Transforming the relations of research: towards culturally safe geographies of health and healing

It is suggested that geographical studies of health and place need to be centred in ‘culturally safe’ research practice and reflects on the issue of representation and the attendant question of how to include the researched in the construction of knowledge about health and healing.

Abstract

The 'cultural safety' debate in New Zealand concerns the power-ladenness of health care interactions and the (controversial) need for health professionals to be fully conversant with the historical and contemporary circumstances of Maori people. We take this debate as a prompt to survey the implications of different 'ways of seeing' for how we define and investigate issues of health and illness in geography. The paper reflects on the issue of representation and the attendant question of how to include the researched in the construction of knowledge about health and healing. Given that knowledge and experience of health issues are social and cultural constructions, we suggest that geographical studies of health and place need to be centred in 'culturally safe' research practice.