Using autoethnography, creative writing and participatory approaches as research methods in migration studies

About the workshop:

This Research Gym will focus on qualitative research methodologies in migration that are experimental, creative and interdisciplinary – for instance, methods like autoethnography, participatory action research (including Photovoice), creative writing and others that are arts-based. The objective is to consider the potential of these unconventional approaches for studying complex trajectories and issues in migration in today’s digitally connected world. Together we will explore, for instance, opportunities created through employing these innovative approaches, including how we may anticipate the challenges and navigate the ethical considerations they present.  

Even though the personal experiences of the migration researcher and their situatedness within the research field are often key drivers of their work, the perspectives stemming from their lived experience are little used as critical tools in migration studies. Exploring the role and significance of such approaches in the migration field is important as they carry potential to produce knowledge 'differntly'.

This Research Gym will examine researcher positionality and self-reflexivity as key strategies – theoretically and methodologically within autoethnographic and participatory approaches. Further, it will be an opportunity for early career migration researchers to explore how they might centre co-creation and collaboration in their research and practice, not only as a way to disrupt the power dynamics in traditional research settings, but also to help strengthen voice and agency in their participants, thereby contributing to decentring and decolonizing migration discourses.

This workshop will focus on the following questions:

• How does the researcher’s positionality and the migrants’ lived experience shape research design and methods in migration studies?
• How can storytelling and autoethnography, creative writing and other artistic and creative practices, add new dimensions to qualitative research in migration?  
• Do alternative research approaches provide opportunities to disrupt or reset the power dynamics in research relationships; how do they do this?
• Why are participatory approaches, like participatory action research, Photovoice, and arts-based methods important research tools for understanding the migrant experience; and how can they help researchers explore innovative methods for producing and mobilizing migration-related knowledge? 

How this workshop will be delivered:

This workshop will use an interactive format for presenting information and for promoting discussion. Case studies and readings using research methods highlighted above will be shared in advance. The session will rely on role-playing participatory tools and narrative activities in a small-group setting to facilitate co-creation, reflective practice and experiential learning.

About the workshop leader:

Alka Kumar is a Mitacs Elevate Postdoctoral Research Fellow at CERC Migration. She completed doctoral work on labour market integration for racialized skilled immigrants within the interdisciplinary Peace and Conflict Studies program, University of Manitoba. In her current project at CERC Migration, implemented in partnership with the Catholic Crosscultural Services (external link)  and Mitacs (external link) , Alka uses participatory research methods in addition to storytelling, as well as artistic and creative practices, to explore the migration and resettlement experience of refugee women from Syria, Afghanistan and Ukraine.

Prior to that, during COVID-19, she led the StOries Project: Strangers to Ourselves at CERC Migration. This was a teaching and training project, with a cohort of interdisciplinary graduate students from across Canadian universities. The project explored the potential of storytelling, narrative inquiry, and creative writing to generate new insights into multigenerational migration histories and contested notions of identity, race and multiculturalism in Canada. Based on this project, a hybrid collection of academic essays and story-chapters, Migration and Identity through Creative Writing (external link)  (open access, co-edited with Anna Triandafyllidou), was published in 2023.

Our workshops are often oversubscribed, and we maintain a waiting list. We ask that you please cancel your registration if you are no longer able to attend. We appreciate your understanding.