Introduction Feminist Research Method to Communication Study

Introduction
Feminism encompasses diverse frameworks, ideologies, attitudes, and analyses of
the political, economic, and social inequalities between women and men. In this
pluralistic context, the need for diversity in research methods would seem as obvious
as the conclusion that any method that can be used on behalf of women's rights and
interests is by definition a potential feminist tool. Useful traditional methods may be
used for answering certain kinds of important feminist questions. Yet other questions
need to be addressedquestions about women's lived experiences, how we think
about our lives and ourselves, about the meanings of events and relationships in our
lives, and how we differ in our constructions and interactions in the world. Such
questions simply cannot be answered with old-fashioned methods. So the search is on
to identify and develop the methods we need to answer them. Feminists will continue
to debate the merits of various methodological approaches for answering different
questions. However, as for the fundamental knowledge about feminist research, the
following may be of some value.
Feminist Research Background
Schools of Feminist Thought

Liberal Feminism (can be overlapped, but have to be classified)

Radical Feminism (Ideological/Marxist Feminism)

Production of knowledge is mediated by situated conjunctions of class,

gender, racial, ethnic, and sexual identities; women's positioned knowledge
is particularly effective in destabilizing oppressive institutions.

Post-Structuralist /Post-Modern Feminism

Links female oppression to the material conditions of social organization

created by capitalist political economy.

Standpoint Feminism

Seeks the inclusion of women in rights and benefits traditionally afforded to

men; traditionally through juridical means.

Deconstructs language and discourse to understand how gendered identities

are developed as both a practical and political process.

Ecofeminism

Links gender-based oppression to institutions that exploit and destroy other

non-human life forms and environments.

Feminist Research as a Method

Feminism is a perspective, not a research method, so it is could use a multiplicity
of research methods. At the same time, we need realized that, Feminism not all
feminist social research is innovative with regard to method
For feminist researchers who do not follow "rigorous" scientific procedures, the
feminist spirit is one of breaking free of methodological traditions
Qualitative Methods in Feminist Research

Feminists hold that since the production of knowledge is an act of power,

researchers and their participants should ideally be equal partners in that process.
The bias in qualitative (and particularly, ethnographic) methods toward
developing intimate, cooperative, and accountable research relationships serves
this goal

Feminist researchers generally reject objectivist premises that have historically

contributed to the suppression of women's voice under the guise of scientific
rationality and detachment

Qualitative research potentially serves feminists grappling with the complex

politics of diversity

Feminist researchers are sensitive to the ways that all forms of research may be
affected by the corrosive forces of sexism, racism, homophobia, and class
discrimination

Feminists hold that since data is produced in the context of a relationship, it

should be recorded and interpreted accordingly.

Feminist commitments dramatically influence the form of qualitative research

narratives

What is Feminist Research?

Involves an ongoing criticism of nonfeminist scholarship

Is guided by feminist theory

May be transdisciplinary

Aims to create social change

Strives to represent human diversity

Frequently includes the researcher as a research subject and tool

Frequently attempts to develop special relations with the people studied (in
interactive research)

Frequently defines a special relation with the reader

5. What Does a Feminist Method Look Like?

Carrying messages that challenge claims by those who occupy privileged

positions

Engaging in feminist theory and praxis means to challenge knowledge that

excludes while seeming includes

Listening to the experiences of "the other/s" as legitimate knowledge

Sharing some common angles of vision that are "connected in principle to

feminist struggle," often with the intent to change the basic structures of
oppression

Engaging both theory and practice of research--beginning with the formulation

of the research question and ending with the reporting of research findings

Deconstructing what they perceive as errors, or examples of androcentrism,

across a range of academic disciplines and professional fields

Not necessarily embracing the practices of a positivist mode of inquiry, but

positivism is not the enemy of all feminist inquiry

Feminists go to the heart of some foundational questions, namely, who can

know? What can be known?

