THE SAGE HANDBOOK OF UALTTATIVE THIRD EDITION YVONNA S, LINCOLN @SAGE Publications Rousand Oaks» London « Now CoP| INTRODUCTION The Discipline and Practice of Qualitative Research Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln about scientific research, including qualitative research, from the vantage point of the colonized, 4 position that she chooses to privilege, Linda ‘Tuhiwei Smith (1999) states that “the term ‘esearch? is inextricably linked to European imperialism and colonialism.” She continues, “The word itself is probably one of the distest words in the indigenous worlds vocabulary... It is implicated in the worst excesses of colonial- ism? with the ways in which “knowledge boat indigenous peoples was collected, dassiied, and then represented back to the West” (p. 1). This dirty word stirs up anger, silence, distrust. “It is 30 powerful that indigenous people even write poetry about research (p. 1). Iris one of clonial- isms most sordid legacies. Sedly, qualitative research, in many if not all of ts forms (observation, participation, iter- viewing, ethaography), serves as @ metaphor for colonial knowiedge, for power, and for ruth, The metaphor works this way. Research, quantitative and qualitative, is scientific. Research provides the foundation for reports about and represen- tations of “the Other” In the colonial contest, research becomes an objective way of represent- ing the dark-skinned Other tothe white world. Colonizing nations relied on the human dis- ciplnes, especially sociology and anthtopology, te produce knowledge about strange and foreign ‘worlds. This close involvement with the colonial project contributed, in significant ways to quali tative rescarchis long and anguished history, to its becoming 2 dirty word (for reviews, see in this volume Foley & Valeneuela, Chapter 9; Tedlock, Chapter 18). In sociology, the work of the “Chicago schoo!” in the 1920s and 1930s estab lished the importance of qualitative inquiry for the study of human group life. In anthropology during the same period, the disciline-detining studies of Boas, Mead, Benedict, Bateson, Evans- Pritchard, Radcliffe-Brown, end Malinowski charted the outlines ofthe fieldwork method (see Gupta & Ferguson, 1997; Stocking, 1986,1989). “Tutor? Nove We ere gratefil to maoy who hae helped wth this chapter inchding Egan Guba, Mich alles, David Monje, and Katherine yan, wt2m HANDBOOK OF QUALI The agenda was clear-cut The observer went to «foreign setting to study the culture, customs, and habits of another human geoup. Often this was @ _gF0up that stood in the way of white setters. Ethno- _graphicreports of these groups where incorporated into colonizing strategies, ways of controlling the foreign, deviant, or troublesome Other Soon quali- tative research would be employed in other social and behavioral science disciplines, including education (especially the work of Dewey), history, political science, business, medicine, sursing, soctal work,and communications (for criticisms of this tradition, see Smith, 1999; Vidich & Lyman, 2000; se also Rosaldo 1989, pp. 25-455 Tedlock, Chapter 18, this vole), By the 1960s, battle lines were drawn within the quantitative and qualitative camps. Quaati- tative scholars relegated qualitative research to a subordinate status in the scientific arena. In response, qualitative researchers extolled the humanistic virtues of their subjective, inter pretive approach to the study of human group life. In the meantime, indigenous peoples found themselves subjected to the indignities of both approaches, as each methodology vas used in the name of colonizing powers (see Battiste, 12000; Semali & Kincheloe, 1999), Vidich and Lyman (2994, 2000) have charted amany key features of this painful history. In thei now-classic analysis they note, with some irony, ‘that qualitative research in sociology and anthro- pology was “born out of concern to understand the ‘other™ (Vidich & Lymati, 2000, p. 38) Furthermore; this “other” was the exotic Other, & primitive, nonwhite person from a foreign culture judged to be less civilized than ours. OF course, there were colonialists long before there were ‘anthropologists and ethnographers, Nonetheless, there would be no colonial, and now no neocolo- nial, history were it not for this investigative ‘mentality that turned the dark-skinned Other {nto the object of the ethnogrepher’s gaze. From the very beginning, qualitative research was implicated in a racist project! Jn this introductory chapter, we define the field of qualitative research, then navigate chart, and review the history of qualitative research in the human disciplines. This will allow us to (TATIVE RESEARCH—CHAPTER I locate this volume and its contents within their historical moments. (These historical moments’ are somewhat artifical; they are soci structed, quasi-histoical, and overlapping conven- tions. Nevertheless, they permit a “performance” of developing ideas. They also facititate an increas- ing sensitivity to and sophistication about the pitfalls and promises of ethnography and qualita: tive research.) We also present a conceptual frame- work for reading the qualitative research act a5 a multicultural, gendered process and then provide a brief introduction to the chapters that follow. Returning to the observations of Vidich and Lyman as wel as those of hocks, we conclade wit a brief discussion of qualitative research and critical race theory (see also Ladson-Billings & Donnor, Chapter 51, this volume). We also discuss the threats to qualitative, human subject research frora ‘the methodological conservatism movement men- tioned briefly in oor preface. As we note in the pre ace, we use the metaphor of the bridge to structure ‘what fllows, This volume is intended to serve as a bridge connecting historical moments, politic, the decolonization project, research methods, par- adigms, and communities of interpretive scholars, BA Dernvrrionat Issues Qualitative research is a field of inquiry in its cowa tight, 1 crosscuts disciplines, fields, and subject matters? A complex, interconnected family of terms, concepts, and assumptions