The Return of Tracy Chapman.

The process of applying for provincial and federal grants has begun.  

I was shocked into one of the realities of academic research last Friday morning: in order to research, you need money, and to get money,  you need to write convincing and exciting grant proposals.  

For the majority of the people in my program, it appears that this is not a new or intimidating prospect.  They are simply copying and pasting from a variety of undergraduate thesis and grant proposals, or have already received these prestigious allocations, and do not need to bother with it this year.  

For the rest of us, this now requires a scramble to quickly review the relevant literature in our field, produce a 'cogent research question' to investigate, and then devise a plan to actually gather the data.  

For the past six months, I have been planning on investigating the experiences of gender-based violence in the Aboriginal community.  

Ever since returning from Iqaluit, I have been unable to forget the way that domestic violence was visible in the community.  Working at PPSC I used to read through the files during my spare time, pulling out anything coded with domestic or child abuse.  

For the past week I have been wading through my memories of being in Iqaluit and Malawi, and engaging with survivors of gender-based violence.  Two different continents, languages, cultures, skin colours, and communities.  Same problem.   All of this brought me to this Masters program, to the opportunity to contribute to the existing knowledge and research on this issue.  

 Somewhere years ago, I tapped into the violence and pain that is experienced by people just like me.  People who could have easily been me.  It has now taken me half-way around the world, and to remote places in my own country.  It drives my academic pursuits and volunteer activities.  It makes up my leisure reading.  

And now I have to find a way to translate this passion and interest into a scholarly thesis.  It feels emotional. 

Tonight I attended a 'Take Back the Night' ceremony in downtown St. Catharine's.  Take Back the Night is held in communities around the world and offers people a chance to speak out against violence against women, as represented by many women's inability to walk safely at night.  

One woman was holding a sign which read "Women have the right to walk at night".  

Say that a few times.  

Hear the emphasis on right.  

Think about what the sign is saying.  

How can a person in Canada in 2008, one of the countries looked to throughout the world as a symbol of democracy, freedom, and model human rights, have to assert her right to WALK at a certain time of day.  I looked at that sign for a long time.  

It really struck a chord.  How many times have I tried to explain what it feels like to walk alone at night?  How many times have I tried to articulate my own sense of vulnerability, my own fear?  

It was a good idea to go to the event tonight.  Even if my study is not about women walking alone at night, or even about the experiences of Aboriginal people by the time this is all said and done, it is an important issue.  And for whatever reason, it is my issue.  

So tonight was the night to bring back Tracy Chapman.  If you ever listen to her lyrics, you will hear that she sings about equality, rights, minorities, oppression, fear, sadness, women, men, humanity.  They are good songs.  

Research?

It feels like today is a good day to write.  

I read a very interesting article for my methods class yesterday.  It introduces the model of autoethnography.  In many ways, the term is not really definable.  At its core lies the idea that the researcher themselves is able to offer learning and insight through exploring their own experiences.  Through analyzing their emotions, memories, feeling, and thoughts on an experience, they can offer understanding to one experience as part of a greater whole.  Autoethnographies can take the form of poetry, monologues, plays, or personal narrative to name a few forms.  I was extremely excited and engaged by this article.  To think that telling ones story is viewed by a small number of academics to be a truly valid and important way of doing research totally shakes my world.  I was also drawn to the therapeutic aspect of autoethnography.  The scholar presenting her argument made no attempt to rationalize or justify the secondary benefit to sorting out ones emotions through autoethnography.  She instead celebrated it.  I think this idea especially spoke to me because of how passionately I feel about my research topic.  Many of the more traditional social science research methods seem to curb that passion, or moderate it in order to produce the 'distanced and objective researcher'.  

While reading this article, I immediately began to think about my experiences living in Malawi.  I have been struggling for the past year trying to figure out how to best capture all of my thoughts and memories about this altering period in my life.  I have wanted to write, but have not been sure how.  The idea of writing articles for a newspaper or magazine does not appeal to me.  I do not write poetry or music.  I have wanted to write, but I want my writing to have a purpose.  Autoethnography appeals to me.  I think that the material gathered from living and working in Malawi would be very well suited to this method of research.  Not only is the experience deeply emotional, personally challenging, and I believe, an engaging story.  But I also feel that my experiences are deeply rooted in a sociocultural political context.  Many of the overriding lessons and conclusions that I have drawn from my experiences are related to development and colonial theory, the discourse of intercultural communication, and the place of a white woman working in development.  I would love for any writing I produce to help me further uncover these themes in my experiences.  

Perhaps there will be a point to this past year after all.  A synthesis of sorts.