“Tell Me Who You Are, and I Will Tell You My Story”

^{Photo: November 2022, Riohacha, Colombia © Nina Bries Silva}

Positionality and Ethics in Research and Migration Law 

Positionality—Ethics—Vulnerability—Marginality—Asymmetrical Law.

Under a sacred Dibidibe tree in Riohacha, Colombia, Edison, a member of the indigenous community Wiwa, challenged a researcher with a question that our law faculties have long overlooked: “You ask me to trust you and share my most intimate stories, but who are you?” This is not merely an anecdotal or innocent question; it is an epistemological, ethical, and profoundly legal challenge—one that every lawyer working with exiled, displaced, or migrant populations should consider. Drawing from fieldwork experience, this text aims to unpack the concepts of positionality and reflexivity, which are essential for practitioners engaged in migration law—a field characterized by its inherent asymmetries.

Nina Bries Silva 

A. Contextual Background: Positionality as an Ethical Challenge for Migration Law

“Tell Me Who You Are and I Will Tell You My Story”

Under a sacred Dibidibe tree in Riohacha, Colombia, Edison, a member of the indigenous community Wiwa, challenged a researcher with a question that our law faculties have long overlooked: “You ask me to trust you and share my most intimate stories, but who are you?” This is not merely an anecdotal or innocent question; it is an epistemological, ethical, and profoundly legal challenge—one that every lawyer working with exiled, displaced, or migrant populations should seriously consider. Drawing from field experience and through a dialogue with Edison, this text aims to highlight issues of positionality and reflexivity, often overlooked by our universities and legal practices, and yet essential for anyone applying law in general, and especially when working with marginalized and vulnerable actors, such as in the context of migration law.

Therefore, we invite you to read this piece written by Nina Bries Silva, a postdoctoral researcher at EDEM in the “CLAIM” project (Climate Litigation Actions by the Internationally Marginalized), which examines the role of marginalized actors in international struggles for climate justice. Her thesis, Weaving Ontologies, Contesting Power: Transitional Justice in Dialogue with Indigenous Territories, defended at the European University Institute (EUI) seeks to rethink and decolonize the law through Indigenous onto-epistemologies.

This text is part of a broader reflection initiated at EDEM on our situated methodologies, service learning, and decolonial approaches to migration law. It was shared with students at UCLouvain during the inaugural lecture of the Rosa Parks Legal Clinic, aiming to introduce them to the key concepts of positionality, self-reflexivity, and accountability which are essential not only for their work at the legal clinic but also more broadly as future legal practitioners, researchers, and citizens.

B. “Tell Me Who You Are, and I Will Tell You My Story”

On November 2022, I arrived in Riohacha, Colombia, to interview Wiwa indigenous members of the Organización Wiwa Golkushe Tayrona about their experiences of armed conflict for my PhD research. At their request, I met with Edison, one of the Wiwa coordinators, under a Dibidibe tree. He told me he insisted on bringing me here to speak because, “this tree is sacred; it represents an elder, the Mamo, who will witness our words and ensure that we remain truthful to them.” He made it clear that it was now my responsibility to honor Wiwa knowledges. Furthermore, he stated that they anticipated a lawyer from Europe would come to assist with their legal claims. Although I had previously introduced myself as a doctoral researcher, the Wiwa were more interested in my legal background.

Edison then challenged me, saying that I wanted him to tell his story, but that I had shared nothing about myself. I was surprised because I had carefully adhered to my university’s ethical guidelines, explicitly explaining my research objectives and detailing my data protection policies. I understood then that, beyond my academic credentials and research topic, I had said little about who I truly was. I asked him to trust me and share his most intimate stories about the armed conflict while I remained silent about my own.

The ethical guidelines of our universities require researchers to explain their objectives at the beginning of interviews, to detail data protection policies, and obtain informed consent. Traditionally, researchers are also advised to maintain emotional restraint and avoid personal disclosures, as such openness is often viewed as potentially compromising objectivity and neutrality. But can one truly ever be neutral? Aren’t all knowledge and law inherently situated? What roles do reflexivity and self-criticism play in the research process?