sur- round the term qualitative research. These include the traditions associated with foundationalisi, positivism, postfoandationalism, postpositvist, poststructuralism, and the many qualitative research perspectives, andlor methods connected to cultacal and interpretive studies (the chapters in Part IE take up these paradigms)? There are separate and detailed literatures on the many methods and approaches that fall under the cate- ‘gory of qualitative research, such as case stody, politics and ethics, participatory inquiry, inter- Viewing, participant observation, visual methods, and interpretive analysis. In North America, qualitative research oper- ates in a complex historical field that crosscuts atsithin theie i moments cially con ingcomven- rfoomance” an increas- about the rnd qualita val frame hen provide that follow. and Lyman ith a brief and critical & Donnos, discuss the search fom ent men- sin the pref to structure to serve as ats, polities, ethods, par- ve scholars suiry in its fields, and connected sptions sur- rese include lotonalism, tpositivism, qualitative sconnected he chapters there are « the many ter the cate- case study, yuiry inter al methods, earch oper- crosscats at least eight historical moments. (We discuss these moments in detail below.) These moments over Jap and simultaneously operate in the present We define them as the traditional (1900-1950); the modernist or golden age (1950-1970); barred genres (1970-1986); the crisis of representation (1986-1990); the postmodern, a period of experi- mental and new ethnogsaphies (19901995); ‘postexperimertal inguiry (1995-2000); the ‘methodologically contested present (2000-2004); and the fractured future, which is now (2005). The future, the eighth moment, confronts the methodological backlash associated with the evidence-based social movement. It is concerned ‘with moral discourse, with-the development of sacred textualites. The eighth moment asks that the social sciences and the humanities become sites for critical conversations about democracy, face, gender, dass, nation-states, globalization, freedom, and commanity? The postmodern and postexperimental moments were defined in part by a concern for literary and thetorical tropes and the narrative turn, a concern for storytelling, for composing ethnographies in new ways (Bochner & Ellis, 2002; Ellis, 2004; Goodall, 2000; Pelias, 2004; Richardson & Lockridge, 2004; Trujllo, 2004) Laurel Richardson (1997) observes that this moment was shaped by 2 new sensibility, by doubt, by a refusal to privilege any method or ‘theory (p. 173). But now atthe dav of this new century we struggle to connect qualitative research to the hopes, needs, goals, and promises ofa free democratic society Successive waves of epistemological theorizing move across these eight moments. The traditional period is associated with the positivist, founda- tional paradigm. The moderaist or golden age and blurred genzes moments are connected to the appearance of postpositivist arguments. At the same time, a variety of new interpretive, quali tative perspectives were taken up, induding hhermeneatics, structuralism, semiotics, phenoms- enclogy, cultural stadies, and feminism. In the blurred genres phase, the humanities became central resources for critical, interpretive theory, and the qualitative research project broadly conceived. The researcher became a bricoleur Dengin & Lincoln: Introduction wg 3 (see below}, learning how to boreow from many differen disciplines. The blurred gentes phase produced the next siage, the criss of representation, Here researchers struggled with how to locate themselves and subjects in reflexive texs.A kind of methodological diaspora took place, a two-way exodus. Humanists migrated to the social sciences, seatching for new social theory, new ways to study popular cultare and its local, ethnographic contexts, Social scien tists turned tothe humanities, hoping to leern how to de complex structural and poststructual ead- ings of social texts. From the humanities, social scientists also learned how to produce texts that refused to be read in simplistic, linear, incontro vertible terms, The line between text and contert blurred Inthe postmodern, experimental moment, researchers continued to move avay from foun- dational and quasi-oondational criteria (see in this volume Smith & Hodkinson, Chapter 36; Richardson & St. Pierre, Chapter 38), Alternative evaluative criteria were sought, criteria that might prove evocative, moral, critical, and rooted i local understandings ‘Any definition of qualitative research must ‘work within this complex historical field. Qualia tive research means different things in each of these ‘moments, Nonetheless, an initia, generic defini- tion can be offered: Qualitative research is a sita- ated activity that locates the observer in the world. tconsists ofa st of interpretive, material practices that make the word visible. These practice tans- form the world. They turn the world into a series cof representations, including field notes, inter ‘views, conversations, photographs, recordings, and memos tothe self At this level, qualitative research involves an interpretive, naturalistic approach 10 the world, This means that qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempt to make sense oor interpret, phenomena interns | of the meanings people bring to them.” Qualitative research involves the studied use and collection of a variety of fmpiticalmaterials— ase study; personal experience; introspection; life Story interview; artifacts; cltural texts and pro- dductions: observational, historical, interacto and visual tests—that describe routine and prob- lematic moments and meanings in individual’4/m HANDBOOK OF QUALITATIVE lives, Accordingly qualitative researchers deploy 4 wide range of interconnected interpretive prac tices, hoping always to get a better understanding cof the subject matter at hand, itis understood, however, that each practice makes the world visible in a different way. Hence there is frequently a commitment to using more than one interpretive practice in any study. The Qualitative Researcher