Thinking through the micro-politics of disclosure/exposure while researching race and gender: a multi-voice essay on how to manage vulnerability

This multi-voice essay emerges from a collective, multidisciplinary workshop on Researching Race and Gender, where participants reflected on the micro-politics of disclosure and exposure while researching and writing about race, racism and gender. Drawing on diverse disciplinary backgrounds and field locations, our collaborative reflections explore how researchers navigate the vulnerabilities that come with the demand for transparency in contemporary academic practice. We argue that while a neoliberal research culture invites openness and reflexivity, it often fails to acknowledge the embodied, emotional, and political vulnerabilities that certain acts of disclosure entail. Through an assemblage of personal experiences and critical reflections, we thus ask: how do researchers deal with the vulnerabilities resulting from processes of disclosure/exposure? And in particular, how do they engage questions of disclosure and exposure in researching race and racism? In this essay, we then build upon our own experiences around disclosure and exposure, to consider how power relations shape what can be said, revealed, or withheld, and by whom, while offering concrete suggestions and strategies for how to navigate the pressures of disclosure at various stages of the research process.