How can we conduct relevant and responsible research with social movements we care about? This workshop will create a collective space to explore practical answers to this question. Drawing on experiences with activist research involving in-depth interviews and long-term participation, this workshop will dig into real-world dilemmas around accountability and academic expectations. It will also offer take-away tools for crafting research questions and practices, maintaining humility and humor, setting goals beyond credentialing requirements, and making research processes useful for activists.

Chris Dixon, originally from Alaska, is a longtime activist and an adjunct research professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Carleton University. His writing has appeared in numerous book collections as well as periodicals such as Anarchist Studies, Briarpatch, Left Turn, and Social Movement Studies. Dixon is a member of Punch Up Collective, a columnist for Canadian Dimension, and an advisory board member for the activist journal Upping the Anti. His latest book is Another Politics: Talking Across Today’s Transformative Movements, published by University of California Press. Find him at writingwithmovements.com.