Archives of Conflict and the Bandita* researcher - Talk by Professor Hilary Footitt

 

 

This talk was delivered at the Researching Conflict workshop co-organised by the Centre for Translation & Intercultural Studies at the University of Manchester, UK (see http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/events/2013-04-18/index.shtml). Using specific examples from personal research practice, Professor Footitt examines four questions relating to war/ conflict research. Firstly, she considers the nature of Archives as symbols/forces of power, and explores their limitations for conflict research, with particular emphasis on the ‘missingness’ and ‘serendipity’ of Archives. Secondly, she looks at the experience of ‘growing one's own archive’, developing an eclectic and organic approach to constituting an archive of practice (including types of archives, personal papers, newspapers, oral history, interviews, maps, photographs, memorabilia, cultural production). Thirdly, she suggests pathways of analysis through this new archive, with an emphasis on following processes, and seeing narrative cartographies. Finally, the talk engages with questions relating to ethics and the archive, in particular arguing for an ethics of attention and linguistic respect.

 

* Bandita: an image (suggested by Linda Singer) of the writer as intellectual outlaw, raiding the texts of others, and taking what she finds most useful: ‘The remains recycled make a different map, and mark new intersections between discourses, disciplines, forms of “knowledge” ’ ( L. Singer, Erotic Welfare: Sexual Theory and Politics in the Age of Epidemic. New York: Routledge, 1993, 22).

 

 

Conducting Field Research on Conflict - Talk by Professor Paul Gready

 

 

This talk was delivered at the Researching Conflict workshop co-organised by the Centre for Translation & Intercultural Studies at the University of Manchester, UK (see http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/events/2013-04-18/index.shtml). Ethical codes for conducting research - such as informed consent - are predominantly individualistic and devised for conventional research settings and outputs. Research on conflict, or in post conflict settings, often takes place on different terms. This presentation discusses three challenges associated with conducting such research. (1) Relationships between interviewer, interviewee and community. (2) Negotiating shifting patterns of violence and conflict. (3) Control and ownership of testimony and research in a media age. Through a discussion of these challenges the presentation offers  some thoughts on what constitutes an 'enabling ethics' for conflict research.