as Bricoleur and Quilt Maker The qualitative researcher may be described using multiple and gendered images: scientist, naturalist, field-worker, journalist, social criti, arlst, performer, jazz musician, filmmaker, guilt maker, essayist. The many methodological pr tices of qualitative research may be viewed as soft science, journalism, ethnography, bricolage, quilt ‘making, or montage. The researcher, in turn, may be seen as a bricolewr, as 2 maker of quik, or, as in filmmaking, a person who assembles images into montages. (On montage, see Cook, 1981, pp. 171-177; Monaco, 1981, pp. 322-326; and the discussion below. On quilting, see hooks, 1990, pp. 115-122; Wolcott, 1995, pp. 31-33.) Harper (1987, pp. 9, 74-75, 92), de Certeau (1984, p. xv}, Nelson, Treichler, and Grossberg (1992, p. 2), LevieStrauss (1966, p.17), Weinstein and Weinstein (1991, p. 161), and Kincheloe (2001) clarify the meanings of bricolage and bricoleur? & bricolew makes do by “adapting the bvioles ofthe world, Bricolageis the poetic mak: ing d0” (de Certeau, 1984, p. xv) with “such bricoles—the odds and ends, the bits left over” (Harper, 1987, p. 74). The bricoleur is a “Jack of all trades, a kind of professional do-it-yourself” (Lévi-Strauss, 1966p. 17). Jn their work bricoleurs define and extend themselves (Harper, 1987, 75). Indeed, the bricoleur’ life story, ot biogra phy, “may be thought of as bricolage” (Herper, 1987, p.92), There are many kinds of brieolews—inter Pretive, nacrative, theoretical, political, method- logical (see below). The interpretive bricleur roduces a bricolage—that is, a pieced-together Set of representations that is fitted tothe specifics of & complex situation, “The solution (bricolage) ARCH —CHAPTER 1 ‘which is the result ofthe dricoleur’ method is an {emergent} construction” (Weinstein & Weinstein 1991, p. 161} that changes and takes new forms as the bricoleur adds different tools, methods, and techniques of representation and interpretation to the puzzle, Nelson et al. (1992) describe the thodology of cultural studies as“abricolage. tis choice of practice, that i, is pragmatic, strategic and self-reflexive” (p. 2), This understanding can be applied, with qualifications, to qualitative research, The qualitative researcher as Bric raker of quilts, uses the aesthetic and material tools of his or her craft, deploying whatever strategies, methods, and empirical materials a at band (Becker, 1998, p. 2). If the researcher needs to invent, or piece together, new tools or techniques,heor she will do so, Choices regard: ing which interpretive practices te employ are ‘not necessarily made in advance. As Nelson et al. (1992) note, the “choice of research practices depends upon the questions that are asked, and the questions. depend on their context" (p. 2) what is available in the context, and what the researcher can do in that setting. ‘These interpretive practices involve aesthetic issues, an aesthetics of representation that goes Beyond the pragmatic or the practical. Here the concept of moniage is useful (see Cook, 1981, 3; Monaco, 1981, pp. 171-172). Montage is a method of editing cinematic images. In the history of cinematography, montage is. most closely associated with the work of Sergei Eisenstein, especially his film The Batlship Potemkin (1925). In montage, several diferent images are juxtaposed to or superimposed on one ‘another to create a picture. In a sense, montage is like pentimento, in which something that has been painted out of a picture (an image the painter “repented,” ot denied) becomes visible again, creating something new, What is new is ‘what had been obscured by a previous image. Montage and pentimento, lke jazz, which is improvisation, create the sense that images, sounds, and understandings are blending together, overlapping, forming a composite, a new cteation, ‘The images seem to shape andl define one ancther, and an emotional gestalt effects produced, n filmvethod is an Weinstein, ethods, and terpretation lescribe the cricolage. Its ie, strategic tending can qualitative ad material 1g whatever naterials are researcher > new tools vices regard- employ are Nelson et a sh practices > asked, and C(p.D, xd what ve aesthetic an that goes al Here the Cook, 1981, Montage is ages. In the «ge is most © of Sergei @ Battleship ral different vosed on one wse, montage ing that has » image the ames visible at is new is ws image. az, which is hat simages, ling together, rew creation cone another, tuced. In lm tmontage, images are often combined in a swifly run sequence that produces @ dizily revolving collection of several images around a central or focused picture or sequencs; directors often use such eects to signify the passage of time. Pethaps the most famous instance of montage in film is the Odessa Steps sequence in The tleskip Potemkin. Inthe climax ofthe film, the citizens of Odesse are being massacred by czarist ‘zoops on the stone steps leading down to the harbor Fisenstein cuts to a young mother as she pushes her baby in a carriage across the landing in front of the firing troops? Citizens rash past hes jolting the carriage, which she is afraid to push down to the next light of stairs. The troops are above her, fring at the citizens. She is trapped ‘tween the troops and the steps, She screams. A line of rifles poins tothe sky, the rifle besrels erupt ing in smoke. The mother’ head sways back. The wheels of the carriage teeter on the edge of the steps. The mother’s hand clutches the siver buckle cof her bet. Below her, people are being beaten by soldiers. Blood drips aver the mother's white gloves, The baby’s hand reaches out of the carriage. The mother sways back and forth. The troops advance ‘The mother falls back against the carriage. A woman watches in hortor as the rear wheels of the carriage roll off the edge of the landing, With accelerating speed, the cariage bounces down the steps, past dead citizens. The baby is jostled from side to side inside the catriage. The soldiers fre their rifles into a group of wounded citizens. A student screams as the carriage leaps across the steps, tks, and overturns (Cook, 1981. p.167)." Montage uses brief images to create a clearly defined sense of urgency and complexity. 