Ethical practice in research with refugee-background youth: a dialogic reflection using Mohja Kahf’s ‘the aunty poem’

Abstract

Ethical dilemmas arise in any engaged human research. These are amplified in research involving uneven power dynamics and marginalised communities. In this article, we engage a dialogic autoethnographic methodology using Mohja Kahf’s ‘The Aunty Poem (Mi Privilege Es Su Privilege)’ to reflect on our participatory action research with refugee-background young people. We highlight some ethical dilemmas inherent in our research and argue for the need for researchers to take seriously questions of care, responsibility and reciprocity, including why our research matters and to whom; the nature of participant-researcher relationships and how these will end or be continued beyond our research; and the wider relational implications of our research (for example, with families, schools, and community leaders). We also argue that, since relational research is dynamic and unpredictable, ‘ethical practice’ requires ongoing attention to, and accountability for, shifting researcher-participant dynamics, and the interdependencies that mark our research relationships.