Exploring racial identities through participatory visual and ethnographic methods: (Re)presenting the identities of ethnic minority youth in Hong Kong

Abstract

There is increasing research attention to the integration of ethnic minority youth in Hong Kong. Within this attention lies an interest in how these young people make sense of their identities in relation to their schooling experiences. From a qualitative methodological viewpoint, researchers’ positionalities, including their cultural background and scholarly motivations, have implications on the ways in which they (re)present their findings. Using the axes of insider and outsider, we reflect on and compare how we have approached two studies with ethnic minority youth in Hong Kong. We discuss the potential affordances and tensions of cultural insider and outsider roles in our research to highlight the cultural dynamics in our interactions with our participants. As we advance dialogue on how researchers approach their work through their own cultural positionalities, we offer a nuanced account of the complexities surrounding the ‘making’ of ethnic minority young people’s identities in Hong Kong.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

[1] Ethical clearance for Gube’s study was granted by the Tasmania Social Sciences Research Ethics Committee (Reference number: H0012911).[2] Gube’s study was supported by Tasmania Graduate Research Scholarship and Tuition Fee Scholarship.

Notes on contributors

Casey Burkholder

Casey Burkholder, PhD is an Assistant Professor at the University of New Brunswick. During her two years as a classroom teacher in Hong Kong (2008–2010), Casey saw her ethnic minority students systematically excluded from school activities and high quality instruction, and watched as many students were pushed out of the school. She wondered about the difference between the Hong Kong government’s policy to include ethnic minority youth in schools, and their lived experiences. This question served as the foundation for Casey’s Master of Arts work, which she undertook in Educational Studies at Concordia University (2011–2013), and later, her doctoral work at McGill University’s Department of Integrated Studies in Education (2013–2018). Casey Burkholder’s work has been supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (Canada) under the Joseph Armand-Bombardier Canadian Graduate Scholarship; City University (Hong Kong) under the Graduate Teaching Assistantship Scheme; and McGill University under the Jackie Kirk Fieldwork Support Fund and the Herschel and Christine Victor Fellowship in Education.

Jan Gube is Postdoctoral Fellow at the Department of Education Policy and Leadership, The Education University of Hong Kong. A linguist by training, educational researcher by profession, social scientist by inclination, his work addresses how people make sense of their identities through language, diverse cultures, communities and learning environments. As a result, his publications are related to ethnicity, diversity and equity, among a variety of educational issues. In 2017, Jan received the International Education Association of Australia Outstanding Postgraduate Thesis award. He is publishing a co-edited volume (with Fang Gao) Education, ethnicity and equity in the multilingual Asian context (forthcoming 2019) and writing a monograph Ethnic identities within a multi-ethnic school: Tales and social currencies of Filipino students in Hong Kong (both with Springer).