1 invites « viewers to construct interpretations that build on one another as a scene unfolds. These interpreta- tions are based on associations among the con- trasting images that blend into one another. The ‘underlying assumption of montage is that viewers perceive and interpret the shots in a “montage Sequence not sequentially, or one at a time, but rather simultaneously” (Cook, 1981, p. 172). The Viewer puts the sequences together into a mean- ingful emotional whole,as#f at glance all at once. "The qualitative researcher wino uses montage is like ¢ quilt maker ora jazz improviser. The quilter Dentin & Lincoln: Inrodection 5 stitches, edit, and puts slices of reality together ‘his process creates and brings psychological and emotional unity—a pattern—to an interpretive experience. There are many examples of montage in current qualitative esearch (see Diversi, 1998 Holman Jones, 1989; Lather & Smithies, 1997; Ronai, 1998; see also Holman Jones, Chepter 30, this volume). Using moltiple voices, diferent tex- tual formats, and various typefaces, Lather anel ‘Smithies (2997) weave a complex text about AIDS and women who ete HIV-positive. Hoiman Jones (1999) creates a performance text using lyrics for the bes songs sang by Billie Holiday. In texts based on the metaphors of montage, quilt making, and jeze improvisation, many dif- ferent things ave going on at the same time diflerent voices, different perspectives, points of views, angles of vision Like autoethnographic performance texts, works that use montage simultaneously create and enact moral meaning. ‘They move from the personal to the political, from the local to the historical and the cultural These are dialogical texts, They presume an active audience. They create spaces for give-and- take between reader and writer. They de more than turn the Other into the object of the social science gaze (see in this volume Alexand Chapter 16; Holsnan Jones, Chapter 30). Qualitative research is inherently multi method in focus (Flick, 2002, pp. 226-227). However, the use of multiple methods, or triangulation, reflects an attempt to secure an in-depth understanding of the pheaomenon in ‘question. Objective reality can never be captured. ‘We know a thing only throogh its representa. tions. THangulation is not a tool ora strategy 0 validation, but an alternative to validation (Flick, 2002, p. 227}. The combination of multiple methodological practices, empirical materials, perspectives, and observers in a single study is best understood, then, as a strategy thet adds rigor, breadth, complexity richness, and depth to any inquiry (see Flick, 2002, p. 229). J ‘In Chapter 38 of this volume, Richardson and St. Pierre dispute the usefulness of the concept of triangulation, asserting that the cen. tral image for qualitative inquiry should be the ‘xystal, not the triangle. Mined-genre texts in the6 wi HANDBOOK OF QUALITATIVE postexperimental moment have more thaa three sides. Like crystals, Eisenstein montage, the jazr solo, or the pieces in a quilt, the mnixed-gente ‘ext “combines symmetry and substance with an infinite variety of shapes, substances, transmu~ Crystals grow, change, alter Crystals are prisms that reflect externalities and refract within themselves, creating different colors, patterns, arrays, casting off in different dizections” (Richardson, 200, p. 934) In the crystallizetion process, the writer tells the same tale from different points of view. For example, in A Thrice-Dold Tale (1982), Margery Wolf uses fiction, field notes, and a scientific arti- le to give three different accounts of the same set of experiences in a native village. Similarly, in her play Fites in the Mirror (1993), Anna Deavete Smith presents a series of performance pieces based on interviews with people who were involved in a racial conflict in Crovn Heights, Brooklyn, on August 19, 1991, The play has malti- ple speaking parts, induding conversations with gang members, police officers, and anonymous ‘young girls and boys. There is no one “correct! telling of this event. Each telling ke light hiting a crystal, reflects a different perspective on this incident. 4 Viewed as a crystalline form, as a montage, for as a creative performance around a central theme, triangulation as a form of or alternative to, validity thus can be extended, Triangulation is the simoltancous display of multiple, refracted realities, Bach of the metaphors “works? to create simultanety rather than the sequential or linear. Readers and audiences are then invited to explore competing visions of the context, to become immersed in and tierge with nev realities to comprehend, ‘The methodological bricoleur is adept at per- forming a large number of diverse tasks, ranging from interviewing to intensive self-reflection and introspection, The theoretical dricoleur reads widely and is knowledgeable about the many interpretive paradigms (feminism, Merxism, caltural studies, constructivism, queer theory) that can be brought to any particular problem. He or she may not, however, fel that paradigms can SEARCH—CHAPTER 1 bbe mingled or synthesized, That is, one cannot easily move between paradigms as overarching philosophical systems denoting perticalar ontole ies, epistemologies, and inethodologies. They represent belief systems that attach users to par- sicular worldviews, Perspectives, in contrast, are less well developed systems, and one can move between them more easly. The researcher as bricoleur-theorist works between and within competing and overlapping perspectives and paradigms ‘The imerpretive bricoleur understands that research is an interactive process shaped by his (or ber own personal history, biography, gender, social lass, ace, and ethnicity, and by those of the people in the setting. The critical bricoleur ste the dialectical and hermeneutic nature of inter- disciplinary inquiry knowing thatthe boundaries ‘that previously separated traditional disciplines no longer hold (Kincheloe, 200, p.683). The political bricolewr Knows that science is power, for