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Inclusive Research in an Exclusionary Setting

Youth Participatory Action Research in Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya

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Handbook of Social Inclusion

Abstract

This chapter reflects on a 3-year youth participatory action research (YPAR) collaboration set in Kenya’s Kakuma Refugee Camp. Facilitating YPAR with a team of refugee and Kenyan students enrolled in a camp secondary school created an opportunity to codesign research with, by, and for displaced youth. Drawing from co-facilitator reflections and youth researchers’ self-reported learning, we highlight three mechanisms through which YPAR became an inclusive process for a globally marginalized youth population. First, youth collaborated with one another across diverse identity groups, spanning dimensions of nationality, ethnicity, gender, as well as citizenship status. Second, as youth-led concerns drove the study, young people took on more assertive and questioning roles in their everyday lives as they became empowered to ask questions about the structures and opportunities that shape their lives in exile. Third, youth co-researchers placed high value on learning research through the lens of ethical principles and dilemmas, and extending these ethics into their everyday lives in a context where they are rarely granted the opportunity to refuse requests from adult authority figures. This chapter documents design choices that deepened young people’s understandings and critiques of research, while supporting youth in applying research skills to their everyday contexts in exile, important markers of and pathways toward social inclusion.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Educational Studies, School of Education, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Michelle J. Bellino

  2. Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Nairobi, Kenya

    Ali Adan Abdi

Authors
  1. Michelle J. Bellino
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  2. Ali Adan Abdi
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Correspondence to Michelle J. Bellino .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Health Sciences, Western Sydney University, Penrith, NSW, Australia

    Pranee Liamputtong

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Bellino, M.J., Abdi, A.A. (2021). Inclusive Research in an Exclusionary Setting. In: Liamputtong, P. (eds) Handbook of Social Inclusion. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48277-0_81-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-48277-0_81-1

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