Overcoming dis/ability barriers in field research

This chapter is a reflexive piece of writing that centres on a visit to Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) in April 2023. While the author has made many previous trips to BiH and has undertaken extensive fieldwork in the country over the years, this was her first time there as a wheelchair user. The author travelled to BiH primarily to attend a memorial service in the village of Ahmići, on the 30th anniversary of one of the most heinous war crimes committed during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. Additionally, the trip was an opportunity to experience her disability 'in the field', to think about possible future fieldwork and to confront some of the challenges that might come with it. The chapter is not, however, about the practicalities of doing fieldwork. What the reader can expect to gain from it, rather, are some different ways of thinking about disability and fieldwork as the author unpacks how her personal experiences of being physically back in BiH expanded and enriched her ideas about accessibility, her own body and her relationship with her wheelchair.