How do we keep in touch with friends and research participants in war zones? How often do we contact them and how far do we go in supporting them in their needs? This paper is about the way friendships and research relationships are challenged in times of war. On the basis of my experiences with friends and research participants in Yemen, and in particular my relationship with one of my best friends in the port town Hodeidah, I explore the different ways in which friendships and research relationships can develop in situations of crisis and war. I argue that friendships are of utmost importance in times of war, as a way to keep in touch with our colleagues, friends and informants. Friendship is in my view one of the main ways in which we can show our solidarity and support with people in difficult political and economic circumstances. I build on Abu-Lughod’s tactical humanism (1993) and the work of feminist anthropologists on friendship in fieldwork. In contrast with scholars who make a plea for friendship as a method of research (Tillman-Healy 2003), I argue that friendships should not be used as alternative research methods and that personal relationships with friends, colleagues and informants are more important that the collection of research data, in particular in times of crisis. I also discuss the difficulties to keep in touch, feelings of guilt, frustration and despair and a number of ethical dilemmas, which become accentuated in times of crisis and war.  

Shaped by the Field- Shaping the Field: On how political, ethical and personal dilemmas of doing ‘fieldwork under fire’ shape/ deform scholarly knowledge Based on 19 months of fieldwork research in Palestine, this paper critically explores how risks (Nordstrom& Robben 1995), emotions and practical considerations (Deeb, & Winegar 2015) and political ethical dilemmas (De Jong 2012) influence our ethnographic data and how this concurrently shapes the scholarly body of knowledge about conflict areas. As part of a regional panel, this paper will first briefly introduce both the actual field (Gaza, West Bank, East Jerusalem and Israel) and the theoretical field (doing ‘fieldwork under fire’) through three exemplifying ethnographic descriptions. The paper will concurrently focus on the less discussed but crucial aspect of how this myriad of considerations has direct theoretical consequences. While consciously presented as open-ended and purposefully controversial questions rather than answers, this discussion is structured in two parts. First, the questions, choices and dilemmas that a researcher in Gaza, the West Bank, Jerusalem or Israel will face during fieldwork are centralized. Because of access and perceptions of risks, the West Bank is a more likely place for fieldwork research than Gaza. But how does this shape our knowledge of the area? How does it play into the politically enforced perception of Gaza as more extreme and more dangerous? Does it unwittingly reinforce the power filled discourse of Palestine as fragmented? Second, the practical political surrounding of researching and teaching Palestine-Israel (before and after fieldwork) will be critically explored in regards to the kind of scholarship that is/is not produced. With the practise of ‘denied entry stamps’ to academics by Israeli border officials growing more regular, stated purpose and research questions are adapted accordingly. But how does this self-censorship shapes or even deforms an entire field of knowledge? Forced to consider funding bodies, which language is used/reproduced and which critical subjects are left untouched as a bargaining deal in order to keep or retain access? Equally contentious, how does the call for BDS and accusations of normalization force artificial separation of subjects , phenomena and interlocutors? This paper does not aim to oppose more personals approaches to feelings, politics and ethics in fieldwork research. On the contrary, through the critical questions it will raise, it strongly poses that such questions are inherently intertwined with the theory we do/do not produce and should be appreciated and discussed as such.

In this paper I address the ethical and emotional implications of doing fieldwork with Syrians who were forced to flee their country. The main focus of this research was the intimate realm of experiencing displacement, war, and hope (or lack of it), and the narratives surrounding such experiences. I spent three months, January to March 2014, with Syrians who were living (or surviving) in a foreign place, while the conflict was still destroying their country, just across the border. . Two Turkish cities were strategically chosen: Gaziantep, because of the large influx of Syrians arriving daily due to its location close to the border; and Istanbul, because it offered a completely different scenario and was a sought-after destination for participants. Doing research with people in vulnerable situations, especially when it involves telling experiences, emotions, and expectations for the future, is a very delicate process. Participants might have been through several situations in where they have been questioned before (Knudsen 1995) and probably re-victimized. Add war and forced displacement to the equation, and it gets trickier. As researchers, we are active agents in the development of any ethnographic work, and that comes with various challenges and particularities that need to be thoroughly considered and discussed. In my case, my experience as a Colombian anthropologist played a paramount role especially because of Colombia’s violent history and today’s peace process. As Bruner argues, “In the field we are in dialogue with ourselves as much as we are in a dialogue with others” (Bruner 1986: 15). This issue, and others regarding feelings (despair, nostalgia, boredom, anguish) and concerns (well being, safety, justice) surrounding the different stages of fieldwork and my relationship both with the locals and the Syrian participants are at the core of this paper.

This paper will critically reflect on testimonial narrative fieldwork conducted on traumatic experiences amongst young activists (18-35 years) in (post-)revolutionary Cairo. This fieldwork, consisting of interviews with activists from all political stripes, was conducted between October 2013 and February 2014: shortly after the Rabaa massacre and in a context of deepening social and political polarisation. It will discuss the experiences in Egypt that led to this research, as well as the personal, political and professional difficulties faced both during and after the completion of this work. It particularly focuses on feelings of guilt and heightened responsibility towards interviewees who have shared some of their deepest personal and profoundly traumatic experiences (which had often remained unspoken prior to these interviews) – as well as feelings of anger and desperation as the lived reality worsens for many of them. This paper thus explores both the blurring of relations to interviewees as well as the shattering of the researcher’s own lifeworld (e.g. secondary traumatisation). It hence insists that as political scientists, we should critically reflect on issues of transference and countertransference between researcher and interviewee both during and after the conduction of highly sensitive interviews. It will also insist that whilst it is impossible (and possibly frustrating) to translate such traumatic narratives in a context were the audience – both academic and non-academic – has no frame of reference for such experiences, the impact of this type of critical research is nevertheless profound. It is therefore time to bring the ‘human’ back into Political Science.