Care and method

transdisciplinary and multi-sited approaches researching disappearances of migrants in Mexico

Resumo

This article examines the challenges of articulating transdisciplinary and multi-sited approaches while studying the disappearances of migrants in Mexico. We argue that situated ethics of care—continuous consent, the right to withdraw, and agreed terms for circulation and feedback—constitutes a condition of method, and that the viable form of comparability is interpretive rather than standardized. We organize the discussion around design-orienting tensions: the timelines of social actors vis-à-vis academic timelines; safety vis-à-vis visibility; and inter-regional comparability vis-à-vis situated ethics of care. Our analytical contribution links the continuum of disappearances with forms of accompaniment and social actors, to guide situated decisions and agreements across contexts of differing density. Rather than presenting finalized fieldwork results, we delineate enabling conditions for research co-produced with social actors.