Paper short abstract:

Data from interviews and everyday interactions among Tamil refugees in Norway demonstrate how relations of intimacy, empathy and imagination give access to meanings that confront specific moralities and calls for general ethical perspectives in creation of knowledge – about Tamil social experiences.

Paper long abstract:

This paper addresses how the interview and engagement in the other as a mutual subject can create relations that challenge researchers' particular moral codes and cause us to expand these to more general ethical perspectives. Conducting fieldwork among Tamil refugees in a small fishing village in northern Norway with a concern for illness and well-being, interviews and conversations were contextualised by sharing daily activities to capture Tamils' tacit perceptions and experiences of social life. The paper presents a case-study with a Tamil woman who experienced stigmatisation in relation to the local Tamil and Norwegian population. Data from interviews and everyday interactions demonstrate how relations of intimacy, empathy and imagination give access to meanings and values that confront specific moralities and calls for ethical creation of knowledge - about Tamil social experiences.