3 The field site and methodology
3.4 Research method
The mixed methods research design is a product of my reflexive engagement with the field site, participants and the fluidity of ideas that were flowing in the earlier months of data collection. As I explain below, this approach came about because, while the academic institution suggested that a flexible, unstructured approach to the research was more culturally sensitive, the research participants subtly indicated that a more formal, structured approach would yield better engagement among participants. The following section explains how each phase of the research design, method and analysis was undertaken. This includes the challenges I encountered throughout the process, how this affected the research findings, and how I addressed these various situations as they arose.
3.4.1
Initial consultation, September 2015
Early discussions with the Ardjumarllarl Aboriginal Corporation (AAC) and key service providers helped shape the research proposal. In September 2015, I presented a research proposal to the AAC and several other service providers and government representatives. The AAC’s Board of Directors continued to be important formal and informal contacts throughout the research who actively provided feedback and engaged in a mutual learning process.
Informal conversations with service providers and community elders early in the research were influential in helping me understand the contradictions between policy objectives and the everyday lived reality of safety on the ground. From these discussions, it became clear that policy discourse on community safety did not align with how the concept was viewed at a local level. Elders and service providers were in the process of visualising how their own experiences of community safety could be contained within certain parameters: what fits within the boundaries of ‘safety’ in both the Kunwinjku and Western worlds. For them, many issues were encompassed by the term ‘community safety’ including, but not limited to, jealousy and family fighting, alcohol and volatile substances abuse, sorcery, grass fires, petty and serious crime, and broken cars around the home.
During this time, I witnessed Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal service providers grappling with the concept itself, by attempting to re-articulate and contextualise it in a way that was relevant to local social dynamics in a specific time and space. From these early experiences, I understood that safety issues occurred within a kinship-based network where every person in
the community is connected to each other through a moiety system. Unsafe behaviour performed by an individual unavoidably has ripple effects throughout the social network. Understanding what it means to be and feel safe from the perspective of Kunwinjku people requires the researcher to understand social phenomena from the everyday lived perspective, from that of a Kunwinjku person. The research design was later shaped based on these discussions and experiences.
3.4.2
Data collection, April to November 2016
This thesis draws insights from critical realism to understand participants’ perceptions and experiences of harm, unsafe behaviour or circumstances and safety. To integrate qualitative and quantitative methods in the research design and analysis, this thesis uses constructivism and realism, to understand how aspects of the empirical reality are constructed from physical interactions and social experiences (Bazeley, 2013; Maxwell & Mittapalli, 2010). In this philosophical stance, there is a physical reality with which we interact every day, but our perceptions and experiences of this reality are subjective.
For participants, their perspective on the concept of ‘safety’ is constructed based on their physical interactions with their home, family, school, work and community environments. It is also constructed based on their mental properties: their social and emotional experiences which influence their goals, attitudes and intentions (Bazeley, 2013). Critical realists argue that there is no possibility of gaining data that provides an objective or distanced perspective of social phenomena (Bazeley, 2013; Houston, 2001; Maxwell & Mittapalli, 2010). Aligned with this philosophical stance, the mixed methods data was collected in two distinct stages: semi-structured interviews and then questionnaires. This thesis integrates these methods and types of data to gain insight into the contextually rich descriptions of harm and safety. The following sections explain the data collection methods used in this study and then elaborate on fieldwork challenges and data analysis techniques.
3.4.2.1 Ethnographical approach
Ethnography is a flexible approach to data collection that employs multiple techniques. It involves a reflexive process of observation, immersion, ‘hanging out’, casual conversations and structured or semi-structured interviews. In ethnographic methods, data emerges from the interactive, reflexive and abductive engagement between the researcher, participants and the
field site (Charmaz & Mitchell, 2001; Gupta & Ferguson, 1997; D. E. Smith, 2005; Wolcott, 1985).
An informal approach to the early months of fieldwork was essential for me to learn some Kunwinjku language, understand kinship networks and how family groups are connected to homelands. I spent considerable time building relationships across the community, attending cultural activities with my adopted family and working with community members on the 2016 Census enumeration. This later opportunity was pivotal for me to expand my social networks and learn how family groups were spatially and socially distributed across the West Arnhem region.
‘Hanging out’ was an important aspect of the ethnographic approach in the early months of the research. Hanging out happens when the researcher learns to become a family member and a part of the community (Aveling, 2013). I spent many hours talking to people, telling stories with each other and listening to elders while on camping trips, hunting or fishing on the weekends and sometimes just sitting around. In July 2016, I attended a culture camp held at the Manmoyi outstation49 which was co-organised by the outstation’s elders and traditional owners and the Bawinanga Aboriginal Corporation, based in Maningrida. I participated in the event because the traditional owners at Manmoyi outstation are related to my adopted family. This experience immersed me in an education program for children that explained the basic principles of Kunwinjku spirituality and law. This was the beginning of my attempt to understand strengths-based notions of community safety in terms of rebuilding and repairing the social, cultural and spiritual fabric of Kunwinjku society.
