When research is conducted and findings presented, it's often the voice of the researcher that is loudest. Even when researching the experiences of those from minoritised backgrounds in good faith, the tendency is to speak over them in summary, or for them in an attempt to amplify them. This has to change.
Traditional research
Traditional research tends to narrow its focus from diverse sources, voices, and subject matter.
The voice of academic institutes (built in the image of European colonialism) reigns supreme. This means that even when looking at Black matters, we do so through white lenses, parameters, and expectations. This leaves no room for what can't be measured through white cultural norms and contexts. We say that research should be decolonised. Research can be experiential as well as experimental. Research does not need to be conducted by those with qualifications, but those with a desire to know and understand. Research should not only be legible to those in the silos of academia, but it should be crafted by all and for all.
If research is the preserve of the few, then so is knowledge. When that happens, knowledge ceases to be a tool of liberation and is wielded as a weapon of oppression. This is currently the place that we find our world; Rejecting knowledge as it has become synonymous with oppression.
Unheard voices
When research is conducted and findings presented, it's often the voice of the researcher that is loudest. Even when researching the experiences of those from minoritised backgrounds in good faith, the tendency is to speak over them in summary, or for them in an attempt to amplify them. This has to change.
Empowering the minoritised to speak for themselves, write their own stories, present the findings that they are more versed in than any researcher, allows research to delve deeper, become more authentic and answer questions that the researchers may not even think to ask.
Contextualising data
Numbers is hard and real and they never have feelings. But you push too hard and even numbers got limits.
(Yasiin Bey)
While we use data to help illuminate a problem and assess the efficacy of our coaching interventions, it is important to not rely solely or too heavily on data. The idea that empirical data is objective is a false one. Data collection is always carried out with bias and the inherent racism that is endemic to all systems and structures is neither accounted for or measured. Because of this, we have to:
- Always ensure that we put data in its proper context.
- Provide/look for anecdotal evidence of things working and not working.
- Place those with lived experience at the centre of all systems work.
Why did one straw break the camel’s back? Here’s the secret. The million other straws underneath it.
(Yassin Bey)
Data on its own only provides a partial image of what has already happened or is going on. We have to ensure that we not only contextualise it, but humanise it too. In the end, people aren’t just statistics and breaking them down into figures will not push us to the just society we want.
ROHO
The spirit of Rivers work is to not just work with and provide support to radicals in the public sector, but to connect them with each other.
The critical consciousness through which we do our work is what binds us. Building networks of radical thinkers and doers, within and across borders. Support systems that help build critical consciousness, radical imaginations and human resources, pushing toward a societal critical mass, who will accept nothing short of liberation. ROHO is about always feeding the spirit. Ours and the radicals we engage with. ROHO is ensuring that nobody doing the work feels alone.