Criteria for assessing interpretive validity in qualitative research

Altheide, D. L.,&Johnson, J. M. (1994). . In N. K. Denzin&Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (pp. 485-499). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Validity in Qualitative Research

Robin Whittemore, Susan K. Chase and Carol Lynn Mandle (2001). Qualitative Health Research. 11 (4), 522-537.

Abstract:
Much contemporary dialogue has centered on the difficulty of establishing validity criteria in qualitative research. Developing validity standards in qualitative research is challenging because of the necessity to incorporate rigor and subjectivity as well as creativity into the scientific process. This article explores the extant issues related to the science and art of qualitative research and proposes a synthesis of contemporary viewpoints. A distinction between primary and secondary validity criteria in qualitative research is made with credibility, authenticity, criticality, and integrity identified as primary validity criteria and explicitness, vividness, creativity, thoroughness, congruence, and sensitivity identified as secondary validity criteria.

Reading the historical development of validity issues, the authors discussed three types of tensions.

1. Tension Between Qualitative and Quantitative Research

"Despite the incongruency between quantitative epistemology and qualitative methodology, translated standards of validity have proven to be useful criteria for demonstrating rigor and legitimacy of qualitative research. Guba and Lincoln (1989) advanced this work by proposing standards that were more reflective of specific threats to qualitative research." (pp. 523-524)

2. Tension Between Epistemological Purism and Pluralism

3. Tension Between Rigor and Creativity

"Creativity must be preserved within qualitative research, but not at the expense of the quality of the science. Creative work supports the discovery of the not yet known, going beyond previously established knowledge and challenging accepted thinking (Marshall, 1990). However, it is essential that qualitative work should be highly creative at the same time that it is analytically rigorous and explicit (Patton //--page break--// 1990). Creativity in and of itself will not contribute to sound science. Elegant and innovative thinking can be balanced with reasonable claims, presentation of evidence, and the critical application of methods." (pp. 526-527)


The authors pointed out there is no championing terms to articulate validity criteria in qual. Yet, they call Lincoln and Guba (1985, Naturalistic Inquiry: "credibility" for validity ) "the staying power." Yet, they argued, "validity is an accurate term and does provide the opportunity for criteria to be developed that are reflective of the tenets of the interpretive perspective" (pp. 527).


The authors wrote:

"Validity cannot be assumed, and presentation of research findings must invite the opportunity for critical reflection by consumers. The importance of explicating “how we claim to know what we know” (Altheide & Johnson, 1994, p. 496) is as essential as the claim to what we know." (p 535)

[It implies validity is self-reflection on the research process: authentic, rigor, moral]

Institutional review boards and methodological conservatism

: The challenge to and from phenomenological paradigms. Yvonna S. Lincoln (2008). In N. Denzin & Y. Lincoln (Eds.), The landscape of qualitative research (pp. 221-244). Thousand Oaks, London, New Dehli and Singapore: Sage.

Becoming critical : education, knowledge, and action research

Carr & Kemmis. (1986).

EDU LB1028.24 C27 1986

Gracias Companero: an appreciation of Orlando Fals Borda

Hall, Budd. (2008). Action research, 6 (4) , 442-444. doi: 10.1177/14767503080060040503

Here Hall credited Fals-Borda with the development of the term Participatory Action Research since 1977 Cartagena conference in Colombia.

"Some of those scholars had been working to these ends since the late 1960s outside of academic confines. Orlando traced his lineage in Participatory Action Research and related approaches from that meeting. At the time, I was a newly appointed research officer working with the International Council for Adult Education, fresh from five years working in Tanzania where a number of us began the work which we coined ‘participatory research’. (p. 442)

Convergence

(1975) 8 (2) Special issue on participatory research.

Education library
Edit by Budd Hall, origin of PR

Adult learning, a design for action

: a comprehensive international survey. (1978). Budd L. Hall & J. R. Kidd. Oxford ; New York : Pergamon Press.

LC5209 I524 1976 (EDU)

Intimate details : Participatory action research in prison

Michelle Fine and María Elena Torre. (2006). 4 (3), 253–269. doi: 10.1177/1476750306066801

For the authors, "participatory action researchers have an obligation to reveal, when possible, the intimate details of PAR undertaken in difficult social institutions" (p. 255)

"In communities, schools or prisons, PAR projects document the subterranean pools of collective dissent by aggregating and making public ‘private’ troubles among very different youth, women and men. Revealing the common, public roots of these ‘private’ troubles (Mills, 1959), PAR demonstrates the differentiated consequences of social oppression, distributed unevenly (but not only) by race, ethnicity and class. PAR shatters the false consensus of neo-liberal institutional life by challenging the everyday banality and seeming inevitability of injustice. More specifically, participatory action research lifts the multiple stories and counter stories dwelling within any complex institution or social arrangement, privileging in particular those perspectives that age on the bottom of social arrangements, where the lies, the ghosts, the buried memories, the disposables, the traitors and the silences gather." (p. 255)

Fine continues to use and stresses the word PAR.

[Fancy descriptions and cautious uses of words in this article]

Visual Methods in Social Research

Reviewed by Mark Turin

BANKS, MARCUS. Visual methods in social research. xvi, 201 pp., tables, illus., bibliogr. London, Delhi: Sage Publications, 2001.

In this helpful introductory text, Banks offers advice to social scientists interested in using visual imagery in their work, and discusses the benefits of doing so. The author's approach is neither dogmatic nor evangelical, combining instead quiet confidence with cautionary good sense. The result is a very solid book which will be particularly useful for students in sociology and anthropology hoping to engage with issues of visual representation.

Visual methods in social research covers empirical approaches to image creation as well as image analysis. Drawing on wide-ranging examples, from holiday postcards to vintage film, Banks illustrates how methodology relating to visual form in the social sciences is '[either] scattered or confined to quite specific areas' (p. 2). The author makes effective use of rhetorical questions and discrete subsections (such as 'unnatural vision' and 'reading narratives'), thereby encouraging the reader to reconsider often-unquestioned assumptions about visual culture. Banks is well versed both topically and technologically, and jumps nimbly from caste in India to the Kayapo of Brazil, and from Polaroid to webcams. Moreover, by choosing explicitly contemporary reference points, such as Jorg Haider or Quentin Tarantino's now-cult film, Pulp fiction, he succeeds in engaging younger readers on their own visual territory.