Knowledge is achieved not through "correcting" mainstream research studies by

adding women, but through paying attention to the specificity and uniqueness of
women's lives and experiences

Objectivity should be transformed into "feminist objectivity"---knowledge and

truth are partial, situated, subjective, power imbued, and relational. The denial of
values, biases, and politics is seen as unrealistic and undesirable
Strengths and Weaknesses

Strengths:

Feminist research promotes an intersectional lens, leading to richer data. Feminist

research requires practitioners to think about the ways subjects are composed of
various identities and the ways these identities contribute to how one experiences the
world. With this in mind, promoting an intersectional lens means crafting research
that is subject specific that eschews sweeping generalizations and assumptions.
Feminist research allows for the study of minorities populations. By its very
nature, feminist research trajectories focus on those most socially vulnerable. While
women have historically constituted the impetus for feminist agendas, as a discourse
feminism is about magnifying those left out of white male patriarchal paradigms and
this extends beyond gender.
Feminism creates a discourse in which women in particular create their own
narratives. Feminist research seeks to include the perspectives of women in particular
in male dominated social science research projects. This means both women
researchers and subjects. Many who partake in feminist research are specifically
looking to challenge patriarchy and gender oppression.
Enhances researcher is reflexivity. Feminist research asks practitioners to
examine their relationships to their projects and to the subjects and ideas they analyze.
It suggests that researchers be mindful of their impact and influence on their studies.
As a concept, feminism has evolved to encompass the day-to-day reality of
subjects. So feminism allow research thinks about material conditions. This means
that feminism often connects a subjects lived experience to how they view their
larger worlds. It assumes a connection between material conditions and knowledge
production.
It is what most qualitative research strives to be, even when the concept of
feminism is not mentioned. The balance called for by feminist agendas promotes
research that is ethical, rigorous and multifaceted. While other research projects may
fall outside feminism, many practitioners look to feminist methods for creating rich
projects.
Weaknesses:
Feminism has historically had a PR problem (anti-men, lesbian, separatist).
Because patriarchy is real, and feminism is women centered, feminist research often
gets critiqued as separatist or divisive. This means that people often associate feminist
work as having an antiman agenda.
Thought to privilege the voices of white Western women. Feminist research is
often associated with white womens liberal politics, that is, it is a platform imagined
to be about the experiences of women in the majority.
Can sometimes create the subject it seeks to emancipate. Feminism as a concept
can unknowingly promote an essential womanhood, identifying a standard that no one
fits into and therefore be seen as creating the thing it seeks to liberate.
Often privileges gender and sex oppression as THE feminist issues. Women
across the globe deploy feminism for myriad reasons, whether that be clean water,
prison reform, or structural adjustment programs. Oftentimes though, feminism is

imagined to be a critique of only gender and sex oppression because it is imagined

only in its Western iteration.
Key Practitioners
F
Susan J. Douglas. Douglas is best known for her work on postfeminist media
studies.
She draws from her position as a mother to inquire how the media incorrectly portrays
women. Using standpoint theory, she formulates the conclusion that the media creates
an illusion that women today are equal when in reality, this is far from the case.
Works of hers include: Enlightened Sexism (2010), The Mommy Myth (2005), and
Where the Girls Are (1994).
Angela McRobbie. McRobbie is a canonical scholar in cultural studies and is
best known for her work on postfeminism and fashion. Her piece entitled
Postfeminism and Popular Culture is the most read article in Feminist Media
Studies. Her previous studies use interviewing techniques to interview photographers
and editors in the fashion industry. She found during her conversations, that often
editors would identify as feminists but vehemently argue that airbrushing, dieting,
body policing are important for a womens success. McRobbies contemporary work
explores how the media, specifically Bridget Jones Diary, reinforces the postfeminist
rhetoric that women do not need feminism.
Raka Shome. Shomes most current work Diana and Beyond (2014) argues that
whiteness, specifically white femininity is framed by larger Anglo-dominated
contexts. Shomes work does not link white femininity to the body, but rather she
looks at how national narratives establish a normalization and legitimization for white
women. Her work extends on scholarship that looks at white femininity and examines
how national identity formation exists within whiteness. Her primary site is
contemporary media, which is convoluted through globalization and neoliberalism.
She argues that exploring white femininity is important to understanding national
identity formation. Her primary method is rhetorical discourse analysis and she draws
from numerous sites of interest including: motherhood, fashion, and frugality.
Lisa Nakamura. Nakamuras best known for her research on race and video gaming.
Digitizing Race (2007) is her most current book. Her book explores how digital
spaces shape identity and race relations. She is best known for her ethnographic work
in digital spaces. She once mentioned she spent over 1000 hours playing World of
Warcraft with her participants to better understand the dynamics of the game. Her
most recent work explores the roles Native American women play in the current
Internet infrastructure.
Carol Stabile. Carol Stabiles work is primarily housed in Journalism. Her
current work explores how university institutions frame rape and sexual assault. Her
previous work, entitled I Will Own You: Accountability in Massively Multiplayer
Online Games explores how communicative practices online shape power. Although
her background is in the Humanities, her current work interviewed gamers about their
practices and identities.

