Reflexivity in Criminological Research Experiences with the Powerful and the Powerless

by Lumsden, Karen; Winter, Aaron

• ISBN13: 9781137379399
• ISBN10: 1137379391
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2014-10-06
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

Doing research with criminals or deviants has inspired much academic reflection, particularly in respect of the risks and dangers which researchers may face in these contexts, as well as the ethical, legal and moral dilemmas they provoke. This collection contributes to, advances and consolidates discussions of the range of methods and approaches in criminology through the presentation of diverse international case studies in which the authors reflect upon their experiences with both powerless and/or powerful individuals/groups.
 
Reflexivity, and the need to be reflexive, permeates all criminological research and the chapters in this collection cover various aspects of this, including gaining access to the field, building relationships with the researched, the impact of the researcher's identity on the research (including gender, class and race), ethics, risk, bias and partisanship, policy implications, and how to disseminate findings and 'give voice' to the researched. A range of research settings are drawn from including those typically involving the powerful, such as state institutions, courts and prisons, to those typically conceived of as powerless, such as deviant and dangerous individuals as well as subcultures including boy racers and hooligans. Research participants defined as vulnerable, for example victims of crime, are also considered.
 
This comprehensive collection explores a variety of methods including interviews, participant observation, virtual ethnography and feminist research. Acknowledging the fluid nature of power relations and dynamics, this volume will be a valuable resource to scholars of criminology and sociology.

Author Biography

Karen Lumsden is Lecturer in Sociology at Loughborough University, UK. She is the author of Boy Racer Culture: Youth, Masculinity and Deviance ( 2013) and her research interests include crime and deviance, car culture, youth culture, moral panics, and policing.

Aaron Winter is Senior Lecturer in Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of East London, UK. His research interests include right-wing extremism, terrorism and hate crime in Britain, America and Canada. He is co-editor of Discourses and Practices of Terrorism: Interrogating Terror (2010), a co-convener of the British Sociological Association Race and Ethnicity Study Group and an Associate Editor of Sociological Research Online.

Table of Contents

1. Reflexivity in Criminological Research; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
PART I: RESEARCH RELATIONSHIPS
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
2. Negotiating 'Victim Communities': Reflexivity and Method in Researching High Profile Crimes; Nicola O'Leary
3. Relationships Between Gatekeepers and Researchers: The Experience of Conducting Evaluations into Parenting Programmes in Community and Penal Settings; Julie T. Davies and Dr Eleanor Peters
4. The Mango Tree: Exploring the Prison Space for Research; Rimple Mehta
5. Reflective Friend Research: The Relational Aspects of Social Scientific Research; Stephen Case and Kevin Haines
PART II: IDENTITIES, SUBJECTIVITIES AND INTERSECTIONALITIES: GENDER AND CLASS
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
6. Having the Balls: Reflections on Doing Gendered Research with Football Hooligans; Emma Poulton
7. The Interplay between Power and Reflexivity in Feminist Research on Young Women's Safety; Oona Brooks
8. Power, Pregnancy and Prison: The Impact of a Researcher's Pregnancy on Qualitative Interviews with Female Prisoners; Emily Luise Hart
9. Writing the Ethnographic Self in Research on Marginalised Youths and Masculinity; Elias le Grand
PART III: IDENTITIES, SUBJECTIVITIES AND INTERSECTIONALITIES: RACE AND ETHNICITY
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lusmden and Aaron Winter
10. From 'Hate Crimes' to Social Harm: Critical Moments and Reflexive Practice; David Glisch-Sánchez
11. Prison is My Family Business: Reflections of an African American Woman with Incarcerated Relatives Doing Research on Incarcerated African American Fathers; Breea C. Willingham
12. Accessing the Experiences of Female and Minority Police Officers: Observations from an Ethnographic Researcher; Meghan E. Hollis
13. Researching 'Bogus' Asylum Seekers, 'Illegal' Migrants and 'Crimmigrants'; Monish Bhatia
14. Researching 'Hidden Populations': Reflections of a Quantitative Researcher in Understanding 'Established' and 'Immigrant' Groups' Perceptions of Crime and Social (Dis)Order; Clare E. Griffiths
15: 'Coming in from the Cold': Constructing Qualitative 'Criminality' in Australia's Penal-Welfare State; Michael Wearing
PART IV: RISK, ETHICS AND RESEARCHER SAFETY
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
16. From Paper Ethics to Real World Research: Supervising Ethical Reflexivity When Taking Risks in Research with 'The Risky'; Ruth Armstrong, Loraine Gelsthorpe and Ben Crewe
17. Armed Robbery and Ethnographic Connection in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil; Stephanie C. Kane
PART V: POWER, PARTISANSHIP AND BIAS
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
18. Politics, Power and Gender: Reflections on Researching Female Policy Elites in Criminal Justice; Gemma Birkett
19. Overcoming Barriers in the Criminal Justice System: Examining the Value and Challenges of Interviewing Legal Practitioners; Kate Fitz-Gibbon
20. Doing Research in Prison: How to Resist Institutional Pressures; Vanina Ferreccio and Francesca Vianello
21. 'You Are What You Research': Bias and Partisanship in an Ethnography of Boy Racers; Karen Lumsden
PART VI: REFLEXIVITY AND INNOVATION: NEW CONTEXTS, CHALLENGES AND POSSIBILITIES
Editors' Introduction; Karen Lumsden and Aaron Winter
22. Online Gambling, Advantage Play, Reflexivity and Virtual Ethnography; James Banks
23. Reflexivity and Participatory Policy Ethnography: Situating the Self in a Transnational Criminology of Harm Production; Jarrett Blaustein
24. Innovative Justice: According to Whom?; Hannah Graham and Rob White