A number of sections are particularly strong and worthy of special attention. Discussing the presence of foreign objects and non-indigenous bodies in ethnographic films, Banks points out that in future generations, the 'sight of "imported" artefacts would not be taken as mournful tokens of lost innocence, but celebrated as cultural appropriations' (p. 144). About the aptly named HADDON web-based meta-catalogue of archival ethnographic film and footage, the author's own creation, he is characteristically modest. The existence of this online catalogue and of a supporting website for the book under discussion, , embodies the hands-on approach which Banks advocates. While largely photo-centric, Visual methods also offers useful pointers for working with computer-based digital media, one advantage of which is the potential for 'research parity between sound, text and image' (p. 162). Increasingly, as academic publishing becomes a not-for-profit enterprise and publishers attempt to curtail their production costs, a well-conceived website of video clips and images can provide access to a supporting corpus of rich visual data which can help to illustrate a written text. Focusing on the Yanomamo interactive CD-ROM. Banks demonstrates how the use of multimedia 'opens up a non-linear space within which the detail can be absorbed at the user's own pace, and the arguments which rest upon that detail can be fully explored' (p. 165). This is the power of bits and bytes: the social researcher can 'usefully employ multimedia to state her own case but also to outline the alternative interpretations and provide access to the raw materials to allow the user to test them all' (p. 164). Banks concludes his otherwise cautious narrative with an unexpected, albeit entirely justified, sting in the tail. Having offered the disclaimer that his book contains little explicit theory, he takes a well-aimed swipe at scholars who advocate nothing other than 'swooping god-like into other people's lives and gathering "data" ... according to a predetermined theoretical agenda [which] strikes me not simply as morally dubious but intellectually flawed' (p. 179).

Students would be well served to read this book alongside James Monaco's now-classic How to read a film (currently in its third edition). In tandem, these background handbooks are amply sufficient to prepare researchers in social science with enough practical know-how, together with a healthy dose of reflexive understanding, to ensure the responsible use of visual imagery in their work. Banks is at his best when he stresses the material nature of visual media and the cultural nature of vision (bringing to mind John Berger's work), and in demonstrating how visual objects are entangled in social relations. In his introduction, Banks suggests that 'good visual research rests upon a judicious reading of both internal and external narratives' (p. 12). His own approach--critical yet mindful--does just this.

The North-South convergence : A 30-year first-person assessment of PAR

Orlando Fals Borda. (2006). Action Research 4(3), 351–358. DOI: 10.1177/1476750306066806

Fals-Borda warns the attempts of asserting a set of rules or guides applicable to all. He argued that there are so many autonomous groups. So, he argued:

[I]t is preferable for us to seek our own explanations for building an alternative paradigm, by studying our indigenous or founding regional groups and emphasizing their values of human solidarity. Some of these groups extend from one country to another without respecting present frontiers . . . . The fundamental values of the founding groups provide a strong ethos identifiable with a deep-rooted non-violent socialism that is worth salvaging to repair our deteriorating social fabric.(p. 356-357)

Within this perspective, he called for an alternative methodological paradigm pertinent to regional context:

Our methodology is now faced with the creative challenge of constructing an alternative paradigm in regional contexts, for understanding and valuing the complexities of societies,
as regards their oral links, particular characteristics, present situation and spontaneous nature. (p. 357)

Research tensions and paradigm shifts in action sciences

Orlando Fals-Borda. (2002). In P. Valero & O. Skovsmose (Eds.), Proceedings of the 3rd International conference on mathematics education and society (pp. 1-10).
Copenhagen: Centre for Research in Learning Mathematics.

For him, PAR attempts to challenge power through a radical change in knowledge production. He stated:

We appeared to be involved in a risky mixture of power/ knowledge, for we dared to challenge established ways and rules with heterodox research-and-study techniques in the field, in the classroom and even in the comfort of our armchairs in order to promote changes that are felt necessary both for academia and for society at large. (p. 2)

PAR is a remedy for ineffective analytical procedure in academia and at the same time a tool to pursue social justice for ordinary people in society. From this perspective, he drew attention to three types of tensions that arose in building PAR : (1) theory/practice in determining appropriate safeguards for the application of praxis, (2) in the meaning of the subject/ object and knowledge triad; and 3) in the search for a more satisfactory vision of science, within the context of mathematics education.

Concerning validity, Fals-Borda argued that it has to do with the notions of QUAL and QUAN research. He continued that quantitative measures may be combined with qualitative descriptions. More importantly, he stated:

Validity criteria could be derived from sources other than numerical regressions and correlations. Such alternative guidelines could be drawn by common sense, from inductive/deductive analysis of results obtained in practice through personal involvement in processes, and approved by the considered judgement of local reference groups. (p. 7)

Validity can be sought through self-reflexivity, participants, and other reference groups, as suggested in constructivist approaches as shown in fourth generation evaluation.

Fals-Borda asserted that PAR can bring together diverse knowledge systems--suggesting both QUAL and QUAN--and wrote that is a challenge for intellectual and moral reconstruction. He stated:

Convergence of this type should only be limited by how useful it is in the sociocultural and environmental context that inspired it, and in producing the positive practical results expected of it in the real world. (p. 8)

He noted, "PAR approach is open, plural, practical and interdisciplinary" (p. 9). He continued to stress that:

This open, holistic paradigm of PAR brings together praxis and ethics, academic knowledge and popular wisdom, the professor and the student, the rational and the existential, the regular and the fractal, the qualitative and the quantitative. It breaks down the subject/object dichotomy. It is founded on the democratic pluralist concepts of otherness, service and justice, upholding toleration of diversity and introducing neglected perspectives of culture, gender, popular classes and pluriethnicity into research and teaching activities. (p. 9)

Participatory Action Research

: Psychology and social change. (1997). Mary Brydon-Miller. Journal of social issues, 53 (4), 657-666.

PAR can be defined as a process of research, education, and action (Hall, 1981, Participatory research, popular knowledge and power: A personal reflection. Convergence, 14(3), 6-1 7).

Hall explained: The term participatory research was first used in the early 1970s in the research in Tanzania that drew on local knowledge and expertise in developing a project. Fals-Borda preferred the term PAR to emphasize the social change component of the work. In India, Tandon developed similar approaches to conducting community-based research.

