ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author discusses four encounters that forced her to re-evaluate her role as a researcher and reflect on her identity. She engages critically with these four encounters, placing them in dialogue with relevant literature, interview transcripts and entries into her research journal. The author presents her own reflections on reflexivity as immensely useful, yet ongoing and difficult, before closely examining the four encounters. Being reflexive in these four encounters changed the author and her research. Not only did reflexivity clarify her research aims and process, it helped to shape it. The author began to understand that reflexivity could add a rich additional layer to her data production, changing the shape and nature of her project. Warnings about research that fails to take reflexivity seriously need heeding — otherwise, as well as having an impact on the quality and reliability of research, researchers can also do harm to those they are researching, and to themselves.