Julia Wood. Julia Wood is a prominent scholars in Communication Studies. Her

work on gender and communication is used in many classrooms across the country.
Woods research primarily looks at familial dynamics and interpersonal
communication. Specifically, intimate partner violence and divisions of domestic
labor. Her primary method is interviewing.
Chavez & Griffin. Chavez and Griffins (2012) book Standing at the
Intersections uses rhetorical analysis to explore the importance of looking beyond
only gender in terms of oppression. They posit that scholars must use an intersectional
approach, an approach that also investigates race, class, and other various identities,
when looking at systems of power in communication.
Utilization
In the article of Foss & Foss (1994) explained the significance and application of
personal experience as evidence. As well as emphasized how to use personal
experience as evidence in feminist research.
Generally, personal experience is an individuals true story. Foss & Foss
summarized, personal experience as an emergent from personal participation in
events (Foss & Foss, 1994, p. 39). But for the feminist scholars, personal experience
is a womans life, feelings and interpretations about events.
There are two principles Foss & Foss suggest feminists use as personal
experience. First, womens perceptions, meanings, and experiences should be taken
seriously and valued. Second, the stories of womens perceptions and meanings
should be understood within constructs and theories that were developed within a
consideration of womens perspectives (Foss & Foss,1994, p. 39).
The purpose of feminist research is to eliminate discrimination, so the central
idea is feminist researchers cannot hold any discrimination itself. The primary mission
for feminists is to help women speak their own voice. Feminist scholars should use of
their personal skills and knowledge to present to the public information about
womens lives. Those personal skills and knowledge include using critical and
analytic training to clarify problem, to organize accounts, to locate relevant theories,
materials, and funding, and to access publishing outlets (Foss & Foss,1994, p. 40). As
well as, feminist scholars should use their personal skills and knowledge to coach and
assist women to voice their own experience. Last, feminist scholars cannot
discriminate which kinds of womens personal experiences are better for
understanding a phenomenon, because of every moment of a womens life should be
respect.
Foss & Foss mentioned, using personal experience as evidence is a complex
process. Because they think personal experience is a multiplicity of truths and
values diversity is not possible with many other kinds of evidence. Feminist scholars
emphasize the diversity of womens lives, so they are forced to take into account the
fullness of different experience and to attempt to see how those differences are
enacted in individual lives. The goal of feminist research is to improve womens lives,
so that feminist researchers cannot simply learn about what happened to participants
but are able to glimpse participants feeling, motives for action, world view and

constructions of self, to produces not only knowledge information about others lives
and a capacity for insight, empathy, and attentive caring.
In Lengels (1998) article, the author seeks to discuss theoretical,
methodological, epistemological, and political considerations of feminist ethnography.
The concept of self and other is arises from contemporary ethnography specifically.
But feminist ethnographers, question assumptions of traditional ethnography of self
and other, such as the concepts of first world and third world. Feminist scholars
try to develop a new form of ethnographic inquiry concerned with interrogating the
power relation of self and other. Like the author discussed in her article, new
ethnographic possibilities from non-western experiences and from feminist theory and
politics(Lengel, 1998, p. 230). In the fact, feminist and critical ethnography has a
kind of awkward relationship. While feminism questions the relationship of self
and other in term of the bipolar opposition of men and women, critical ethnographic
and anthropological works examine more board cross-cultural, sociopolitical
hierarchical relationship (Lengel, 1998, p. 231).
Feminist scholars approach multiplicity to look at the issue of women, they are
criticizing the simple dichotomy of traditional criticism scholars idea, such as east &
west, first & third world, and international & national. Because she believes every
woman is different and unique, they cannot be simplified. Lengel also criticized some
classical conceptions of traditional criticism, example of elitism and orientalism.
With feminist developments, Lengel noticed some problems of feminism. She
mentioned feminists started with assumptions and criticize traditional views for
women. So Langel emphasized feminist scholars should be self-reflexive often.
Feminist research helps women improve their lives, so helping women break the
silence and build a stage to speak their voice is obligatory. At the same time, womens
lives change with the developing world, so the aim of feminist research needs to
transform as well.

References
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