Unraveling Interior and Exterior Circumstances

The role of emotions in leadership and policy research is often ignored, indicating the need for an investigation of how researchers’ emotions and the interpretation of emotion in research impact the research process itself. Although at times contradictory and controversial, emotion is the one terrain that unites us in personhood; yet how emotions are understood is said to be defined and controlled by politics. Inspired by critical theories, especially those concerning emotion, this essay aims to theoretically interrogate missed emotion cues when conducting emotional research. This investigation grew out of two research stories of antiracist pedagogy that are laden with emotions. Contemporary observations indicate that the experience of researching emotions (un)consciously alters a researcher’s emotions and thus radically impacts how one ultimately researches emotion. This suggests that emotions in leadership research on political subjects have serious and profound impacts on researchers in ways that are often misunderstood. Concluding remarks note the significant role that research guided by critical theory plays in understanding how scholars’ emotions impact their leadership and policy research on political subjects.