all research findings have political implications. There is no value-fiee science. This researcher seeks a civic social science based on a politics of hope (Lincoln, 1999). The gendered, narrative bricoleur also knows that researchers all tell stories about the worlds they have studied, Thus the neratives, or stories, scientists tell are accounts couched and framed within specific storytelling traditions, often defined as paradigms (eg. positivism, postposi- tivism, constructivist). ‘The product ofthe interpretive bricolew’s labor is a complex, qailike bricolage, a eexve collage ‘or montage—a set of fluid, interconnected images and representations. This imerpretive structure is like quilt performance text, «sequence of rep- resentations connecting the parts tothe whole Qualitative Research asa Site of Multiple Interpretive Practices Qualitative research, as a set of interpretive activities, privileges no single methodological practice over another As a site of discussion, or discourse, qualitative research is difficult to define clearly. t has no theory or paradigm that is dis- tinetly its own. As the contributions to Part I ofme cannot vwerarching dar ontolo- spies. They sers to par ontrast are can move earcher as ved within ctives and stands that sped by his dhs gender, those of the leur stesses re of inter boundaries sciplines no fhe political wer, for all sions. There her seeks @ ies of hope ive bricoleur ies aboutthe arratives, of ached and Sitions, often 2, postpost- oleur’s labor exive collage acted images structure is uence of rep- he whole ices interpretive thodological iscussion, or 0 define 1 that is dis to Part Il of, this volame reveal, multiple theoretical paradigms aim use of qualitative research methods and strategies, from constructivist to cultural studies, feminism, Marxism, and ethnic models of study. Qualitative research is used in many separate disciplines, as we will discuss below. It does not belong to a single discipline Not does qualitative research havea distinct set of methods or practices that are entirely ts own, Qualitative researchers use serniotcs, narrative, content, discourse, archival and phonemic analy sis, even statistics, tables, graphs, andl numbers. They also draw on and utilize the approaches, ‘methods, and technigues of ethnomethodology, phenomenology, hermeneutics, feminism, rhi- zomatics, deconstructionism, ethnography, inter viewing, psychoanalysis, cultural studies, survey research, and participant observation, among others." All of these research practices “can pro- vide important insights and knowledge” (Nelson etal, 1992, p.2).No specific method or practice can be privileged over any other. Many of these methods, or research practices, are used in other context in the hurvan disciplines. Each bears the traces ofits ovn disciplinary history ‘Thus there is an extensive history of the uses and meanings of ethnography and ethnology in educa- tion (seein this volame Ladson- Billings & Donno, Chapter 11; Kincheloe & McLaren, Chapter 12); of participant observation and ethnography in anthropology (see Foley & Valenzuela, Chapter 95 ‘edlock, Chapter 18; Brady, Chapter 38), socilogy (Gee Holstein & Gabrium, Chapter 19; Fontana & Frey, Chapter 275 Harper, Chapter 29), communica- tions (see Alexander, Chapter 16; Holman Jones, Chapter 30), and cultural studies (see Saukko, Chapter 13) of textual hermeneutic, feminist, psy- choanalytic, arts-based, semiotic, and narrative analysis in cinema and literary studies (see Olesen, Chapter 10; Finley, Chapter 26; Brady Chapter 39) and of narrative, discourse, and conversational analysis in sociology, medicine, communications, and education (soe Miller & Crabuee, Chapter 24 Chase, Chapter 25; Perekyla, Chapter 34) ‘The many histories that surround each method of research strategy reveal bow multiple uses end meanings are brought £0 each practice. Textual Denzin ScLincoln: Introduction 7 analyses in Hterary studies, for example, often treat texts as self-contained systems. On the other hand, a researcher working from a cultural studies ‘or feminist perspective reads a text in terms of its location within historical moment roarked by a particular gender, ace, orclassideology.A cultural studies use of etinography would bring a set of understandings from feminism, postmodernism, and poststracturalism to the project. These under- standings would aot be shared by mainstream postposiivist sociologists. Similarly, pastpostivist and poststructurel historians bring clfferent understandings and uses to the methods and find- ings of historical research (see Tierney, 2000), ‘These tensions and contradictions are all evident in the chapter in this volume. “These separate and multiple uses and mean- ings of the methods of qualitative research make it difficult for scholars to agree on any essential definition of the field, for it is never just one thing” Sill, we must establish a definition for purposes ofthis discussion. We borrow from, and paraphrase, Nelson et als (1992, p.4) attempt to define cultural studies: Quelitative research isan interdisciptinacy,trans- disciplinary, and. sometimes counterdisciplinary field. Tecrosscuts the humanities and the socal and physical sciences, Qualitative research is many things atthe same time. It is multiparadigmatic in focus es practitioners re sensitive tothe value of the muiltimethod approach, They re committed 0 the naturalistic perspective and tothe interpretive understanding of human experience. At the same time, the fel is inerently politcal and shaped by multiple ethical ané political positions. Qualitative research embraces two tensions at the same time. On the one hand, itis drave to a brood, interpretive, postexperimentel, postmodern, feminist, and critics sensbty.Oa the other hand, it is drawn to more narrowly defined positivist, postpostvist, hamanistic, and naturalistic concep ‘tons of human experience and its analysis. Further, these tensions can be combined in the same project, ‘ringing both postmodern and naturalistic, or both critical and humanistic, perspectives to bea. ‘This rather awkward statement means that qualitative