A walk around the croft: Emerging relationships of hospitality and care among researcher and research participants

One finding from a study exploring analytical approaches to data collected on ‘walking and talking’ research excursions is that analytical positioning changes if we consider the relationship between the hosts/tour guides (or research participants) and the guest/tourist (or researcher) as an emerging relationship of care, rather than power.

Diverse walking methods, where researchers tour environments of significance to the participants, have become increasingly attractive in the arts, humanities and social sciences over the last 20 years (O’Neill & Roberts, 2019). This paper draws on walking-based research with speakers of Gaelic and English, to understand bilinguals’ language practices on the move (McPake, in preparation).

Influenced by Nicolini’s view (2009) that researchers analysing actions and interactions should pay attention to what participants care about, my analysis of conversations on a walk with Mairead, Seumas and Niall around their family’s croft revealed that they cared about enhancing my understanding of saoghal Gàidhlig (Gaelic world) as a place where language and culture are inextricably entangled. They participated in the research in the hope that I would make better-informed contributions to Gaelic revitalisation initiatives. My analytical position shifted as I recognised, in my response to their hospitality, a desire and an obligation to make that contribution. Understanding our relationship as one of care for each other’s concerns and aspirations, rather than one of power, in which the researcher’s interests are paramount (even where this is critiqued), significantly changed the analytical heuristic and, therefore, the nature of the findings, as the presentation will illustrate.

This paper therefore proposes that other relationships can exist between researcher and participants, apart from, or in addition to, those based on power dynamics. Thinking of research as a form of hospitality in which researchers and participants strive for relationships of care could transform ways we analyse, interpret and represent our data.