Brydon-Miller finds its major philosophical influence in the work of Freire, who emphasized experience-based learning and developing critical consciousness from this knowledge through repeated cycles of action-and-reflection. The author stated that this cycle lies at the heart of PAR's knowledge generation.

One of the distinctions between PAR and more traditional research is in the acknowledgment of the political nature of research. PAR rejects value-free knowledge production. Brydon-Miller noted that this acknowledgment allows researcher to act in a more direct manner upon social issues.

Brydon-Miller described a basic set of tenets of PAR by following Hall (1981):
PAR originates in communities and populations that have traditionally been exploited; PAR addresses specific concerns of the community and the fundamental causes of oppression in order to bring about change; and PAR is a process of research, education, and action.

Brydon-Miller asserted the difficulty in typifying the methodology of PAR. In this light, she stated:

PAR can and does use what might seem to be fairly traditional methods of social scientific inquiry such as community questionnaires and interviews, the fundamental difference being that in PAR, members of the community determine which methods to use. (p. 661) [This indicates PAR is not a kind of methods, which is often divided into QUAL and QUAN. Both can be used in PAR but under a different set of rules, i.e., who determines what methods to use.]

She continued to state:

They then develop or adapt the research instruments and learn to carry out the research and to take part in analyzing the results. Finally, and most important, they own the results of the research and can determine how the information is to be used in addressing the concerns they have articulated. In addition to more standard methods, PAR also utilizes a variety of other approaches, including popular theater, political action, group discussions, community seminars, educational camps, intercultural exchange programs, video productions, and storytelling, to name just a few. (p. 661).

Ideology and Political Economy in Inquiry

: Action research and participatory research. (1983). L. David Brown & Rajesh Tandon. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 19 (3), 277-294. DOI: 10.1177/002188638301900306

The authors examine two traditions of applied behavioral science inquiry--action research and participatory research. They argued that both espouse similar values and employ common methods in different settings.

They pointed out that action research, formulated by Lewin, which consists of cycles of analysis, fact finding, conceptualization, planning, implementation, and evaluation to simultaneously solve problems and generate new knowledge. They observed that action research took place in the Global North in business firms and educational organizations. Yet, academia social scientists had not accepted it as fully as applied researchers in organizations.

On the other hand, participatory research emerged from the work with the oppressed in the Third World, where problems of adult education and social oppression are particularly acute, in various forms, such as Freire's conscientization and other work in Africa and Asia. The international network of participatory researchers was formed in 1978 sponsored by the International Council for Adult Education. Here the characteristics of participatory research were summarized:

Hall (1981, Convergence, p.7) defined participatory research as "an integrated activity that combines social investigation, educational work and action."

Paragidmatic controversies, contradictions, and emerging confluences

Egon G. Guba & Yvonna S. Lincoln. (2008). In Norman K. Denzin & Yvonna S. Lincoln (Eds.), The landscape of qualitative research (3rd ed.) (pp. 255-286). Thousand Oaks, London, New Delhi, and Singapore: Sage.

The authors developed their definition of the nature of paradigms proposed in 1994 by incorporating John Heron and Peter Reason's (1997) participatory/cooperative paradigm. In this chapter, they focused on issues of axiology, commensurability, action, control, foundations of truth and knowledge, validity, voice, reflexivity, and postmodern textual representation.

It is interesting to note that they changed their perspective on commensurability: in the past, they had argued commensurability between paradigms is not possible, although within each paradigm, mixed methodologies may make good sense. Yet, in this chapter is argued that it would not be impossible to blend some elements from each paradigm. For instance, positivism and postpositivism are clearly commensurable.

Concerning the call to action, the authors noted:
"The mandate for social action, especially action designed and created by and for rearch participants with the aid and cooperation of researchers, can be most sharply delineated between positivist/postpositivist and new paradigm inquirers. (p. 267)

Another controversy around paradigms is centered on control of the study: who initiates? who determines research processes? who determines what to be represented? The authors noted that the issue of control is deeply embedded in the questions of voice, reflexivity, and postmodern textual representation, which are relevant only to new paradigm inquirers. Interestingly, however, the term control is used to foster empowerment, noted the authors:

"[F]or new-paradigm researchers control is a means of fostering emancipation, democracy, and community empowerment, and of redressing power imbalances such that those who were previously marginalized now achieve voice (Mertens, 1998) or "human flourishing" (Heron & Reason, 1997). (p. 268)

Validity is the most controversial term among paradigms. Questions relevant to validity include: are the findings sufficient enough to act upon them?

Voice: In the past, the only appropriate voice was "voice from nowhere" (p. 277). While the voice of informants becomes important, the authors observed that it is critical to participatory research, having a researcher's voice in the text and simultaneously letting participants speak for themselves through various media, such as plays, forums, performance-oriented media... The authors remarked: "Performance texts, in particular, give an emotional immediacy to the voices of researchers and research participants far beyond their own sites and locale" (p. 278). For Rosanna Herz (1997, Introduction: Reflexivity and voice. In (Ed.), Reflexivity and voice), voice is a struggle for representation of the author's self as well as the respondents' selves. She wrote:

Voice has multiple dimensions: First there is the voice of the author. Second, there is the presentation of the voices of ones' respondents within the text. A third dimension appears when the self is the subject of the inquiry. (p. 278).

[Participatory video, these dimensions come into play. How do participants represent their voice when they present their respondents' interviewed voice? Is this argument really relevant ti PV in any case? I explored a bit of this issue in writing reflexivity.]

Reflexivity: The authors defined as reflexivity here reflecting critically on the self as researcher, instrumental to research.

Postmodern textual representations: postmodern and poststructural perspectives brought forth criticism around conventional texts: their reductionist representation of human reality and contribution to historical oppression. As a counter-text, new forms of texts flourish to break boundaries and moving the center to the margin. One of the examples is "messy texts" (Marcus & Fischer, 1986), which breaks the binary between science and literature. The authors noted that "Representation may be arguably the most open-ended for the controversies surrounding phenomenological research today" (p. 280).

In concluding, the authors remain as constructivists. They think it is highly unlikely and even less than useful that positivist and new paradigm forms of inquiry resolve their differences because of the assumption that there is no single truth. Thus, they wrote:

"We stand at the threshold of a history marked by multivocality, contested meanings, paradigmatic controversies, and new texual forms" (p. 281).

