Human rights and research ethics: Methods for sex workers’ rights scholarship

The Journal of Human Rights methods sequence illuminates diverse methodological commitments and modes of data collection in the field of human rights. Although empirical data on human rights topics are imperative to the field, how one conducts that research is of equal importance. A human rights-based approach to research is key when working with vulnerable or stigmatized communities, comprehensive of crafting research questions, developing the methodology and research design, the modes of data collection, and how that generated knowledge is then disseminated and applied. In this article, I reflect on my decade of experience as a scholar-activist conducting research with sex workers rights' communities to highlight the utility of feminist grounded normative theory (FGNT) and the importance of critical feminist and human rights-based research methods, specifically those that center narrative and testimony, through interviews, participant observation, and archival work. These methods and modes of engagement provide for a solidaristic approach to research-activism that makes meaningful contributions to the goals and efforts of the movement and has the potential for addressing injustice in transformative ways.