (2018), "What did I say that was wrong? Re/worlding the word", Qualitative Research Journal, Vol. 18 No. 2, pp. 198-207. https://doi.org/10.1108/QRJ-D-17-00049
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited