lessons on running a research team in a place where women are not respected

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Today was hard, probably one of the hardest days I’ve had in a long time. But now that the 12-hour day ended in a meltdown, I feel a bit better.

We piled into the 4x4 at 8am to make the drive to Busongo, a rural village outside of Mwanza. I was told the drive would take 45 minutes, but we drove 45 minutes on the main road, and then another 45 minutes on dirt paths. We were way, way out there.

When we arrived at the village, we met with the leader in his tiny concrete office building that was the size of a closet. He spoke no English, so I let Jacob and Datius take over the discussion. We then drove to the school in the village with 2 of the research assistants, who were to conduct interviews with a couple of teachers who have refused IRS. While we were waiting for introductions to be made, the school children started gathering outside my car window, staring and giggling. I got out of the car and they quickly all backed up. I said, “Jambo!” in greeting, and they giggled and responded back. I then reached out my hand to a little one standing in the front for a shake, and they all giggled and took off running. Jacob told me they had probably never seen a white person before.

The other two RAs were assigned to a couple of homes that were supposedly a 20 minute walk. But 20 minutes turned into 30 for the first home, and then another 20 to the second home. Until it was all said and done, I walked an hour out and an hour back. I did not take my camera because I was told the villagers would probably not be comfortable with me taking their photos. But it was probably for the best since it is so big and heavy.

Despite the heat, my low supply of water, the scorching sun and lack of sunscreen, it was an interesting experience. The homes were mud huts with straw roofs, built together in little compounds so that all members of the families had a place to stay. Chicken coops were built out of straw, and there were rows upon rows of kasava plants (the only vegetable they eat in addition to a diet of grains).

We passed a couple of other houses along the way. A woman was standing in the doorway of one, wearing a shirt that said, “This is what a great grandpa looks like.” During the drive I had seen a woman wearing a blue Walmart smock. How nice that the developing world gets Americans’ shit that they no longer wear. At another compound, a bunch of women and children were sitting under a tree. They giggled and smiled at me as I walked by. I was told it was probably because they are not used to seeing a white person walk so comfortably behind a group of Tanzanians.

Luckily I had my small video camera in my bag and was able to take a short video of the one dwelling. The woman of the house said to me, “Karibu, Mama!” meaning “welcome”. She then started chattering away in Swahili. I, of course, understood none of it, but was told that at one point she was talking about how men take all of the family’s money and buy alcohol, leaving nothing for food or the children. Her husband was sitting right next to her the entire time. I was thrilled because this is what I teach about in my Global Gender Studies course—that doing development work that is focused on economic empowerment of women is often more beneficial because women tend to put the money to better use than do men.

But what made the day hard, aside from not having my physical needs met from the lack of food, water, and shade (I was not told to prepare for such a day), was that the man we hired to supervise the research group seems to not want to deal with me. I think it’s a combination of the fact that I am a woman, I am considerably younger than him, but yet I have the same amount of education and am leading the project. He has a lot of experience and is probably used to running things himself, and so is not happy that the young white American woman is telling him not to deviate from the research or ethics protocols. As a result, I think he is sidestepping me and dealing only with Jacob, talking to the research team only in Swahili so that I cannot understand, and is trying to run the study his own way.

I was totally unprepared for this. I guess I am so used to running research studies on women with women that I did not take the gender factor into account. Tanzania remains a very patriarchal society. I don’t know the statistics on the number of female professionals or the number of women in government or universities, but I do know that you see far fewer women out and about than men, in many cultures within the country women eat after their husbands are satisfied, and women are getting HIV at higher rates because they do not have power in their sexual relationships. In putting together the research team, I had insisted on the same number of female researchers as male, but little did I know that the guy who is supposed to be the most enlightened, the most educated, and the most reliable would be my biggest obstacle.

Anyway, the entire day—seeing the poverty level, being sunburned, hungry, thirsty, disrespected, and not included in most conversations led to a meltdown. But hey, I didn’t take this job because it was easy, right? These are the reasons why doing applied research in the field is so challenging—not only do you have the challenges that come along with collecting data, you also have multiple other issues. But I laid down the law at dinner and tried to be firm that the protocols have to be followed. As long as that happens and the supervisor does not decide to do his own thing, I think the data will come out fine.

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