Miller, M.C., Grimwood, B.S.R., Arai, S.M.
Ascetic practices for reflexively navigating power, privilege and freedoms in leisure research
(2015) Leisure/ Loisir, pp. 1-20. Article in Press.
DOI: 10.1080/14927713.2015.1116204
Abstract
Critical reflexivity enables leisure researchers to interrogate assumptions and discursive structures associated with subjectivities enacted in and through research processes. We argue that reflexive practices implemented prior to entering into fieldwork help researchers prepare for, understand and negotiate power-imbued contexts that will be encountered during research. Drawing on Foucault’s ideas on practices of freedom, this paper represents an ascetic practice whereby the first author, with support from her co-author advisers, engaged in a reflexive exercise of the self to think critically about her subjectivities in relation to freedom, justice and forthcoming leisure research. Methodologically, the paper engages a decontextualized perspective-taking exercise that opens opportunities for exploring the limits and regulations of research desires, privileges and powers, and how perspectives of injustice and oppression are inextricably linked to subjectivity. © 2015 Canadian Association for Leisure Studies / Association canadienne d’études en loisir
Author Keywords
Ascetic practice; freedom; justice; reflexivity; subjectivity