We eventually began discussing the impact of the armed conflict. Despite my questions, Edison kept returning to a story about a centipede with boots on each of its legs, making noise when walking. Although I had worked hard to cultivate openness and cultural awareness, my initial instinct was to dismiss this story and redirect the conversation. Yet, he persisted and started drawing the centipede on a blackboard and how he went to the mountains and, at the top, ate a little girl. Eventually, I understood he was recounting the story of the armed conflict: the centipede represented the state army troops, and the story of the girl alluded to the rapes committed during the conflict.

While this episode may seem anecdotal, it highlights crucial issues related to positionality and ethical challenges in research. Positionality refers to individual identities and the intersection of those identities and statuses with systems of privilege and oppression. Positionality is a fluid and context-dependent concept; having a legal education when discussing ongoing legal cases was highly relevant under the Dibidibe tree, but less so when conducting research in Belgium. Similarly, being Spanish in Latin America carried much greater meaning and impact than it did in Belgium, given the colonial past of Spain in the region. Identities vary across spaces and time.

Counter to the myth of neutrality in research, my multiple identities have undoubtedly influenced my research choices. Being a supporter of indigenous struggle determines my worldview and shapes how I interpret information, such as when I first disregarded the centipede’s story. It also influenced the Wiwa’s perceptions of me and generated expectations. This suggests that positionality implies more than a simple statement at the beginning of a thesis, as a disclaimer or confessional narrative. It involves a constant process of self-reflexivity, acknowledging that the individuality of the researcher affects the research. Reflexivity demands that we humbly step back, accepting that we do not hold the absolute truth or possess all knowledge. It requires us to listen and learn from others, adapt our behavior, and ultimately allow the research process to transform us. As Opaskwayak Cri Shawn Wilson states, “if research doesn’t change you as a person, then you haven’t done it right.” 

For indigenous people, we are not in relationships; rather, “we are relationships.” This has encouraged me to see research with indigenous peoples as ongoing relational work. Building a trusting, long-standing, and honest relationship implies going beyond interviewing under academically defined ethical standards and disappearing afterwards, or simply producing a retrospective report for the communities “studied” at the end of the project. Hence, the data generated through my research belonged to the communities too and were subsequently used in their ongoing lawsuits.

Not only must one maintain relationships, but as Edison rightfully reminded me, they must also hold one accountable, this relational accountability. While in law faculties we are often taught to set aside emotions, I believe they instead act as ethical barometers. As Lauren Tynan, a Pairebeenne Trawlwoolway woman, reminds us: “Relational accountability is that feeling you get in your gut, knowing you have not called your research collaborators recently. It is that moment before you present at a conference and realise you should not be standing there alone, that your collaborators should be with you. It is the writer’s block you are feeling because you are trying to author a publication on your own.”

 Conclusion: Migration Law as an Asymmetrical Law

The dialogue with Edison beneath the Dibidibe tree underscores critical issues surrounding positionality and the ethical complexities of engaging with actors facing marginalization and vulnerability, especially within the context of migration.

Migration law embodies a fundamental asymmetry. The researcher’s or practitioner’s positionality is not a mere methodological detail; it fundamentally shapes both the production of knowledge and the recognition of rights. Edison’s story of the centipede—initially misunderstood and later unveiled as the recounting of army-perpetrated rapes—illustrates this vividly: an ethnocentric interpretation can obscure truth and perpetuate injustice. Who determines whether an asylum narrative is deemed “coherent”? On what cultural assumptions is “fear” evaluated? These questions highlight the importance of critically examining the underlying frameworks that influence legal and interpretive judgments in migration contexts.

Reflexivity is a democratic requirement for the migration lawyer. “If research doesn’t change you as a person, then you haven’t done it right,” writes Shawn Wilson. If migration law does not challenge the one who applies it, it risks perpetuating the inequalities it claims to regulate.

Bibliography

• Tynan, L., “Data Collection Versus Knowledge Theft: Relational Accountability and the Research Ethics of Indigenous Knowledges”, in H. Melber, U. Kothari, L. Camfield, K. Biekart, Challenging Global Development: Towards Decoloniality and Justice, Cham, Springer Nature Switzerland, 2024.
• Wilson, S., Research Is Ceremony: Indigenous Research Methods, Halifax & Winnipeg, Fernwood Publishing, 2008.