Robetson & Tremlett/Ritual Personhood, 4. ‘Guesthood’ as a Scientific Method: Principles Supporting Relational Research

James L. Cox (University of Edinburgh) takes the idea of guesthood further in his “‘Guesthood’ as a Scientific Method: Principles Supporting Relational Research”. Drawing on the physicist Carlo Rovelli, Graham’s 2003 Numen article and others, Cox presents an approach he calls “relational research” which combines guesthood, phenomenology and action research. Rovelli has demonstrated in laboratory studies how so-called physical processes differ according to context and are relative to the position of the observer. By extension, when applied to the study of human subjects, the interaction between the researcher and those being researched is determinative in producing scientific conclusions. Relationality as a key concept in research methodologies not only acknowledges local agency as critical in designing research projects, but, following Rovelli, this chapter contends that principles derived from relational research are requisite for a study to be regarded as genuinely scientific.