Paper long abstract:

This paper presents an ethnographic study in which participatory methods are favored in order to examine the ethical and political dimensions of knowledge production in research on minorities. I provide examples of projects in which Finnish Africans are invited to examine current representations Africa and Africans in Finnish non-fiction together with researchers, and in which they are actively involved when new texts about their presence in Finland are produced. These projects aim not only at making minority voices better heard but also including them in "our (future) history" by including their voices in the national we. My paper suggests that participatory methods, thought time-consuming, can improve the quality of research especially in studies of minorities and subordinated groups.