The Sexual Politics of Embodiment and Care in the Field

Keywords: sex, sexuality, embodiment, feminist geography, care, autoethnography
Session Type: Virtual Paper
Day: Saturday
Session Start / End Time: 4/10/2021 08:00 AM (Pacific Time (US & Canada)) - 4/10/2021 09:15 AM (Pacific Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 15

Abstract

In this paper I draw from my dissertation research and methods chapter, in which I use authoethnographic excerpts to situate myself as an embodied feminist researcher in a persistently sexualized field. I reflexively examine how my presence impacts informants and research outcomes, including how I cope on a daily basis with my positionality and the effects that this work has caused. I discuss the care work needed to conduct sensitive sexuality research, allowing an autoethnographic vulnerability to demonstrate these tensions. The methodological ethos central to this is informed by feminist theory and praxis, with a particular emphasis on geographical work on affect, emotion, and intimacy. In fact, feminist and queer geographers’ innovations in these methods have guided this work. Methodological interventions distinguishing reflexivity and positionality, autoethnography, intimate insider/outsider relationships in the field, the embodied researcher, sexuality in research, and care ethics, were crucial to understanding my presence in and entanglement with the sexual politics of the field.