Over six weeks in July to September, I was employed by the ABS to recruit, train and supervise 12 field interviewers to conduct the 2016 Census. Field interviewers were Aboriginal people who lived in Gunbalanya. This experience was an important part of my research methodology in that it gave me a legitimate space to work with and become familiar with the Bininj community50, in addition to travelling to the outstations in the West Arnhem region. I coordinated and managed the 2016 Census operations for 16 outstations located between the
49 Manmoyi outstation is located approx. 3.5 hours’ drive east of Gunbalanya and is situated on the Mann River. 50 One of the crucial elements to this process was learning to be comfortable with approaching people’s houses, sitting on their doorsteps and simply being in a place that was radically different to that which I was accustomed. The apparent racial and socioeconomic difference was even more stark as they offered me a chair to sit down. Without wanting to offend, I always refused to sit on a chair in an attempt to lessen the power difference between us. This is an example of how my research ethic attempted to symbolically bridge the divide between researcher and participants.
Mann River and the East Alligator River. Through this experience, I had a legitimate reason to enquire about people’s familial connections within Gunbalanya and to homelands across the region, and I was able to learn about spiritual and cultural practices. In fact, it was important that I became quickly familiar with these practices to learn avoidance practices and etiquette when approaching people’s physical space for the first time. This became important later in my research when conducting the questionnaires at people’s homes.
An important role of the ethnographer is to embed oneself within a web of relationships, interactions and ways of working. Some authors promote that ‘yarning’ is a culturally safe way for Western researchers to deploy Indigenous methodologies (Aveling, 2013; Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010; Geia, Hayes & Usher, 2013). Yarning is a way for researchers to develop and build relationships through unstructured conversations, thereby enabling the participant the power to shape what gets said within conversation, what remains unspoken but subtly gestured and that which remains silenced (Aveling, 2013; Geia, et al., 2013). Over time, the researcher then makes decisions on what parts get included in the continuing stages of the research and which points are further drawn on in later conversations (Aveling, 2013).
This process of ‘hanging out’ was an important experience in my being, learning and doing whilst experiencing life in a Kunwinjku community. Simply, hanging out and yarning is a way of life that is shared while fishing, camping in the homelands, during long drives or while having a cup of tea. This combined range of experiences allowed me to understand sensitive issues that participants gradually revealed to me in their own terms. Furthermore, ‘hanging out’ enables the researcher to embed oneself in reciprocal relationships and develop mutual trust with participants over time. In some instances, the sharing of company, knowledge and companionship through yarning is the basis of the relationship. This becomes a relationship of mutual trust, reciprocity and exchange that is only shared with close adopted family members. Some of the research’s information was gathered in this way, after informed consent was clearly established. In other instances, the participant provides the researcher with knowledge in-lieu of a ‘favour’ or in-kind help.51
Through the process of negotiating the researcher terms, Bininj often use their kinship obligations with the researcher to negotiate how they can benefit from the exchange. Exchanging knowledge for driving around, fishing trips, cigarettes, money or other in-kind
51 This exchange can be referred to as ‘humbug’ which can be described as an annoyance or persistent request or demand (Macquarie Dictionary, 2017); however, as I further articulate in this thesis, what is considered humbug is often subjective according to local culture and personal interpretations.
help are a frequent part of the experience. In these contexts, Bininj people are negotiating the demands of the Western world and exercising their own sense of agency by exchanging one service for another. These are some ways in which my approach to fieldwork practiced an ethical and meaningful engagement when working with Kunwinjku people.
3.4.2.2 Semi-structured interviews
From May to November 201652, I undertook 16 semi-structured interviews including with 6 service providers and 17 community members.53 Interviews, were approximately 30 minutes to 1.5 hours in duration. With community members, some interviews were completed in multiple sessions of 30 minutes. These semi-structured interviews began with open-ended questions about the aspects of community life that Kunwinjku people saw as problematic, what strategies they viewed as appropriate in addressing these community safety issues and aspects of family and community life that these Kunwinjku people believed helped created safer and stronger environments (refer to Appendix B). After participants identified the community safety issues that they were most concerned about, in the interview I followed-up with more direct questioning to encourage further discussion about these issues.
After seeking advice from the AAC, I invited certain community members to participate. They were selected because we already knew each other, they had a reputation54 for being a strong person and they were able to talk comfortably about sensitive issues or community affairs. I used purposive sampling for these interviews – that is, selective sampling of participants based on certain characteristics (non-probability sampling). Some participants were selected based on their comfort and ability to talk about sensitive issues, including family violence, theft, humbugging and addiction. For some people, a participant’s potential safety could be compromised for the mere suspicion of discussing family violence in public.55 I allowed participants the choice to decide for themselves when and where it was safe, and what they were prepared to talk about.
52 Most of these 16 semi-structured interviews were undertaken between April and September 2016. Only three interviews with non-Indigenous service providers were undertaken during October and November. The reasons for this delay was due to the challenges of fieldwork discussed in section 3.4.3.
53 Some of these semi-structured interviews were undertaken with multiple persons present, in groups of two or three people. During the interview process, I remained flexible to the requests of participants. Interviews were undertaken in group format upon request from the participant. Participants selected who they wanted to be included in the group.
