ABSTRACT
This chapter will explore issues that appear when sensitive studies are at stake. I found challenging ethical questions around how to publish sensitive empirical material describing how athletes were doing sexuality in a sporting context. These ethical questions influenced several factors in my research, such as: the sampling procedure, methods in use, the process of interviewing and the writing process. In her book, Gender Research: a Guide to Feminist Theory, Methodology and Writings, Nina Lykke identifies five elements relating to how and why experimental writing has influenced research work in the field of gender studies: (1) epistemology and the speaking subject (different telling positions); (2) research ‘objects’ as subjects with agency; (3) the language and narrative turn effectuates a move beyond traditional texts and genres; (4) to write body and passion; (5) to write understandably (Lykke 2008, 178–197, my translation). Laurel Richardson views poetic representation in research as a ‘method of inquiry’ that contains both creative and analytic research work and the use of non-traditional academic genres, such as poetry, drama, conversations, etc. (Richardson 2000, 929–930). Lykke takes the dimension of the poetic further when discussing Richardson's work, and argues for a certain ‘poetic truth’, which can be raised against a positivistic view of truth as objective and generalizeable. Drawing on Hywel D. Lewis’ definition of poetic truth, she sees the benefits of the use of poetic genres in research as being composed around their effects on the reader, effects that are both aesthetic and ethical (as in art consumption); they fascinate, give a sudden experience and make us both think and feel around what is presented to us (Lykke 2008, 190–191).