Competing paradigms in qualitative research

Egon G. Guba & Yvonna S. Lincoln (Eds.). (1994). Handbook of qualitative research (pp. 105-117).

An alternative paradigm dialog

Egon C. Guba (1990). In E.G. Guba (Ed.), The paradigm dialog (pp. 17-30). Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

In this chapter, Guba proposed as the generic definition of paradigm "a basic set of belief that guides action" (p. 17), in particular, disciplined inquiry as the action in our concern. Such paradigms respond to three questions: ontological, epistemological, and methodological questions.

1) Ontological: What is the nature of reality?
2) Epistemological: What is the nature of the relationship between the knower (researcher) and the known (researched)?
3) Methodological: what is the process of finding out knowledge or research?

Positivism
The positivist paradigm is rooted in a realist ontology, the belief that "there exists a reality out there driven by immutable natural laws" (p. 19). The purpose of science is to discover the true nature of reality and how it truly works.

From this ground, positivists practice an objectivist epistemology, in which they put questions directly to nature and wait for its answer without altering it. Since the inquirer can be positioned far away from nature, research outcomes are value free. Within this paradigm, experimental/manipulative methodology is the most appropriate in such a way that questions and hypotheses are stated in advance and subjected to empirical tests under carefully controlled conditions.

Postpositivism
It is a modified/less naïve version of positivism. It is based on critical realism: postpositivists believe that reality exists out there, yet because of human sensory/intellectual limitations, it is impossible for humans truly to perceive it. Thus, they emphasize the need for being critical about what researchers find.
Epistemologically, postpositivists recognize the absurdity of the separation of inquirers from the inquired; thus they take on a modified objectivist epistemology in the sense that objectivity is a regulatory ideal to adhere, yet in reality, can be achieved reasonably closely (approximated) only by cleaning up one's preposition, relying on the tradition of the field to report the inquiry, and seeking judgment from peers in the disciplinary community. Guba criticized that the latter two requirements virtually make is impossible for new paradigm to assert themselves.
Methodologically, it put forth critical multiplism (modified experimentalism/manipulatism), which was also articulated as triangulation by Denzin (1978). Because of limited human sensory, it seeks as many sources as possible to draw findings. They often calls for more qualitative methods, depending more on grounded theory, and reintroducing discovery into the inquiry process.

Critical Theory
Guba proposed the label of "ideologically oriented inquiry" instead of critical theory, which encompasses feminism, neo-Marxism, Frerieism, participatory inquiry, and critical theory. The shared quality in this family is rejecting the claim of "value freedom" made by positivism (and postpositivism to an extent). They believe that values do enter into every inquiry; inquiry thereby becomes a political act.

Guba criticizes an ontological juncture that critical theorists (ideologists) adhere to:

But, for whatever reason, critical theorists (ideologists) have elected to believe in an objective reality--as the phrase commonly used by them, "false consciousness," readily demonstrates (because it implies that there is a "true consciousness" somewhere "out there," or, more likely, possessed by the inquirer or some better informed elite). The task of inquiry is, by definition, to raise people (the oppressed) to a level of "true consciousness." Once they appreciate how oppressed they are, they can act to transform the world. The close parallel between transforming the world and predicting and controlling it should not be lost. (p. 24)

Critical theorists undertake subjectivist epistemology, regarding inquiry acts as a process intimately related to the inquirer's values. Yet, Guba points out a logical disjunction a "realist ontology coupled with a subjectivist epistemology" (p. 24).

Guba asserted that critical theorists' methodology is more consistent and framed it as transformative and dialogic one. It seeks to eliminate false consciousness and to facilitate transformation.

Constructivism
Constructivist calls for a completely different paradigm. It acknowledge value-laden facts and furthermore, the interaction of inquirer and inquired into that shapes outcomes of an inquiry. Therefore, constructivists state that:

It [constructivism] renders the distinction between ontology and epistemology obsolete; what can be known and the individual who comes to know it are fused into a coherent whole. Further, it makes the findings of an inquiry not a report of what is "out there" but the residue of a process that literally creates them. Finally, it depicts knowledge as the outcome or consequence of human activity; knowledge is a human construction, never certifiable as ultimately true but problematic and ever changing. (p. 26)

From this perspective, ontologically, it takes a position of relativism in that "realities are multiple, and they exist in people's minds" (p. 26). Guba argued that relativism is "the key to openness and the continuing search for ever more informed and sophisticated constructions" (p. 26).

Epistemologically, the constructivist takes a subjectivist position, not because of the limited human conditions but because of its ontological assumptions: if realities exist only in people's minds, subjectivist interaction is the only way to accessing them.

Methodologically, the constructivist takes hermeneutics and dialectics: it attempts to depict individual constructions as accurately as possible, and simultaneously, contrast and compare dialectically to generate informed constructions on which there is substantial consensus.

A Participatory Inquiry Paradigm

John Heron and Peter Reason (1997). Qualitative inquiry, 3 (3), 274-294. doi: 10.1177/107780049700300302

Deveoloping Guba and Lincoln (1994, Competing paradigms in qualitative research. In N.
K. Denzin & Y S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research), the authors articulate a participatory paradigm by supporting Guba and Lincoln's argument that the constructivist paradigm is unclear about the relation between constructed realities and the original cosmos. In this light, the authors argued that "participative realities" are more useful.

The authors begin a paradigm building from the constructivist worldview. Further, it emphasizes human beings in relation to the living world and experiential knowledge, inquiry and reality. They argued:

"Constructivist views tend to be deficient in any acknowledgment of experiential knowing; that is, knowing by acquaintance, by meeting, and by felt participation in the presence of what is there. (p. 277)

For them, reality is a form of experience and experiential reality is both subjective and objective. For instance, holding someone's hand means that it shapes the person and simultaneously I meet the person. Thus, they stated, "To experience anything is to participate in it, and to participate is to both to mold and to encounter; hence, experiential reality is always subjective-objective" (p. 278). This participatory, subjective-objective, experiential reality constitutes the ontology of participatory worldview. Heron (1996 p, 11 ...) wrote:

It is subjective because it is only known through the form the mind gives it; and it is objective because the mind interpenetrates the given cosmos which it shapes. (p. 11)

Thus, in this paradigm, they argue that there is a primordial reality, in which the mind actively penetrates and cocreates reality through interaction with the cosmos.

