Emotions and positionalities: Experiences from fieldwork among Danish Muslims

This paper discusses epistemological and methodological considerations related to emotional experiences of conducting research among Muslims. It also involves considerations of positionalities and the issue of doing critical research on the basis of experiences. Through concrete examples, we unearth experiences from fieldwork, in this way uncovering emotions and prejudices from both researchers and research participants. Experiences then have a double meaning: both as the study of “their” experiences as living and acting minorities and as “our” methodological experiences and their influence on our studies. It includes recruitment, mutual prejudice, insecurity, and research roles in participatory research. The paper draws on research projects that we have undertaken and written about during the past 10 years involving our work with ethnic minorities (dominantly Muslims) in Copenhagen. Our approach is what we will call “critical phenomenology” and our methods involve in‐depth interviews, ethnographic observations, and participant observations. The major object of the studies, then, is “ordinary life,” that is, everyday life and embodied experiences from living as ethnic minorities in the city. This paper discusses epistemological and methodological considerations related to emotional experiences of conducting research among Muslims. It also involves considerations of positionalities and the issue of doing critical research on the basis on experiences.