“Feminist Participatory Methods to Center Women in African and International Research”

This article presents a practical response to the longstanding call for more inclusive research practices, particularly for marginalized populations, such as women in the Global South. It introduces and evaluates three qualitative methods for fully integrating female participants into field research, drawing on the first author’s experiences in West and East Africa. The article outlines the value of mobile ethnography, also known as “go-alongs,” video-based digital storytelling (DST), and participatory cartography, also referred to as “counter-mapping.” Separately or in combination, these methods can create more natural and dynamic interactions, leading to more reliable data. Better social science may empirically inform praxis-oriented policy solutions in development. Centering women’s voices may draw on their gender-based knowledge and empower them as engaged participants throughout the research process. Such methods may improve scientific outcomes in international studies and make research more inclusive in subaltern contexts globally.