Epistemology: the authors emphasize critical subjectivity as the epistemological ground. They acknowledge that knowing is from a perspective and that perspective has authentic values as well as restricting bias. Thus, what involves is critical subjectivity, such that a self-reflexive attention is given to the knower's ground. Developing the community consensus (which determines relative truth) of constructivism, the authors add shared experiential meaning to judge the relative truth. [THIS ARGUMENT IS VERY VAGUE.] In this light, they argued that critical subjectivity extends to critical intersubjectivity, for personal knowing is always set within cultural and experiential shared meaning.

Methodology: Collaborative/Cooperative forms of action inquiry.
The authors argued that cooperative inquiry rests on two participatory principles: epistemic participation and political participation:

The first means that any propositional knowledge that is the outcomes of the research is grounded by the researchers in their own experiential knowledge. The second means that research subjects have a basic human right to participate fully in designing the research that intends to gather knowledge about them. (p. 284)

The more participatory systematically the more cooperative. Thus, they distinguish this methodology from the mainstream qualitative paradigm:

Qualitative research about people is a halfway house between exclusive, controlling, quantitative, positivist research on people and fully participatory, cooperative research with people. (p. 285)

Cooperative inquiry is "a wide-ranging science about any aspect of the human condition that a group of coresearchers choose to explore through the instrumentality of their own experience" (p. 286).

Axiology: the authors contended that the omission of axiology in Guba and Lincoln's paradigm table is a critical deficit because axiology ultimately asks why we try to create reality and what it worthwhile and valuable. In this question, the authors respond that the participatory paradigm answers it is for human flourishing. It is practical knowing of "how to choose and act" (p. 287).

The Sage handbook of action research

: Participative inquiry and practice. Reason, Peter & Bradbury, Hilary (Eds.). (2008). London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi, and Singapore: Sage.

Introduction (P. Reason & H. Bradbury, 1-13)

Reason and Bradbury traced back to the origin of action research to Lewin, liberationist perspective, exemplified by Freire, scholar-practitioners' work in education, health, and community development, and philosophical roots in critical theory, constructivism, phenomenology, etc. Epistemologically, they argue that action research has been shied away from the mainstream social sciences, which focus on objectivity and emphasize representation rather than action. Within this context, they define action research as:

a family of practices of living inquiry that aims, in a great variety of ways, to link practice and ideas in the service of human flourishing. It is not so much a methodology as an orientation to inquiry that seeks to create participative communities of inquiry in which qualities of engagement, curiosity and question posing are brought o bear on significant practical issues. (p. 1)

In their definition, action research is characterized with a participatory process. They wrote: "[A]ction research is participatory research, and all participatory research must be action research" (p. 4). Here "action" means that research responds to "people's desire to act creatively in the face of practical and often pressing issues in their lives in organization and communities" (p. 3) and it is action because the research looks into the participants' own action in their daily lives. They distinguish action research from traditional research in that action research aims at producing practical knowledge to act upon practical issues and bring about transformative experience of our daily lives. Thereby, it is contentious to some of the academic community, which aims at producing academic theories unencumbered by practical questions. In so doing, action research challenges a monopoly of knowledge production inveterate in academic practices. The authors emphasize the emancipatory dimension of action research: Without it, action research would be co-opted by the status quo instead of flourishing individual or community lives.

The authors' terms first, second, and third-person research practices as an organizing framework are useful to analyze the process of action research. First-person action research practices involve with the individual ability to inquire into his or her own life. Second-person action research practices addresses the ability to inquire into mutual issues and problem through face-to-face interpersonal dialogue and develop organizations. Third-person action research practices aims to create a wider impact. They assert that research reports can be an important form of third-person inquiry.

The authors do not bind action research with a specific set of methodologies. Instead, they draw attention to action research as a form of bringing scholarship and praxis together and a new way of knowing, and the development of new thinking about validity and quality in research. It is a paradigm. In their definition, participation is the backbone of action research. They also note that participation is political in that it allows people to have a say in decision making and producing knowledge about them. It empowers them because it allows them to see that they can construct and use their own knowledge to address pressing issue.

Living inquiry: Personal, political and philosophical groundings for action research practice (15-30, Wicks, P. G., Reason, P., & Bradbury, H. ).

The authors analyze the survey responses from action research practitioners. One of the patterns noted by the respondents is Thomas Kuhn's influence on paradigmatic shift for their epistemological understanding and research practices. Some also attributed their practices to pragmatist position that "knowledge is acquired through responding to a real need in life" (p. 19). Most respondents also seek critical social theories as their philosophical backdrop: the political dimension of theories and knowledge led them to the perspective that knowledge is value-laden and can be emancipatory. Also many come from the objection to traditional education research and embraces critical perspectives on pedagogy influenced by Freire and Hall. McTaggart and Kemmis in particular look for the transformative potential of action research. The authors conclude as the status of action researchers:

[A]ction researchers themselves could be understood to have been action as 'bricoleurs' over time, and in a very real sense, 'making the road while walking'. Indeed, the active process of integrating and making sense of various influences and perspectives and of developing one's own understanding seems to be central to many action researchers' accounts. (p. 26)

Participatory action research as practice (31-48, Swantz, Marja Liisa)
Swantz argued that the conventional scientific criteria could not validate PAR; practical success verifies the usefulness, asserted the author. Specifically, she noted Heinz Moser's (1975, as cited on page 43) three criteria: (1) transparency: are all the participants aware of the whole process of research, such as functions, aims, and methods, (2) compatibility of the aims and methods. For instance, outside researchers cannot be an independent observer, and (3) participant researcher's claim: does she claim that she knows better than does any outside observer and can she set forth all the aspects that she knows? [Criteria to evaluate PR]

Analyzing her own work, Swantz argued for the potential of participatory action research: She argued that by breaking the monopoly of privileged knowledge, people can break the monopoly of bureaucratic and technocratic power. She also asserts that knowledge should be grained in people's lives and PAR should promote such knowledge production.

Some trends in the praxis of participatory action research (Rahman, Anisur. 49-62)

Rahman finds the philosophical background of PAR in Marxist's call for the working class to create their own history, yet pointed out that Marxists have shown little interest in PAR movement. Instead, Freirians or others who focused micro-level grassroots movement and "conscientization" have promoted active PAR. Looking through regional trends throughout the world, Rahman defined PAR as a 'micro ideology' (p. 60), through which the downtrodden people can create their own history by building their own science.

