ABSTRACT
Rather than some evangelical posturing with respect to the right way to conduct research for supposed right reasons, within this chapter we delineate our own positioning related to praxis – a term we understand as rooted in a feminist insistence that knowledge is useful, that understands theory and research as practice, and that is committed to understanding the social world and then changing it (Stanley, 1990, 2013). That is, we understand physical cultural studies (PCS) as being influenced by an emancipatory aspiration; one which offers a ‘powerful opportunity for praxis to the extent that the research process enables people to change by encouraging self-reflection and a deeper understanding of their particular situations’ (Lather, 1986). This aspiration has certainly been present in work to date; Andrews (2008: 54) for example argued that PCS is committed to producing and disseminating ‘potentially empowering forms of knowledge and understanding’, whilst Andrews and Giardina (2008: 408) advocated the importance of PCS ‘activist-minded projects’. Yet, these motivations, despite such clarion calls, have perhaps yet to be realized to date; as Atkinson (2011: 141) suggested, ‘the tallest and broadest hurdle [for PCS] is ultimately one of our collective commitments to engaged intervention and willingness to openly take sides in the process of policy development and reformation’.
