Living and Loving as Research Methodologies

Living and Loving as Research Methodologies follows Audre Lorde’s call to dismantle “the master’s tools” in favour of other strategies towards meaningful change, this volume presents examples of post-qualitative research that start from different epistemological openings than mainstream western conceptions of knowledge. Each chapter outlines research praxis through its design and engagement and offers creative perspectives on ways to approach data and representation.

This book builds on feminist definitions of living as research method, like Sara Ahmed’s “listening with a feminist ear” and “tending to spillage” as well as adrienne maree brown’s “noticing” of emergence that legitimizes everyday acts and overlooked instances. Love is similarly defined as noting and ritualizing care, with the recognition that “what we pay attention to grows”. These chapters foreground the tradition of love as resistance articulated and furthered by Black feminists, expanding into new materialist “becoming-with” definitions of entangled living. The methods presented embody love at every stage and work towards enacting a kinder, just world.

This book is designed for graduate and advanced undergraduate courses in research methodology, particularly in conversation with feminist and decolonial theory and posthumanist scholarship. Such courses are increasingly being offered across Education, Sociology, Anthropology, Gender Studies, Cultural Studies, Creative Writing, Decolonial Studies, and related fields.