Reflexivity and Positionality

Too often researchers concentrate on methods and approaches to conducting research, to the extent that the researcher’s values are obscured by such “proceduralness” (Savin-Baden, 2004:367). Recognising this, I turn to a discussion of my positionality as regards my personal biography (see Doucet, 1998). I reflect on my positionality, not to navel-gaze (Latour, 1988); rather, I believe that reflexivity is important in qualitative research where the “self-as-instrument” (Rew et al., 1993:300) is used in data gathering and analysis.

5.10.1 Researcher personality

Lack of focus on the researcher’s personality is an egregious oversight, as personality is capable of shaping both the research process and the outcome (Moser, 2008). This is particularly so when considering that “personalities respond to other personalities in different ways” (Hoogendoorn and Visser, 2012:264). Following Moser (2008), I believe that my social and emotional qualities enabled close relationships to be developed between the young people and I. I have an extrovert personality. I am bubbly; talkative; personable; youthful; confessedly emotional; and

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I enjoy making new friends. I am in further agreement with Sultana (2007) that who I am, and the way I interact with participants, is essential in developing relationships premised on trust. The following field diary excerpt expresses this well:

Today MJ confided in me about a boy she had started dating, she told me that I was the first person to know...I wondered what it was about my personality which allowed her to confide in me. I know I am amiable and a good listener. Or perhaps she has heard me discussing my love life before and knew it would be a welcomed topic

(Author’s field diary, 10/11/13) By confiding in me, MJ could see that, although I am a researcher, I carry with me “human spirits of understanding and concern” (Shaw, 2005:845). As Stanley and Wise (1993:157) point out: “researchers remain human beings complete with all the usual assembly of feelings, failings and moods”. However, there is a tendency in the literature to de-humanise, and disembody (see Throsby and Evans, 2013), researchers, reducing them to their academic qualities and qualifications.

A rare exception to the cold descriptions of positionality is a piece by Widdowfield (2000). Widdowfield (2000) argues that emotions may influence the researcher’s interpretation of a situation, yet this does not prevent rigorous analysis. Here I provide an example of this from my fieldwork:

Today my intuitive nature told me that Modest Mouse was feeling upset. I probed him about this and he opened up to me, telling me how he was struggling with his low paid part-time job. Modest Mouse was surprised that I noticed he was upset and said that he had put on a good act, even to family and station management

(Author’s field diary, 20/03/14) The above excerpt reveals how my instinctive character enabled me to notice when a participant was feeling down; in turn, the participant told me a personal story that was rich data. Though Stacey (1988:23) tells that “the lives, loves, and tragedies that fieldwork informants share with a researcher are ultimately data, grist for the ethnographic mill”, I must emphasise that I did not show care in order to obtain good data; rather, being caring is an intrinsic part of my personality. By emotionally investing in the young people, I developed a close rapport with participants in my role as researcher, fellow volunteer, and friend.

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The young people’s perception of my personality and character can be discerned through the following ‘presenter biography’, which they wrote about me and published on the KCC Live (2015a) website:

Cat Wilkinson is a Human Geography PhD student, although given her poor sense of direction and inability to read a map, you’d never guess this. Cat loves a good cup of tea and has on average 20 cups per day, professing to be a tea expert. However her most knowledgeable topics are The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent [reality television talent shows]! She has a self- confessed crush on Simon Cowell16 and often bores Rob [a KCC Live volunteer] with the latest TV gossip! A great strength of Cat’s is rapping, she can regularly be heard rapping the weather forecast on air, and she is often referred to by other presenters as “the female Jay Z17_”.

Above, the young people who wrote the biography can be seen to be downplaying my PhD-related skills; what they ascribe to my “inability to read a map”, and exaggerating my young people/presenter skills: “she can regularly be heard rapping the weather forecast on air”. The young people found out about my rapping ability when we collaborated to produce a rendition of Band Aid 20’s ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’18

, where I assumed the role of rap artist Dizzee Rascal. The significance of their comprehension of me as, for instance, “the female Jay Z”, is particularly so when considering Byrne et al.’s (2009:68) assertion that meaningful relationships

necessitate a de-emphasising of “researcher only” knowledge. For, as Hadfield-Hill and Horton (2014:148) tell, “we are never just researchers, just doing research”, in the same way as our participants are not just participants in research.

5.10.2 Researcher appearance

Community radio stations are male-dominated environments and women are underrepresented within this sector (Mitchell, 2004). Therefore, just as my presence as a woman at KCC Live was significant for the volunteers, equally, my access to the airwaves as a woman presenter was significant for the listeners. The gender of the researcher is important, as gendered understandings of who we are have consequences for the ways we are treated (Warnke, 2008). The significance of my gender came to the fore when a male volunteer remarked to me whilst attending a community media event “everyone is obviously looking at you and thinking, wow,

16 _{Simon Cowell is an English television talent judge and music and television producer.}

17 _{Shawn Corey Carter, known by his stage name Jay Z, is an American rapper, record producer, and}

entrepreneur.

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she’s a girl and she knows about radio” (Author’s field diary, 5/10/13). Regrettably, most researchers do not go far beyond simply acknowledging whether they are male or female (e.g. Bucerius, 2013; Salle and Harris, 2011). Third wave feminism (the feminist movement stemming from the 1990s, informed by post-colonial and post- modern thinking) has critiqued the supposition that women share a universal gender identity and set of experiences (Valentine et al., 2014). In line with this, I argue that I am not only female, but that I am overtly feminine. I dye my hair: blonde, brunette, red; I wear hair extensions; I have fake nails applied in the salon; my daily makeup consists of brightly coloured lipstick and heavy mascara; I carry my makeup bag with me daily; I wear fake tan and false eyelashes on occasions; the clothes I wear are feminine. See Plate 5.1:

During my fieldwork, there were instances where my appearance was commented on by young people who told me that I “don’t look like a PhD student” (Author’s field diary, 06/05/13), or that I wore “more fashionable clothes” than they imagined (Author’s field diary, 23/05/13). Pertinent here is Butler’s (1990; 1993) research on