research, asa set of practices, embraces8g HANDBOOK OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH within its owo multiple disciplinary histories constant tensions and contradictions over the project itself including its methods and the fooms its findings and interpretations take, The field sprawis between and cuts across ail ofthe haman disciplines, even including, in some cases, the physical sciences. Its practitioners are variously committed to modern, postmodern, and pastex perimental sensibilities and the approaches to social research that these sensibilities imply. Resistances to Qualitative Studies ‘The academic and disciplinary resistances ta ‘qualitative research illustrate the politics embed: ded in this feld of discourse. The challenges to qualitative research are many. As Seale, Gobo, Gubrium, and Silverman (2004) observe, we best understand these criticisms by “distin. guish ing} analytically the political (or external) role of [qualitative] methodology from the proce- dural (or internal) one” (p. 7}. Politics situate methodology within and outside the academy. Procedural issues define how qualitative method ology is used to produce knowledge about the world Often, the political and the procedural inter sect Politicians and “hard” scientists sometimes call qualitative researchers journalists or sot sci- entists, The work of qualitative scholars is termed or only exploratory or subjective. tis called criticism rather than theory or science, ori is interpreted politically, as a disguised version of Maris or secular humanism (see Huber, 1995; see also Denzin, 1997, pp. 258-261) These political and procedural resistances reflect an uneasy awareness that the interpretive traditions of qualitative research commit the researcher toa critique of the positivist ot post: positivist project. But the positivist resistance to qualitative research goes beyond the ‘ever-present desire t maintain a distinction between hard science and soft scholarship” (Carey, 1989, p. 9% see also Smith & Hodkinson, Chapter 36, this volume). The experimental (positivist) sciences (physics, chemistry, economics, and psychology, for example) are often seen as the crowning CHAPTER 1 ievements of Western civilization, and in their ces itis assumed that “truth can transcend opinion and personal bins (Carey, 1989, p. 98; Schwandt, 1997, p. 399). Qualitative research is seen as an assault on this tradition, whose adher- eaits often retreat into a “value-free objectivist science” (Carey, 1988, p. 104) model to defend their position, They seldom attempt to make explicit, or to critique, the “moral and political commitments in their own contingent work” (Carey, 1989, p. 104; see also Guba & Linco Chapter 8, this volume) Positivists further allege thet th new experimental qualitative researchers write fiction, not science, and that these researchers have no way of verifying their rath statements, Ethnographic poetry and fiction signal the deat ‘of empicical science, and there is litle to be gained by attempting to engage"in moral criti- cism, These critics presume a stable, unchanging reality that can be studied using the empirical methods of objective social science (see Huber, 1995). The province of qualitative research, accordingly, is the world of lived experience, for this is where individual belief and action intersect with culture. Under this modal there is no preoc- etweeen the situational researchers ing. In con- he measure- ips between F such stud om within a Reseach Sty Doing the Same Things Differently? Of course, both qualitative and quantitative researchers “think they know something about society worth telling to others, and they use @ variety of forms, media and means to communi- cate their ideas and findings” (Becker, 1986, p- 122). Qualitative research differs from qaanti- tative research in five significant ways (Becker, 1996). These points of difference, discussed in turn belos all involve different ways of address- ing the seine set of issues. They retura alays to the politics of research and to who has the power to legislate cortect solutions to social problems Uses of positivism and posipositivism. First, both perspectives are shaped By the positivist and ‘postposiivist traditions in the physica and social sciences (se the discussion below). These two pos- itvist science traditions hold to naive and critical realist positions concerning teality and its percep- tion. In the positivist version itis contended that there is a reality out thereto be studied, captured, and understood, whereas the posiposiivsts argue that reality can never be fully apprehended, only approximated (Guba, 1990, p. 2). Postpostivism relies on multpie methods as a way of capturing ‘as much of reality as possible. At the same time, i emphasizes the discovery and verification of theories, Traditional evaluation criteria, such as intemal and external validity ate stressed, a5 i the ‘use of qualitative procedures that end themselves to structured (sometimes statistical) analysis, Compater-asisted methods of analysis that permit frequency counts, tabulations, and low-level statis- tical analyses may alo be employed. ‘The positivist and postpasitivist traditions linger like long shadows over the qualitative esearch project. Historically, qualitative esearch ‘was defined within the positivist paradigm, where qualitative researchers attempted 10 do good positivist research with less rigorous methods and procedures. Some mid-20th-centary qualita tive researchers reported participant observation findings in terms of quasi-statistics (e.g. Becker, Geer, Hughes, & Strauss, 1961). As recently as 1998, Stcauss and Corbin, two leading proponents Dendin & Lincoln: Fetroduction a 1. of the grounded theory approach to qualitative research, attempted to modify the usual canons of _good (positivist) science to fit their awn postpos- itvist conception of rigo (but see Charmaz, Chapter 20, this volume; see also Glaser, 1992). Some applied researchers, while clairaing tobe atheoretical, often fit within the positivist or postpositivist framework by default. Flick (2002) usefully