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On the knowledge making enterprise in OMT: the significance of reflexivity and diffraction

Research output: Contribution to conference - Without ISBN/ISSN Conference paperpeer-review

Published
Publication date11/12/2016
<mark>Original language</mark>English
EventIFIP Work Group 8.2 Conference - UCD, Dublin, Ireland
Duration: 8/12/20169/12/2016

Conference

ConferenceIFIP Work Group 8.2 Conference
Country/TerritoryIreland
CityDublin
Period8/12/169/12/16

Abstract

Reflexivity is often considered fundamental for the ‘production’ of responsible and ethical ethnographic work. Through reflexivity one can account as a researcher and author of the ethnographic practice, and acknowledge one’s responsibilities in knowledge-making and the impact this work has on others. Yet, it has been suggested that same practice has a darker side, as it tends to ‘overshadowing participants’, producing a ‘warped narcissism’, and ‘self-indulgence’. We explore these argumentative positions on reflexivity in ethnography, and clarify that the premise of a “narcissism” critique is an ontology of separateness that the concept embeds. We suggest and illustrate empirically how an ontology of inseparability of participants and researchers, such as one engrained in diffraction, can contribute in extricating narcissist tendencies of those ethnographic works weighting more on the left side of the “Self-Other” continuum. Our theoretical contribution is to elaborate a framework enabling a politically responsible ethnographic practice, which takes differences as methodological premise for grasping a phenomenon.