Accountability, ethics and knowledge production: racialised academic staff navigating competing expectations in the social production of research with marginalised communities

ABSTRACT

Universities, both in Canada and throughout the global North, are predicated on empiricist and positivist understandings of knowledge and knowledge production which are communicated and strengthened through research practices and protocols. Drawn from a larger study exploring research leadership among accomplished academic staff, this paper examines interviews with eight racialised female academic staff who focus on social justice research predicated on co-producing knowledge with marginalised communities. Building on the rich scholarship which conveys the consequences of systemic discrimination for racialised and Indigenous scholars working in Canadian universities, we explore how participants navigate systems that fail to understand their epistemological and methodological orientation towards research and consider what it reveals about research culture and claims of inclusiveness in the Canadian academy. Drawing on Sara Ahmed’s work on performative diversity in academia, we consider how academic structures, protocols and policies associated with research influence the social production of knowledge and resist change toward greater equity and Reconciliation demanded of Canadian higher education.

KEYWORDS:

• Knowledge production
• research ethics
• racialised academic staff
• Canadian higher education
• collaborative research

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 We use the term ‘racialised’ to emphasise the socially constructed nature of the concept of race. Racialisation refers to the process by which the racially dominant groups mark those perceived as racially different as ‘other’.

2 The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) was established in 2008 to educate Canadians about the history of Indian Residential Schools and the impact on the children forced to attend by the Canadian government. The Report includes 94 Calls to Action directed at specific institutions and groups; the Calls to Action are the culmination of a process designed to address the ongoing impact of residential schools on survivors and their families.

3 Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR) are two national research funding bodies.

4 The Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans is a joint policy of Canada’s three federal research agencies – the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and all universities are required to abide by these standards. Research ethics boards at individual institutions draw up their guidelines in direct reference to the TCPS as it is perceived as the best standard for research ethics.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada: [Grant Number 435-2017-0104].