Research performances

I revisit a participatory research project, carried out with domestic worke rs at the Philippine Women Centre, to assess how persistent conventions dic tated what did and did not count as evidence. I attempt to push against the se conventions, to entertain a broader range of evidence. Beyond this, our writing can be thought of as a performance; I try to imagine writing perfor mances that provoke productive tensions within the audience/reader, between identification and dis-identification. Finally, our research itself is a p erformance; framing it as such may enable us to imagine and experiment with a broader repertoire of research strategies, beyond the documentary and th e confessional, and multiple research objectives: here, now, and then and t here.