Suspicion During Fieldwork: Lessons From Ethnographers Suspected of Espionage

Abstract

Researchers routinely face suspicion during fieldwork. This article presents findings from interviews with 34 ethnographers who were suspected of being spies while conducting fieldwork in Turkey. I find that the way the ethnographers experienced and responded to this suspicion depended on whether they reported being questioned about whether they were spies versus accused of spying. Questioning was interpreted as sense-making, and researchers reported several common strategies for addressing the suspicions they faced. Accusations, in contrast, were associated with threats and motivated the researchers to mitigate risks to themselves and their interlocutors. Engaging with scholarship on social cognition, high-risk fieldwork, and reflexivity, I discuss how my findings offer practical insights for navigating suspicion and risk during fieldwork—even in seemingly low-risk environments—and I make the case that interrogating how researchers react to suspicion can help them clarify their positionality and aid reflexivity.