ABSTRACT
For many scholars hoping to make a real-world impact through sociolinguistic research, the ultimate goal of such work is the empowerment of research participants. Within sociolinguistics, the idea of empowerment has primarily circulated via the work of Deborah Cameron and her colleagues, who propose a three-part taxonomy of relationships between researcher and researched, which they label ethics, advocacy, and empowerment. The student-researchers must obtain informed consent from their research participants. When scholars set aside objectivizing methodologies and restructure the research relationship as a partnership in which participants as well as scholars set the agenda, such work involves not only "research on and research for" but also "research with"– in other words, empowerment. Beyond sociolinguistics and related fields, however, the idea of empowerment has come in for more extensive critique, primarily among those who, like its proponents, view scholarship as a crucial site for explicit sociopolitical engagement.
