Notes on Care, Positionality, and the Slow Work of Witnessing in the Field: A Photo Essay Series – Part 3

Stories and Reflection from the fieldwork in M-East Ward, Mumbai, India

By Anushree, Research Assistant, NIHR-GEMMS, India

This photo essay series reflects on fieldwork conducted during interviews with migrants in the M-East Ward: On learning to witness, on being changed by what you see, and on the slow becoming that unfolds in spaces where care, community, and researchers meet.

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Positionality, Power, and the Pursuit of Belongingness on the Field

“Where are you from?” she asks.
You say you’re from the same state, Bihar.
You tell her that you understood the part of the dialect she was using to speak with her mother-in-law earlier.
You understand the use of mustard oil while cooking the sabzi (vegetable).

She says she is elated.
You are elated too, to find this connection with the participant.
You use it in your interview to personalise the experience for her.

Later in the interview, she tells you how the public healthcare facility doesn’t treat her right. It sees her as an added burden on an already stretched resource.
You realise: even when your geographies overlap, your access does not.
You know you are buffered by caste, class, education, and institutional backing.
You are a migrant in a city like Mumbai, but with a certain level of mobility.
You understand the system, and the system understands you.

The urge to find a sense of belongingness is strong in the field, to reach for shared origin.
But the field teaches you to honour and witness difference.
To hold it with integrity, and to resist flattening it in the name of empathy and connection.

And yet it asks you to witness the trust, laughter, warmth, and care.
It gives you stories that cannot only be captured through your interviews.
It gives you questions that won’t leave you.

The field also stretches you.
It asks you to keep showing up, to hold more than you thought you could.
It brings you face-to-face with your limits, your discomfort, and your privilege.

There are days you feel extractive as a researcher.
You wonder if you will ever belong amidst such conflicting realities.

And then someone asks you, “Can you help my child with the admission to the course you know about?”
And you know that even with all these imperfections, your presence is a resource. It can still be part of what the field receives.

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Photo Credits: Most photographs featured in this essay series were taken by the author (Anushree) during the data collection phase of the NIHR-GEMMS project. The image accompanying the caption of “Care as Method” was generously shared by community researcher Manisha Balaji Uphade. 

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This research was funded by the NIHR (NIHR Global Health Research; grant nihr134629) using UK aid from the UK Government to support global health research. The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the UK government.