summarizes the aif ferences between these two approaches. t0 inquiry, noting that the quantitative approach hhas been used for purposes of isolating “causes and effects... operationalizing theoretical rla- tions ....fand} measuring and ... quantifying phenomena ...allowing the generalization of findings” (p. 3). But today doubt is cast on such projects: “Rapid social change and the resulting cliversification of life worlds are increasingly con- fronting social researchers with new social con- texts and perspectives... traditional deductive rethodologies... are falling... thus research is increasingly forced to make use of inductive strategies instead of starting from theories and testing them..... knowledge and practice are studied as local knoviledge and practice” (p.2). Spindler and Spindler (1992) summarize theit qualitative approach to quantitative materials: “Instramentation and quantification are simply procedures employed to extend and reinforce tain kinds of data, interpretations and test hypo- theses across samples. Both must be kept in their place. One must avoid their premature or overly extensive use asa secuity mechanistn”(p. 69). ‘Although many qualitative researchers in the postpositivist tradition use statistical measures, methods, and documents 28 a way of locating a ‘group of subjects within a larger population, they seldom report their findings in terms of the kinds ‘of complex statistical measures or methods to which quantitative researchers are drawn (08. path, regression, and log linear analyse). Acceptance of postmodern sensibilities. The use of quantitative, positivist methods and assump. tions has been rejected by a new generation ‘qualitative researchers who are attached to post- structural andor postmodern sensibilities. These researchers argue th t ositivist methods are but12 w HANDBOOK OF QUALITATIVE RESEARCH—CHAPTER | one way of telling stories about societies or socal worlds. These methods may be no better or ne han any other methods; they just tel nt kinds of stores. This tolerant view is not shared by all qualita Live researchers (Huber, 1995). Many members the critical theory, constructivist, poststructura, and postmodera schools of thonght reject posi tivist and postpositivist criteria when evaluating their own work. They see these criteria as ircle- vant to their work and contend thet such criteria reproduce only a certain kind of science, science that silences too many voices. These researchers seek alternative methods for evaluating their work, including verisimilitude, emotionality, pe sonal responsibility, an ethic of caring, political praxis, multivoiced texts, and dialogues with subjects. In response, positivists and postposi- tivists argue that what they do is good science, free of individual bias and subjectivity. As noted above, they see postmodernism and poststruc turalism as attacks on reason and trath, Capturing the individual’ point of view. Both qualitative and quantitative researchers are concerned with the individual’ point of views Hoveever, qualitative investigators think they can get closer to the actor's perspective through detailed if and observation, They argue that quantitative researchers are seldom able to captute their subjects’ perspectives because they have to rely on more emote, infer- ential empiticel methods and materials. Many quantitative researchers regard. the empirical materials produced by interpretive methods as unreliable, impressionistic, and not objective. Examining the constraints of everyday lif Qualitative researchers are more likely to confront and come up against the constraints of see this world in action and embed their findings in it. Quantita tive researchers abstract from this world and seldom study it directly. They seek a nomothetic or etic science based on probabilities derived from the study of large numbers of randomly selected cases, These kinds of statements stand above and outside the constraints of everyday life, Qualitative researchers, on the other hand, ave committed to an emic, idlographic, case- based position that directs attention to the specifics of particular cases. Securing rich descriptions. Qualitative researchers believe that rich descriptions of the social world are valuable, whereas quantitative researchers, with their etic, nomothetic commitments, are less concerned with such detail, Quantitative reseatchers are deliberately unconcerned with rich descriptions because such detail interrupts the process of developing generalizations. Bea ‘The five points of difference described above reflect qualitative and quantitative scholars’ com- mitments to different syle of research, diferent epistemologies tion. Fach work tradition is governed by a different set of genres; each has its own cassis, its own preferred forms of representation, intespreta- tion, trustworthiness, and textual evaluation (see Becker, 1986, pp, 134-135). Qualitative researchers use ethnographic prose, historical narratives frst- person accounts, still photographs, life histories, fictionalized “facts” and biographical and autobio- ‘graphical materials, among others. Quantitative researchers use mathematical modes, statistical tables, and graphs, and they usually write about their research in impersonal, third-person prose. Tensions Wir Quauiarive RESEARCH It is erroneous to presume that all qualitative researchers share the same assumptions about the five points of difference described above. As the following discussion reveals, positivist, post- positivist, and poststructural dilferences define and shape the discourses of qualitative vesearch. Realists and postpositivists within the inter- pretive, qualitative research tradition criticize Poststructuraists for taking the textual, narrative ‘tum, These critics contend that such work is navel produces the conditions “fora dialogueou phic, case- ition t the etesearchers social world researchers, itmnents, are Quantitative cerned with ai interrupts crlbed above solars rch, if representa by adiferent interpreta aluation (see veresearchers ratives, rst life hist and autobio- Quantitative As, statistical write about srson prose. 