The Personal is Political: Developing new subjectivities through participatory action research

Abstract

Participatory action research (PAR) is gaining critical attention from scholars across the social sciences, and in the field of geography more specifically, as it promises a viable alternative for researchers concerned with social justice. If most of the benefits of PAR are identified in terms of its potential as a vehicle for social change and action, PAR's role in personal change is less understood. This paper considers the development of new subjectivities in a PAR process from a post-structural perspective. My objective is to reframe and connect the social justice orientation of PAR to a feminist post-structural project which emphasizes the fluidity and multiplicity of subject positions as the basis for personal (and social) transformation. Analysis draws upon collaborative research conducted with six young women in New York City and their project Makes Me Mad: Stereotypes of young urban womyn of color. Discussion addresses the role of critical reflection, dialogue, emotion, and narrative in the participatory research process. Building upon critical educator/theorist Paolo Freire's contributions to PAR, I address issues of power, scale, and the politics of location in order to contribute to understandings of spatial praxis.

La investigación-acción-participativa (IAP) está recibiendo atención de parte de eruditos en varias disciplinas de las ciencias sociales, y más específicamente en geografía porque prometa una alternativa viable para investigadores que tienen interés en la justicia social. Si la mayoría de las ventajas de la IAP se entienden en términos de su potencial como un método para la acción y el cambio social, menos entendido es el rol de la IAP en el cambio personal. Este papel considera el desarrollo de nuevas subjetividades en el proceso de IAP desde una perspectiva pos-estructural. El objetivo es reenmarcar y conectar la orientación de justicia social en la IAP hacia un proyecto feminista pos-estructural que enfatiza la fluidez y multiplicidad de posiciones de sujetos como la base para la transformación personal (y social). La análisis utiliza una investigación colaborativa realizado con seis jóvenas de la ciudad de Nueva York y su proyecto Makes Me Mad: Stereotypes of young urban womyn of color. Las discusiones se tratan del rol de la reflexión crítica, el dialogo, la emoción, y la narrativa en el proceso de investigación participativa. Complementando las contribuciones del educador/teorista Paolo Freire a la IAP, atiendo los asuntos de poder, escala, y la política de la ubicación para contribuir a los entendimientos de la praxis espacial.

Keywords:

• Participatory action research
• subjectivity
• post-structuralism
• young women of color
• Paolo Freire

Keywords:

• La investigación-acción-participativa (IAP)
• subjetividad
• pos-estructuralismo
• jóvenas de color
• Paolo Freire

Acknowledgements

Profound gratitude to the Fed Up Honeys whose passionate engagement and intellectual generosity continue to inspire. I feel most privileged to have had the opportunity to work with Cindi Katz, Michelle Fine and Roger Hart whose support and critical feedback inspired, challenged and buoyed me throughout the research process.

Thanks to Linda Peake for her editorial guidance. I am most appreciative of the reviewers' critical and supportive commentary. Sincere thanks to Mike Kesby especially for his close reading and very generous feedback.

This research was supported by a fellowship from the American Association of University Women. A travel grant from the American Association of Geographers and the National Science Foundation allowed me to attend the Participatory Social and Cultural Geographies session of the 2004 RGS-IBG annual conference, organized by Sara Kindon and Rachel Pain, which inspired this paper.

Notes

1. The research team explains their intentional spelling of ‘womyn’ as follows: ‘The reason we spell womyn with a ‘y’ is because the ‘correct’ spelling of woman and women have the words man and men in them’ (http://www.fed-up-honeys.org).