[As Swantz, knowledge is tied to power in the discourse of PAR. Yet, on what basis?]
Continuing the journey: articulating dimensions of feminist participatory action research (FPAR) (Collen Reid and Wendy Frisby, 93-105)

Based on their experience, the authors articulate six dimensions of FPAR:
(1) Centering gender and women's diverse experiences in addressing power;
(2) Accounting for intersectionality across the differences in gender, class, race, culture, etc.
(3) Honoring voice and difference: by articulating personal experiences based on real life, FPAR aims at revealing hidden structural and social institutions. Cooke and Kothari (2001) warned that participatory approaches could contribute to perpetuating entrenched power relations if the heterogeneity of communities is neglected or there is lack of institutional change.

The authors noted as the current limitation of FPAR: "Yet, the feminist ideals of using participatory research techniques to give voice to people's experience and create change by focusing on action aimed at social transformation have not been fully realized" (p. 99).

(4) Exploring new forms of representation by continuing to pushing boundaries of prescribed ways of conducting research;
(5) Reflexivity: The authors define reflexivity in research as making explicit the power relations and the exercise of power in the research process. They note that feminist action researchers are attentive to self criticism and consciously write about themselves into the text. Yet, they argue that writing themselves into the text is not enough; researchers should write themselves into action and activism, meaning provoking self-discovery by using researchers' own self reflection.
(6) Honoring many forms of action: FPAR sees that actions are dependent on one's social, economic and political situation and can occur at both individual and collective levels. Yet, they argue that in some FPAR, it is not always clear what actions were taken and by whom, its effect, etc. More critically, they stated:

"Another critical consideration is whether individual and local actions eventually link up to a larger social change agenda. What this should look like and what steps could be taken to accomplish this are seldom clear." (p. 102)

* Cooke, B., & Kothari, U. (2001). The case of participation as tyranny. In B. Cooke & U. Kothari (Eds.), Participation: The new tyranny? (pp. 1-15). London: Zed.

Towards transformational liberation: Participatory and action research and praxis (M. Brington Lykes & Amelia Mallona, 106-120)

The authors discussed the liberatory and transformational potential of participatory "and" action research. They argued for a preferential option for the poor and a politically contextualized psychology to realize its radical potential. In particular, looking at PAR conceived in the majority society in the 70s and 80s, they asserted:

Participatory and action research and the broad-based social movements of the time were 'walking a long road together' and, in the best of circumstances, contributed to self- and social consciousness among social actors who constructed participatory and transformative grassroots movements towards social transformation. Participatory and action research were thus situated as a resource at the interface of radical humanism and structural transformation. (p. 109)

The authors also found the same idea in participatory and action research in the late 1960s and 70s in India and Latin America, in which personal transformation was emphasized (i.e Rahman, 1990). The authors described it as radical humanism. Reflecting on their own work around participatory and action research, they wrote:

[W]e are still 'making the road as we go', ever aware of the contradictions described above and that transformational liberation is a process to be engaged in, not an endpoint or outcome that we have achieved. (p. 117)

[Action doesn't have to me immediate, as social change is less likely to occur immediately. It is a progress. Thus I would call participatory research, instead of action research or participatory action research.]

Critical theory and participatory action research (Stephen Kemmis, 121-138)
Drawing upon critical theory--in particular the work of Habermas, Kemmis theorizes a new definition of critical participatory action research (CPAR) [WHY so many words?]

He attended to the increasing emphasis on the "social" in PAR. In particular, he drew attention to Habermas's analysis of social life in late modernity and stressed "communicative spaces" that transforms subjectivity to intersubjectivity, through which people "thematize and explore issues and crises, not from the perspective of whole system (either people or states or other social totalities as 'systems') but in terms of public discussions aimed at greater understanding and transformations of social life at the moments and places where specific crises occur" (p. 122).

But in fact, Kemmis's definition of critical PAR is not new. Rather, it insinuates a change within his perspective. His emphasis on PAR was closer to Lewin's action research. In this chapter, he came to see macro-dynamics and adjoin critical theory to his own definition of PAR.

Social construction ad research as action (159-171. Kenneth J. Gergen and Mary M. Gergen)
Gergen and Gergen explores the nexus between action research and constructionist theory. (To begin with, they clarify constructionism and constructivism: Social construction refers to a tradition of scholarship that traces the origin of knowledge, meaning or understanding to human relationships, whereas constructivist scholars views processes inherent in the individual mind and their interpretation of the world.)

As the convergence between "action oriented research" and constructionist theory, the authors explore four aspects:
(1) research as political action: As opposed to posivitists who are committed to a view of scientific neutrality and value-free facts, constructionists believe that "all research is essentially a contribution to domains of meaning" regardless of the researcher's intention. Likewise, action researchers also bring forth values in their research and do not advocate universality, treating action research as like storytelling than sermonizing.
(2) collaboration beyond individualism: As another characteristic of action research that cut away from traditional positive research practices, the authors refer to collaborative methods as opposed to individualist orientation of research. (Heron and Reason (2001) emphasizeds action research as a 'practice of co-operative inquiry,' a domain of practice that researches 'with people rather than on people'). This shift from an individualist to a collectivist orientation to research methods is in tune with constructionism. The authors noted, " constructionist theory lends itself to an ontology in which relationship precedes the individual" (p. 166) and it accounts constructionists' approach to knowledge formation.
(3) From mapping to world making: as opposed to positivist program, in which researchers attempt to bring about accurate accounts of the world, constructionists believe that language cannot map the world of human behaviors and social sciences can only bring about the meaning of the world. Likewise, action researchers reject the concept of describing "the world as it is". Rather, their focus is laid on social change and to realize versions of "what the world can become" (p. 167).
(4) From theoretical and practical priority: In the positivist tradition, the ultimate goal of research is the development of general theory and research itself is important as a case to vindicate or challenge theoretical assumptions. On the other hand, constructionists believe that experimental methods are typically remote from everyday life, thus being stripped of cultural significance; abstract theory has not of use. Within this context, the authors state that action research provides a refreshing and productive alternative by attempting to change existing conditions of life, for its ultimate goal is to generate change.

*Heron, J. & Reason, P. (2001). The practice of co-operative inquiry: research "with" rather than "on" people. In P. Reason and H. Bradbury (Eds.), Handbook of action research: participative inquiry and practice (pp. 179-99). London: Sage.

