University of California Press Harassed: Gender, Bodies, and Ethnographic Research

Researchers frequently experience sexualized interactions, sexual objectification, and harassment as they conduct fieldwork. These experiences are often left out of ethnographers’ “tales from the field” and remain unaddressed within qualitative literature.  Harassed argues that the androcentric, racist, and colonialist epistemological foundations of ethnographic methodology contribute to the silence surrounding sexual harassment and other forms of violence. Rebecca Hanson and Patricia Richards challenge readers to recognize how these attitudes put researchers at risk, further the solitude experienced by researchers, lead others to question the validity of their work, and, in turn, negatively impact the construction of ethnographic knowledge. To improve methodological training, data collection, and knowledge produced by all researchers,  Harassed advocates for an embodied approach to ethnography that reflexively engages with the ways in which researchers’ bodies shape the knowledge they produce. By challenging these assumptions, the authors offer an opportunity for researchers, advisors, and educators to consider the multiple ways in which good ethnographic research can be conducted. Beyond challenging current methodological training and mentorship, Harassed opens discussions about sexual harassment and violence in the social sciences in general.   Review "Harassed should be required reading for any class on ethnography or in-depth interviewing, for any researcher conducting ethnography or interviews, and for any faculty member who is advising students conducting such work. Armed with this book, researchers will not only be better able to protect themselves but they will also gain a model for how to learn and teach from their own embodied experiences in the field."-- "Gender & Society" "When my friends and I faced gendered issues during fieldwork, we viewed it as an anomalous problem to manage as best we could. Hanson and Richards move beyond individual-level suggestions on how to handle risks; they challenge academic assumptions about the very nature of ethnography. Their vision of an embodied ethnography should inform ongoing conversations about how we produce knowledge as well as how to appropriately train and support our students and colleagues."-- "Social Forces" "One of this book's major contributions is to lay bare the gendered character of ethnography as practical endeavor and intellectual pursuit. Interview extracts vividly convey how prevailing conventions create pernicious traps and impossible binds for female researchers, for whom the very act of entering a field site alone and unknown frequently contravenes prescribed norms of feminine conduct and so renders them vulnerable to overtures and advances. . . . While positioned as a challenge to institutional silence, Harassed could instead be seen as throwing down the gauntlet, providing a comprehensive appraisal of the problem and setting out clear-headed proposals for change."-- "Times Higher Education" " Harassed is an important, insightful text that should become a staple for research methods classes in anthropology, sociology, and women's and gender studies. . . . This is a must-read for anyone conducting or supervising ethnographic research. . . . Highly recommended."-- "CHOICE" From the Inside Flap "A groundbreaking contribution and a long overdue publication about the deafening sexual silence surrounding the fieldwork experiences of many women scholars conducting qualitative research in sociology."—Gloria Gonzalez-Lopez, author of  Family Secrets: Stories of Incest and Sexual Violence in Mexico "A novel and important contribution to qualitative methodology that will ignite good discussions not only in classrooms but in larger academic settings as a whole."—Junmin Wang, author of State-Market Interactions in China’s Reform Era: Local State Competition and Global Market Building in the Tobacco Industry From the Back Cover