Stories as Life Performances: Humanizing Research as Honoring, Respecting, Listening to, and Learning With Children, Youth, and Families From Refugee Backgrounds

Abstract

In this personal perspective piece, I share my own refugee background and experiences, as well as stories about myself in the research context, in juxtaposition with stories about children, youth, and families from refugee backgrounds with whom I interacted as a volunteer tutor and researcher in an afterschool program. Drawing on San Pedro and Kinloch and Lee’s notions of humanizing research, I illuminate my work in an educational setting as honoring, respecting, listening to, and learning with study participants. In creating and sustaining relationships of care and dignity in an afterschool program, I extended and reinvigorated languages, cultures, and stories with children, youth, and families from refugee backgrounds.