Power and knowledge (172-189, John Gaventa and Andrea Cornwall)
The authors observed that participatory action researchers have focused on their critique on structural relationships between power and monopolies of knowledge. In particular, Fals-Borda and Rahman (1991) asserted that the control of knowledge and its production was as important as material and other social relations. In this light, they saw the role of PAR is to empower themselves by participating in knowledge production through action and reflection.

The authors asserted that despite slightly different understandings of the location of power (i.e. power within, power between, power embedded in social relations, etc.), PAR practitioners share an epistemological critique about ways in which knowledge is embedded and reinforced in the dominant (or positivist) knowledge production system.
(1) positivist methods distort reality by distancing those who study reality from those who experience it;
(2) traditional research methods (surveys, i.e.) further alienate powerless groups by making them the objects of another's inquiry. And, empirical, quantitative form of knowledge may reduce the complexity of human experience;
(3) it perpetuates the legitimacy of knowledge produced by a small number of privileged experts by obscuring other forms of knowledge and the voices of other knowers.

From this perspective, PAR (1) attempts to bring forth a different forms of knowledge, the authors argued, thereby letting those who directed affected by the research participate in the research process ; PAR also recognizes the social constructedness of knowledge, thus delving into collective analysis of life experiences of power and knowledge; Lastly PAR recognizes different ways of knowing and viewing reality: research often starts with popular knowledge, yet it is deepened through a dialectical process of acting and understanding. It also stresses the importance of listening to diverse voices within the group.

The authors draw a diagram of dimensions of participatory research: participation is constituted by knowledge (as a source to affect decision-making), action (involvement in such knowledge production), and consciousness (production of knowledge as consciousness builder). They observe that one or more aspects are emphasized among PAR practitioners.

[It is interesting to note that "action" is far from the concept of Lewin's action research. Action-reflection is an important cycle of the authors' PAR, yet here action is the process of participation in knowledge production itself, not the part of verification of Lewin's concept of action research.]

Ethics and action research: Deepening our commitment to principles of social justice and redefining systems of democratic practice (199-209, Mary Brydon-Miller)

Brydon-Miller analyzes key ethical principles of research within the notion of power in research setting. For her, the shared values of action research, such as "participation in democratic processes, the improvement of human life, and engagement in morally committed action" (p. 209), are the very ethical challenge among action researchers. Yet, there is a discrepancy between the morality and institutional structural for ethics review. In this light, she rejects the tradition of ethical review centered on university-based experts. She wrote:

[S]hifts in power within the research setting away from the oversight and control of university-based experts and paternalistic oversight committees and toward ownership by members of communities themselves would better reflect the ethical principles of respect for person, beneficence, and justice. This is a critical move if the full promise of these principles is to be realized in our practice as action researchers, but at the same time such redistributions of power and control carry unique challenges and genuine risks if we do not remain vigilant to the ethical implications of our practice. (p. 208)

Handbook of emergent methods

Hesse-Biber, Sharlene Nagy & Leavy, Patricia (Eds.). (2008). New York: Guilford.

Introduction. Pushing on the methodological boundaries: The growing need for emergent methods within and across the disciplines. (Hesse-Biber & Leavy, pp. 1-16).

The authors defined paradigms as "models of knowledge building that provide templates for studying social reality" and "consist of the basic concepts and ideas by which a given discipline views the word." (p. 2).

They argued that social change promotes theoretical and technological innovations and at the same time technological innovations provide the impetus for asking new questions and revealing new realities. They noted that among the researchers who use these emergent methods, they face to negotiating their identities of both insiders and outsiders: They are insiders as they know research processes, yet outsiders because they are not familiar with methods and questions they ask. They asked:

"If I conduct mu research as an "outsider," will I be overly identifying with the other's perspective? If I conduct my research as an "insider," will I lose my ability to challenge my disciplinary perspective?" (p. 4)

The authors noted that thus the development of innovative methods has occurred congruently with increased scholarship on reflexivity. In their term, reflexivity is "the practice of actively locating oneself within the research process, including the representation stage. Reflexive practice seeks to minimize the unintentional effects of power in the research process through attention to the ways that biography, authorship, and textual representations mediate the knowledge-building process, to work within an emergent method and to successfully negotiate insider and outsider status require a highly reflexive process" (p. 4)

The authors justify emerging methods as a respond to social change and our progress in understanding the social world. While emphasizing legitimizing and revealing new methods, they do not limit to specific methods or dividing them into QUAL or QUAN. Instead they asked questions about hybridity of methods. In particular, they asked about arts-based methods:" when dealing with the visual arts and other art-driven methods, how can words be transformed into images and vice versa?" (10). They also criticize lack of training program of emerging methods. What appears to be the most challenging in the era of emerging methods is epistemological justification. The authors noted:

"More than anything else, emergent methods are about advancing our understanding of the human condition. These new approaches--often initially criticized and even feared by those who feel more comfortable with conventional ways of knowing and traditional criteria for judging the usefulness of research (traditionally referred to as validity and reliability)--challenge our very conceptions of knowledge, including who creates it, what counts as knowledge, how it is to be disseminated and to whom, and how authenticity and trustworthiness can be achieved and evaluated." (p. 12)

Knowing poverty

:Critical reflections on participatory research and policy. Brock, Karen & McGee, Rosemary (Eds.). (2002). London: Earthscan Publications.

Introduction (Karen Brock, 1-13)
Brock observed that PR as a poverty assessment method has been accepted in dominant institution, yet methodological credibility (validity), representation, and applicability have been in debate. Alongside, PR has been criticized within. Brock focused on the process of "decontextualizing local people's knowledge"(p. 9), which questions which voices are included and excluded as local knowledge. Pointing out Chambers's chapter, Brock also noted the dilemmas and choices a researcher faces in analyzing data. Drawing on methodological, epistemological, and ethical dilemmas, Chambers argued for the necessity of reflexivity: "the process of reflecting critically on the part one plays as a researcher in the formation, framing and construction of knowledge" (p. 9).

Brock's epistemological stance is interesting to note: Knowledge in PR is inseparable from the concept of action. She wrote:

"In participatory research, knowledge is not produced for its own sake, but is seen as being embedded in processes of social change or problem solving, inseparable from the idea of action." (p. 9)

Brock sharply noted that PR is a "process of reflection, learning, and action, producing the development of a critical consciousness" (p. 10). [This model of cycle is different from that of action research--plan, action, observe...--It is more internal and fundamental, happening at the level of consciousness. Thus, I do think that the discourse of action research is distinguished from that of participatory research. Here, action is not immediate, more about influencing policy.]

