Being the intrusive ‘double outsider’ inside Welsh family homes: Insights from researcher positionality

Building on the theme of the University of Bath’s 2018 Qualitative Research Symposium, ‘How do we belong?’, this paper explores what can be learned by considering researcher positionality. I highlight how my positionality has influenced my research area, before discussing the methodological approach taken in my doctoral research. As an English researcher working within a Welsh suburb, where I do not reside, I argue that I am positioned as a ‘double outsider’, and that this influences participants’ responses to me, and the ways in which they construct insider/outsider boundaries. This paper contends that insights from fieldnotes about being positioned as the ‘intrusive researcher’ can provide valuable and additional reflections on participants’ gendered domestic lives that may not have been raised in interviews. Finally, the paper concludes with some points on the usefulness of the insider/outsider dichotomy, suggesting that sometimes the boundaries between the two are blurred and we can come to occupy a ‘third space’ when dealing with the difficulties and potentialities of ‘outsider’ research