A Screen of One's Own: The Domestic Caregiver as Researcher During Covid-19, and Beyond

Much has been written about the domestic interior as a site of subjection and containment for women, both literal and metaphoric. This brief essay engages the ethical complexities resulting from the unexpected transformation of the domestic interior from a site of largely non-market exchanges into a work-from-home (WFH) and research base during the Covid-19 pandemic. The consequent enfolding of private and public life, work and family, consumerism and caregiving has been particularly complex for those whose research projects have been forced online. To explore these complexities, and within the methodological frame of 'nomadic research', this essay draws from feminist writings about the domestic interior as well as my own intersectional experiences of the pandemic which, while localised and personal, also resonate with those of others' similarly wrestling work and caring from shared, and often overcrowded homes. It argues that it is from our messy bedrooms that we must confront and reimagine ethical research practices, and the often-hidden role of the domestic interior within them.