Working Group 12: Methodology as a Tool for Resistance and Hope

Coordinator:

This working group operates from the premise that methodology itself can be approached and conceptualized as a form of political resistance—a practice that actively resists and reclaims hope by generating alternatives. We seek to position methodology as an explicit, vital strategy for social and political resistance against various and interconnected forms of oppression. This approach asserts that the very tools we use to research and understand the world are integral to changing it.

We invite proposals that explore the theoretical, ethical, and practical dimensions of this work, with a particular interest in papers demonstrating how specific emancipatory methodologies have the capacity to be sites of resistance and hope. Submissions may address, but are not limited to, the following areas:

  • Decolonial Archival Methods & Counter-Mapping
  • Oral History & Testimonios
  • Feminist Interviewing & Collaborative Ethnography
  • Visual, Digital, and Participatory Action Research Methods
  • Reflexivity and Ethical Practice as Resistance

Format: This working group will run as one fully remote session. All participation will be online.

Accepted presentations

  • Surviving Transformative Practices: A Management Perspective on Decolonial Approaches and Reflective Organizational Culture (Dinesh Sathasivam)
  • Speaking Worlds into Being: Methods and Pedagogies of Sustaining Life in the Ruins (Asad Farooq)

For all inquiries regarding this working group, please contact the organizer, Reyhane Gholami:
reyhane.gholami.n@gmail.com.

Abstract submission is closed. Registration is open from 12 January to 15 February 2026. 
The detailed timetable will be published soon.