"Punctuation, pause, next slide, please" : the risks of research and self-disclosure

Research is risky business. A requirement for many of us in academia, research is integral to our professional success. An active research agenda is so important we can lose our jobs if we do not publish often enough. Our profession demands that we add to an existing body of knowledge in ways that not only advance our understandings of our world, but also advance our employers’ reputations. Researchers often share with their employers the responsibility to acquire funding, increase revenue streams, and continue institutional growth. Those risks expand when you are engaging in a new research partnership with a colleague you don’t really know, using a methodology that demands mutual and highly personal disclosures. New research projects are always risky, but when writing an autoethnography about sexual assault with a colleague you’ve only just met, the risks become frightening. When your new research partner lives on another continent on the other side of the world, and you’re separated by physical and temporal distance, the risk becomes daunting. This chapter explores topical, interpersonal, and methodological risk in collaborative research relationships. It is simultaneously a realist, confessional, and impressionist tale (Van Maanen, 1988). It’s a cautionary tale and a love letter (Bell, Golombisky, Singh, & Hirschmann, 2000). Engaging in an autoethnographic research project revolving around sexual assault(s) with a colleague you’ve never met before is certainly risky business, but it is also rewarding business.