The study of diversity is not only about difference in the sense of colourfulness, but also about power relations, since relations of difference are often embedded in those. Researching these power relations in qualitative approaches still poses a challenge that is controversially discussed methodologically (cf. Diehm et al. 2017; Frers/Meier 2022). Since power relations develop and establish themselves historically as macrostructures over a long period of time, it is of interest, how their impact on the micro level can be empirically recorded and which methodological approaches are suitable for this.

Where and how can power be 'discovered' in the material and/or in the research process? What does a methodology of inequality look like? What approaches are advocated from different perspectives?  Where are the respective potentials and where are the blind spots? Which methodological developments are necessary and conceivable in order to track down aspects of power?

The symposium brings different methodological approaches used in studying diversity into conversation with each other in order to approach the questions raised. The symposium will focus on what is understood by "(re)construction" and which aspects of power become visible (or remain hidden) in this way. In addition to the question of the empirical (re)construction of power relations, we are also interested in discussing the power inherent in research and its methodologies and the possibilities of uncovering it (Spivak 1988) – for example, regarding normativity, location-boundness and methodological nationalism (Wimmer/Glick Schiller 2003).

Since a variety of power structures emerge in the context of qualitative research, the symposium will focus with each paper on different aspects, which are further discussed in their relational references:

• Following current methodological discussions in the context of qualitative inequality research, Hinrichsen and Vehse deal with discourse-analytically informed positioning analysis in the context of biographical research. In their contribution, they show how discourse-analytically informed positioning analysis can be productive employed to trace power and domination relations regarding racism and racialisation in the German school system.
• Thoma highlights in her presentation that linguistic ethnography is predestined for the study of language and power in multilingual migration societies. She combines fieldnotes and transcripts of interviews to reconstruct how language education policies and language ideologies (re)produced, negotiated, or irritated in preschools in South Tirol (Italy).
• The paper of Chamakalayil focuses on the data collection. She illustrates, how societal power relations are discussed, shaped, and negotiated, when biographers of colour narrate experiences of racism with regard to school in Switzerland in biographical interviews – while the interview is conducted by an interviewer of colour. Further, she discusses how researchers can work towards a more reflective methodology regarding power.

The perspectives mentioned contribute to continue working together on a reflexive methodology of qualitative educational and social research that not only focuses on the production of difference itself, but also takes the power relations into account.

Diehm, I./Kuhn, M./Machold, C. (eds) (2017): Differenz - Ungleichheit - Erziehungswissenschaft. Wiesbaden: Springer VS. Frers, L./Meier, L. (2022): Hierarchy and inequality in research: Practices, ethics and experiences. Qualitative Research, 22(5), 655-667. Spivak, G. C. (1988): Can the Subaltern Speak? In: Nelson, C./Grossberg, L. (eds): Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. London: Macmillan, 271-313. Wimmer, A./Glick Schiller, N. (2003): Methodological Nationalism, the Social Sciences and the Study of Migration: An Essay in Historical Epistemology. The International Migration Review. Transnational Migration: International Perspectives 37(3), 576-610.