Introduction

Design and execution of this research were informed by minority group, insider politics (Zinn, 1979; Kanuha, 2000), emphasising the importance of ethical rigour and emancipatory political potential in its applications. This coalesced into an overarching set of ideas about how to approach research with trans/gender diverse communities (Vincent, 2018b). I begin this chapter with a detailed explanation of the research design. I then shift from the ‘how’ to the ‘why’, embedding my decisions in relation to the wider methods literature. My construction of mixed media diaries – which allowed diary keepers to record entries via any number of creative forms – is explained and justified, together with discussion of semi-structured interviews, and how the research was executed. I then discuss how the data was analysed. As non-binary narratives have limited precedent as a named category, the stories that the participants tell in relation to identity illustrate new possibilities of being. I draw on symbolic interactionism and social constructionism in order to conceptualise how social meaning is produced, which underpinned my reading of the data in the analytic process.

I then articulate how I addressed questions of recruitment, ethics and rapport, respectively. I then discuss what I believe to be an underemphasised aspect of research methods – my relationship with the work. This might be considered particularly salient because I began articulating a non-binary identity myself during the project (though only explicitly after data collection was completed). I would contend that this in and of itself is neither more nor less relevant than contexts where researchers have an unchanged gender identity throughout a given project (cis or trans), as such a critical reflection provides context with regard to researcher motivations and approaches. I then provide orienting demographic information about participants. The chapter closes with an acknowledgement of limitations.