54 This was based on the initial advice I received from some members of the AAC. 55 This is an example of retaliation or payback discussed later in this thesis.
No translator was required to interview these participants and, where necessary, I used the facilitator to initiate contact with the participant. The interviews were used to develop the baseline data on neighbourhood problems, social stress and cultural safety, which were then used to compile the questionnaires. Based on the interview data, I found 71 indicators for interpersonal, neighbourhood and community safety (refer to Appendix H). The questionnaires allowed me to reach a larger sample population and several questions were used as conversation starters to gather more in-depth qualitative data. The following section provides further detail including the questionnaire structure and purpose, recruitment method and process I used to negotiate consent.
3.4.2.3 Structured interviews with questionnaires
From September to October 2017, I worked with two facilitators, one male and one female, who have a reputation as cultural leaders within their communities. Both facilitators could translate conversations through their knowledge of Yolngu, Kunwinjku, or Creole. The facilitators were employed for three weeks to initiate contact with community members and introduce potential participants to me. We completed 55 questionnaires with Bininj participants from different genders, age groups and family groups. Questionnaire participants were recruited using convenience and purposive sampling. Participants were mostly recruited via door-to-door visits where individuals happened to be available at the time. A smaller portion were selected because they were influential community leaders or traditional owners.
Based on data from the semi-structured interviews undertaken from April to September 2016, 71 variables were identified as indicators of interpersonal safety, social stress and cultural fragmentation. These variables were initially tested with 2 participants; following this, an additional 53 community members participated in structured interviews using the questionnaires. The questionnaires used Likert Scale responses, multiple response questions and open-ended questions (provided at Appendix C). The questionnaires were a way of “quantitizing” qualitative data (Bazeley, 2012, 2015), where the questions asked participants about their perceptions56 of neighbourhood problems and service delivery. All participants in this study are anonymous which allowed them to feel confident in talking about sensitive
56 Participants were not asked directly about their experiences of community safety issues although, as detailed in the philosophical standpoint, participants’ perceptions of interpersonal, household and community safety are grounded in everyday events that participants see and hear. This is detailed in the questionnaire at Appendix C.
issues, and this was specifically requested by the elders57 in the community. Codes58 are
preferred over pseudonyms because of the large number of participants; however, when the code reference could indicate a participant’s identity then an interview or field note date is used instead.
The structured interview was designed to take approximately 40 minutes, however in practice the interviews often took 1 hour to 1.5 hours to complete. Often respondents provided further explanation and clarification on key issues rather than just answering the structured questions. Participants voluntarily elaborated on their views of how unsafe behaviours occur, how social stressors influence each other and whether local services were perceived to improve interpersonal safety. This provided rich, descriptive qualitative data to accompany the quantified values, designed to assess the magnitude of the problem through individual experiences and perceptions. As a result, we collected 28 typed pages of quotations and comments that accompanied the questionnaires.
A total of 55 people completed the questionnaires including 22 males and 33 females and most of these participants59 were aged from 31 to 50 years old (see Fig. 3.2). Overall, there were a total of 78 participants in the study, including 50 females and 28 males, of whom 94 per cent were Kunwinjku Aboriginal people.
57 Specifically, the elders requested that no names, gender, age or other identifying information be associated with the quotes in the thesis or other publications.
58 As an example, CM01 and SP01 indicates a community member or service provider (respectively) who participated via semi-structured interview and Q01 indicates an Indigenous participant who completed a questionnaire. Each participant was allocated a unique number and code. In the thesis, where the content or the code could potential compromise a participant’s anonymity then the date of the interview of field note is used instead of the participant code.
3.4.2.4 Recruiting questionnaire participants
Questionnaire participants were recruited over a period of four weeks, during which I accompanied two facilitators and we walked door-to-door inviting people to participate. Prior to this, I sought advice from members of the AAC to ensure they were satisfied with the research process and that I was welcome to approach community members in this way. As described in this section, my approach to recruiting participants and negotiating consent, required me to be continually sensitive and responsive to the participant’s needs. In doing this, I ensured my conduct was respectful and courteous towards local customs and social norms.
In the process of negotiating consent, I approached the participant’s home with the facilitator and the facilitator introduced me to the participant, in Kunwinjku. In this project, the facilitator and I approached the participant’s home, then I explained how and why we were collecting information on community safety, as follows:
My name is Simone and I come from Canberra. My skin name is ‘ngalkamarrang’. My adopted mother is Donna Nadjamerrek. I am
Fig. 3.2. Questionnaire participants by age and gender (number)
2 2 3 12 3 0 5 3 11 9 5 0 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
18-24 years 25-30 years 31-40 years 41-50 years 51-60 years 65 years and above Num ber o f pa rt icipa nts Age of participants Male Female
working with the Ardjumarllarl Aboriginal Corporation on community safety – ‘kunwok karninnaarre’ or ‘kunwok karibidyikarmerren’. We are talking to all the strong people in the community about things they have seen or heard that they think are ‘unsafe’ and good things about the community that they feel make them stronger. We are collecting this information to make a book. Ardjumarllarl mob can then use the book to talk to police, service providers and government mob about making