For many, a feminist approach to researching technology-facilitated gender-based violence is a process of retaliation, resistance and reclaiming power. Through the process, they disrupt the hierarchical structure of knowledge formation, offer a different perspective on who gets recognition as a knowledge producer, communicate violence/resilience in their own terms and use research as an entry point to network, connect and organise the community. Central to this deeply meaningful process is a researcher’s emotional connection and level of care for their research. Employing feminist research methodologies helps us understand that our knowledge about a specific topic is deeply connected to how much we care about the subjects we are exploring and the communities we work with, rather than for.
This new GenderIT.org edition is a collection of reflections and analytical essays by the Feminist Internet Research Network (FIRN) and FIRN’s research partners. It reflects on what it means to do research at this critical juncture, while having to go through the unbearable pain of witnessing genocide, conflict and war, gross and persistent human rights violations, criminalisation of sex work and LGBTQIA+ communities and intensification of anti-gender mobilisation, as well as operating under spectacularly failed international law, solidarity and transnational feminist movements. Together, this edition shows that care should not be framed as an ethical framework in a research process, but to inform the epistemological interest, from shaping the research agenda to reporting findings that, even imperfectly, capture the narratives, discourses and insights acquired during the process.
Read the full edition at GenderIT.org.
*This work forms part of the APC Feminist Internet Research Network project, supported by the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of IDRC or its Board of Governors.