Body-works and fieldwork: Research with British Muslim chaplains

‘The body’ has become a significant topic of theoretical discussion within social scientific writing, as well as within qualitative research methods debate (especially in the sociology of health and illness). This paper argues that these trends are, paradoxically, far less apparent with the sociology of religion, and virtually non-existent within the study of Islam and Muslims in Britain. On the basis of fieldwork experiences with British Muslim chaplains, I explore how visible markers of difference and identity that are inscribed on the body of the researcher (especially age, gender and race) can have important implications for the data that one is – or is not – able to collect. The paper considers how researchers are ‘moved about’ fieldwork sites by research participants, and how our physical transitions around different contexts (homes, corridors, wards, cells, etc.) and by different means (on foot, by car) require particular physical behaviour in relation to the socio-cultural rules and institutional norms that govern these spaces.