On being a Black woman ‘Mzungu’ researcher

With limited inclusion of Black traveler experiences in tourism scholarship and given that gender and racialization occur across geographies, this article explores the ways in which positionality and embodiment influence a Black diasporic woman researcher’s experience in the cross-cultural context of Livingstone, Zambia. It further explores key player and researcher-participant relationships within the research context, where an autoethnographic approach and the creative analytic practice (CAP) of poetry are used as reflexive practices and to demonstrate the impact of researcher social identities (e.g. race, gender, nationality) on the research process. Aligning with the creative (re)turn in geography scholarship, the use of CAP demonstrates how similar methodologies can provide a more well-rounded view of participant voices, specifically that of Black people informing the production of knowledge. More importantly, the Blackness of diasporic researchers is valued, especially when coupled with mindful intentionality in the approach and assumptions of the research process.