ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines the principles of feminist research methodology informing the design and conduct of the research in this book and gives a detailed description of the qualitative methods used throughout the research process. Challenging the notion of silence in interviews as a ‘problem’ to be overcome by the interviewer, it explains the methodology used for attending to periods of silence within participant interviews and throughout the research process, discusses the research interview as a space for ‘care-full’ listening and details the derivation of four different layers of interview transcripts to enable this level of attention to interview silence. Following discussion of the metaphors ‘midwife’ and ‘midwife-teacher’, familiar within feminist research, it proposes a new term, ‘midwife-inquirer’, for the role of feminist researchers. The chapter concludes with a reflection on the impact of the research process on the researcher’s personal discipline of silence and questions the long-term impact of research interviews in the lives of both participants and researchers.