1 qualitative ptions about ed above. As siivist, post ences define ive researc, othe iat jon criticize val, narrative works navel are dialogue of the deaf between itself and the community” (Sitverman, 1997, p.240). Critics accuse those who attempt to captuee the point of wew of the inter acting subject in the world of natve humanism, of reproducing “a Romantic impaise which elevates the experiential to the level of the authentic (Silverman, 1997, p. 248). Sill others assert that those who take the textual, performance turn ignore lived experi- ence. Snow and Morrill (1995) argue that “this performance turn, like the preoccupation with discourse and storytelling, will take us further from the field of socal action and the real dramas ‘of everyday life and thus signal the death knell of etnography as an empitically grounded e: prise” (p.361). OF course, we disagree. Critical Realism For some, there i a thin’ stream, between nave positivism and poststructuraism, Critical realism isan anipositivist movement inthe social sciences closely associated with the works of Roy Bhaskar and Rom Harré (Danermark,Ekstrom, jakobsen,& Karlsson, 2002) Critical realists use the word criti- cal in a particolar way. This is not “Frankfurt school” critical theory, although there are traces of social criticism here and there (see Denersmark et al, 2002, p. 201). Instead, critical in this context refers to a transcendental realism that rejects methodological individalism and universal claims to truth, Critical realists oppose logical positivist, relativist, and antifoundational epistemologies. Critical realists agree with the positivist that there isa world of events out there that is cbservable and independent of hurman consciousness. They hold that knowledge about this world is socially con- structed, Society is made up of feeling, thinking human beings, and their interpretations of the world must be studied (Danermark et al, 2002, . 200), Critcal realists reject a correspondence theory oftrath They believe that realty is aranged in levels and that scientific work must go beyond statements of regularity to analysis of the mecha- nisms, processes, and structures that account for the patterns that are observed. Stl, as postempircist, antifoundational, criti cal theorists, we reject much of what the critical Densin & Lincsln:Imiroduction ws 13 realists advocate, Throughout the past century, social science and philosophy have been continue ally tangled up with one another. Various “isms” and philosophical movements have crisscrossed sociological and educational discourses, from pos- isvism to postpositivism to analytic and linguistic philosophy, to hermeneutics, structoralism, post- structuralism, Marxism, feminism, and current post-post versions ofall of the above. Some have said that the logical posiivsts steered the social sciences ona rigorous course of self-destruction, We do not think that critical sealisin wil keep the socal science ship float. The socisl sciences are normative disciplines, always already embed: ded in issues of vale, ideology, power, desire, sex- ism, racism, domination, repression, and contrl We want social science that is cooumited up font to issues of social justice, equity, nonviolence, peace, and universal human rights. We do aot want social science that says itcan address these issues if it wants to. For us, that is no Longer an option. With these differences within and between interpretive traditions in hand, we must now beriely discuss the history of quai We break this history into eight historic moments, mindful that any history is always somewhat atbitrary and always at least partially a social construction, Tae History oF Quamative Re RCH The history of qualitative research reveal that the modern social science discipkines have taken as their mission “the analysis and understanding of the patterned conduct and social processes of society” (Vidich & Lyman, 2000, p.37). The notion thet social scientists could carry out this task presupposed that they had the ability to observe this world objectively. Qualitative methods were @ major tool of such observations.” ‘Throughout the history of qualitative research, qualitative investigators have defined their work in terms of hopes and values, “religious faiths, occupational and professional ideologies” (Vidich & Lyman, 2000, p. 38). Qualitative research (like all research) has alrays been judged on the“standard of whether the work communicates or ‘says something to us" (Vidich & Lyman, 2000, 39), based on how we conceptualize our reality and our images of the world. Epistemology is the ‘word that has historically defined these standards of evaluation, In te contemporary period, as we sve argued above, many teceived discourses on epistemology are now being evaluated Vidich and Eyman's (2000) work on the history of qualitative research covers the follow ing (somewhat) overlapping stages: early ethno raphy (to the 17th century), colonial etbnograp (17%, 18h, and 19ch-cencury explorers), the ethnography of the American Indian as “Other” (late-19th- and early-20th-cemtary anthropol- ogy), community studies and ethnographies ‘of American immigrants (carly 2Uth century through the 1960s), studies of ethnicity and intlation (midcentury through the 1980s), and the present, which we call the eighth moment. In each of these eras, researchers were and have been inBuenced by their political hopes and ideologies, discovering findings in thelr research that confitmed their prior theories or belies Early ethnographers confirmed the racial and cultural diversity of peoples throughout the slobe and attempted to fit this diversity into a theory about the origins of history, the races, and civilizations. Colonial ethnographers, before the professionalization of ethnography in the 20th century, fostered a colonial pluralism that left natives on their own as long ¢s their leaders could be co-opted by the colonial administration. European ethnogrephers studied Africans, ‘Asians, aod other Third World peoples of color. Early American ethnographers studied the American indian from the perspective of the con-