Scholars and practitioners who witness violence and loss in human, animal, and ecological contexts are expected to have no emotional connection to the subjects they study. Yet is this possible? Following feminist traditions, Vulnerable Witness centers the researcher and challenges readers to reflect on how grieving is part of the research process and, by extension, is a political act. Through thirteen reflective essays the book theorizes the role of grief in the doing of research-from methodological choices, fieldwork and analysis, engagement with individuals, and places of study to the manner in which scholars write and talk about their subjects. Combining personal stories from early career scholars, advocates, and senior faculty, the book shares a breadth of emotional engagement at various career stages and explores the transformative possibilities that emerge from being enmeshed with one's own research.

Acknowledgments Introduction Patricia J. Lopez and Kathryn Gillespie 1. "With You, Time Flowed Like Water": Geographies of Grief across International Research Collaborations Jessie Hanna Clark 2. Grieving Guinea Pigs: Refl ections on Research and Shame in Peru María Elena García 3. An Immigrant in Academia: Navigating Grief and Privilege Yolanda Valencia 4. The Mongoose Trap: Grief, Intervention, and the Impossibility of Professional Detachment Elan Abrell 5. The Authentic Hypocrisy of Ecological Grief Amy Spark 6. Scale-Blocking Grief: Witnessing the Intimate between a Confl ict Leopard and Confi nement Kalli F. Doubleday 7. On Missing People in the Field David Boarder Giles 8. Grieving Daughter, Grieving Witness Abigail H. Neely 9. The Researcher-Witness of Violence against Queers: One Scholar-Activist's Pathway through Lament William J. Payne 10. Unsteady Hands: Care and Grief for Conservation Subjects Jenny R. Isaacs 11. Grieving Salmon and the Politics of Collective Ecological Fieldwork Cleo Woelfl e-Erskine 12. Witnessing Grief: Feminist Perspectives on the Loss-Body-Mind-Self-Other Nexus and Permission to Express Feelings Avril Maddrell and Elizabeth Olson 13. Self-Care and Trauma: Locating the Time and Space to Grieve Dana Cuomo Epilogue Patricia J. Lopez and Kathryn Gillespie Contributors Index