Between the encounter and writing

hospitality in communication research

Abstract

This paper discusses self-writing and the affective turn as ethical, aesthetic, political and hospitality methods in Communication research, which underpin an action research project being developed with trans and transvestite sex workers. Articulating action and reflection, the approaches destabilize discursive hierarchies and value otherness, preventing the reduction of the subjects we research with to theoretical and normative categories. Based on the concepts of otherness (Emmanuel Lévinas) and hospitality (Jacques Derrida), the study recognizes the importance of the r esearcher's and researcher's affections and vulnerability, showing that the production of knowledge can be built from a common, shared practice of listening and welcoming. Writing oneself allows others to inscribe themselves in their own language, without impositions or translations that dilute their uniqueness. This gesture of openness and hospitality calls for an ethical commitment from the researcher, who recognizes his or her implication in relation to others. A practice that enables the construction of research carried out with the subjects and not about them, expanding the ways of knowing, narrating, existing, transforming and transforming themselves.