Telling

Testimony – the process of narrating yourself before a witness – lies at the heart of qualitative research and therapy. In both, we seek stories we can live in, trying on analytic frames in order to make sense of experience. Testimonial acts may be seen as the engine of personal and social change and our primary source of knowledge. However, particularly in contexts of trauma and difference, testimony may be troubled by our discursive constraints and relations of power. This piece offers a performative, open-ended exploration of the (mis)uses of testimony within and between scholarly and therapeutic frames.