Based on fieldwork with migrants and border populations in Central America and the story of a young Congolese woman in particular, this article discusses how research participants’ use of mobile communication technology provokes a redefinition of the ethnographic field. Increasingly popular trajectory research often sets out to follow migrants, yet a focus on migrants keeping in touch with researchers at their own initiative and discretion, following them, reveals entanglements of selective on- and offline engagement and self-representation. Critical exploration of research participants’ differentiated use of digital technology for navigating a social environment that includes the researcher herself not only transforms our understanding of the field in empirical, ethical, and methodological terms, but also counteracts potentially voyeuristic and life-threatening practices of following people on the move

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doi.org/10.3167/sa.2021.650109, hdl.handle.net/1765/135531
Social Analysis
International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University (ISS)

Winters, N. (2021). Following, Othering, Taking Over: Research Participants Redefining the Field through Mobile Communication Technology. Social Analysis, 65(1), 133–142. doi:10.3167/sa.2021.650109