Seeing the point from which you see what you see: An essay on epistemic reflexivity in language research

Abstract

This essay deals with epistemic issues in language research, focusing particularly onthe field of language planning and policy (LPP). It outlines Pierre Bourdieu’s principleof epistemic reflexivity as a device for understanding what the view of the researchobject owes to the researcher’s past and present position in social space. I hold thatdeveloping such an understanding is particularly vital for LPP scholars, by virtueof the ways in which the objects investigated here tend to linger in the borderlandsbetween science and politics. Accordingly, the essay unearths the philosophical rootsof epistemic reflexivity and highlights some of its implications in the research practicewith examples from Swedish LPP research. It also examines the value of a reflexivestance in interviews as a way of pinpointing the relevance of epistemic reflexivity inevery moment of the scholarly investigation. In conclusion, the argument is that sinceepistemic reflexivity is a useful device for any critical researcher who wishes to grasp theknowledge he or she produces, it is so also for language researchers, and particularlyso in relation to the ideologically normative practices of LPP scholarship. Therefore, areflexive gaze is a pivotal driver for yielding better language research.