Paper Short Abstract:

How do positionalities oscillate during fieldwork, across multiple [state] fieldsites? How do bureaucratic processes limit the role of the ethnographers and, in doing so, reposition them as an extension of the state? What does this mean for the emancipatory possibilities of anthropological research?

Paper Abstract:

In this poster, I reflect on my current PhD research with claimants of the UK disability benefit 'Personal Independence Payment' (PIP). Conducted as a multi-sited ethnography, my field(s) span across legitimised stages of the PIP process and, simultaneously, extend beyond its officiated bounds to include support groups, preparatory workshops and activist spaces. However, this multi-sited approach has brought with it additional, and unanticipated, consequences: my positionality as a lived-experience researcher has varied significantly across my fields.

In my research with disabled benefit applicants, relating to one another across the intersectional axis of disability and class has been fundamental to co-constructing trust with my interlocutors. This is, in part, aided by the very dynamic of the ‘unofficial’ spaces that relatedness to my interlocutors has taken place. This relatedness has unlocked emancipatory research possibilities (Hartblay, 2020), too. In relating to one another’s circumstances, a level of mutual de-individualisation takes place – a catalyst of undoing internalised ‘deservingness’.

Contrastingly, my ethnographic fieldwork conducted within the PIP system has exacerbated alienation – entangling me within the process. Being restricted to non-participatory observation during my time at the Magistrates' Court gives me little opportunity to foster relationships with applicants. Simultaneously, employees demand, as equally as they ask, claimants’ consent for me witnessing their tribunal hearing. Far from mutual vulnerability, my ethnographic fieldwork within the PIP system has forced one-sided intimacy (Mingus, 2017) reminiscent of harmful disability research practices. In essence, how do we retain emancipatory rigidity within the multi-sited restrictions and limitations of the state?