Description
Traditional understanding of migration research draws the concept of positionality upon a clear-cut distinction: an outsider or an insider researcher. The former refers to being a member of the migrant group which is studied whilst the latter encompasses a researcher profile that is a majority group member in the country of settlement. However, such understanding has been challenged by the fact that the insider-outsider divide is neither static nor fixed, on the contrary, the positionality of a researcher is an ongoing process of negotiation which highly depends on not only the relationship between the researcher and informants, but also kinds of markers are assigned to the researcher during the research progress. Drawing upon my long fieldwork experience with the host society members in Adana, Turkey, this article introduces a new category in qualitative migration studies: ‘partial insider’. Acknowledging that researchers’ positions have a direct impact on reaching to and shaping interaction with informants, this new positional category can thus be described as a situational context in which the researcher and target group members are the citizens of the same country, but the researcher does not share the same local origin with the interviewees whose views are asked about a migrant group living in their country by a non-local researcher. Although it is not a new phenomenon to conduct research in an environment which the researcher is familiar, I argue that insider status should not be taken for granted because being born and raised in the same country and speaking the same language with participants of the study can be considered of as a necessary, but insufficient condition for the attribution of an insider researcher.