Brock introduces other topics: how policy-makers learn and change? What is a local perspective on consciousness? What are the policy implications of participatory research?

Power, knowledge and policy influence: Reflections on an experience (Robert Chambers, 133-165)

In his experience, Chambers drew attention to power and knowledge. He stated that power distorts realities and frames the realities of others. In particular, he wrote:

"Researchers had power to determine how open or closed the process was. Knowledge was formed iteratively through interactions of researchers' and participants' priorities, concepts, frames, realities and patterns of analysis and representation. Academic values and practices in part conflicted with the ethics of policy influence. (p. 136)

Because of this very reason, Chambers argued for researchers' reflexivity.

Voice of change

: Participatory research in the United States and Canada. Park, Peter, Brydon-Miller, Mary, Hall, Budd, & Jackson, Ted. (Eds.). (1993). Toronto: OISE.

Forward (Paulo Freire, ix-x)
Freire saw PR as a "politico-pedagogic instrument for moving women and men to such transformative action" (ix). This approach changes the relationship between research subjects, the silenced, and researchers as well as the subjects' relationship with their own world. Freire stated:
[T]he silenced are not just incidental to the curiosity of the researcher but are the masters of inquiry into the underlying causes of the events in their world. In this context research becomes a means of moving them beyond silence into a quest to proclaim the world. (p. x)

Introduction (Hall, xiii - xxii)

He defines the first uses of the term, PR, in the research in Tanzania in the early 1970s, and tracks its tradition in emancipatory approach to research, including Fals-Borda and Anisur Rahman (1991). Here action is not as explicit as in action research, which is often described as a short cycle, yet action is implicit, more specifically, "mobilizing for action" (Gaventa, 1988, p. 19) or "a guide in their own action" (Rahman, 1991, "The theoretical standpoint of PAR", p. 15).

Hall stated as participatory research "a process which combines three activities: research, education, and action" (p. xiv). He acknowledged feminist influence, in particular Maguire, on the advance of PR, in that she revealed the distinct silence of gender and women in the PR discourse.
Defining characteristics of PR
1) as QUEST OF VOICE (ontological assumption)
Hall stated, "Participatory research fundamentally is about the right to speak" (p. xvii) and "Participatory research argues for the articulation of points of view by the dominated or subordinated, whether form gender, race, ethnicity, or other structures of subordination" (p. xvii).
2) as COUNTER HEGEMONIC PRACTICE (epistemological assumption)
This view presents PR's epistemological perspective. Hall sees the knowledge produced in PR as part of the counter-hegemonic process.

For Hall, thus, PR is an instrument to having the voices from the margins be heard assertively whereas the creation of knowledge becomes a site of resistance.

What is participatory research? A theoretical and methodological perspective (Peter Park, 1-19)

Park defined PR as "a means of putting research capabilities in the hands of the deprived and disenfranchised people so that they can transform their lives for themselves" (p. 1).

Goals: PR aims at bringing about a more just society by helping the oppressed--or poor--change their social structure.

In this milieu, PR plays a role of providing a framework in which people understand the oppressive social forces and produce knowledge in collective action through a partnership with the researcher. Thus, Park stated that PR is profoundly educational in that people searching and researching, which corresponds to experiential learning (Dewey 1963) and transformative pedagogy (Freire 1970). In particular, Park pointed out, the path from knowledge generation to knowledge utilization is direct because the same actors are involved in both activities: There is no middle-person.

Kinds of knowledge: Park names three kinds of knowledge: instrumental, interactive, and critical knowledge. Instrumental knowledge originates from natural sciences in the attempt to control external events. It influenced traditional social sciences, yet it doesn't recognize human factors in social science. Interactive knowledge, on the other hand, makes human community possible by sharing a world together. The third comes through reflection and action, focusing on justice and public good. Park argued that such knowledge should be formed through a public forum with the full participation of the citizenry, of which the perspective resonates in Habermas's (1972) critical theory. With respect to critical knowledge, Park stated that people learn not only the root causes of the problems but also come to "realize that things do not have to remain the way they are and that they can engage in actions to transform the reality" (pp. 8-9) [This reflects what Katrina said in her reflection essay] Park associated this critical knowledge with Freire's conscientization, which refers to the cycle of reflection-action-reflection. [Here action is not something readily applicable and measurable as indicated in most action research literature. It is more internal process in each individual or within a group.]

The Research Process

Park emphasizes the roles of the researcher:

"The researcher participates in the struggle of the people. This is the other side of participation in this kind of work. He or she becomes a member of the research team with a specific role to play. The researcher works with the community to help turn its felt but unarticulated problem into an identifiable topic of collective investigation." (p.9)

Related to this perspective, Park refers to the researcher as the focal point of research:

"They [participants] usually require an organizing force that will act as the focal point around which they can rally and deal with their problem. This is the role that the researcher plays in participatory research" (p. 9)

Thus, "The researcher essentially acts as a discussion organizer and facilitator and as a technical resource person" (p. 10) [But this shouldn't be narrowly understood.]

Park suggests in the evaluation of PR that "Its success will depend on how acutely the problem is felt by the community and how motivated its members are to do something about it"(p. 10) [Here, Park rejects the criteria of validity or trustworthiness and defines different types of criteria for PR.]

Park argued that the researcher should present to the group methodological options. Park agreed that PR is not bound to any particular methodologies and theoretically draws upon all possible research methods. Yet, he warned that certain methods, which separate researched from researcher, such as psychological experimentation researcher, should be eschewed. In addition, any methods should be designed to allow greater interaction between the questioner and the questioned in order to enhance dialogue. Park argued that dialogue is the most critical methodological feature of participatory research.

Unlike traditional (more QUAN) research, in which all responses are converted to measures of variables, Park argued that the validity of PR depends on "the subjects fully emphasizing with the purpose of the study, thoroughly understanding the intent of the questions, and wanting to give the needed information the best way they know how" (p. 13)

Additionally, Park suggested as a long term criterion of PR:

"Because participatory research is a continuous educational process, it does not end with the completion of one project. When successful, it lives on in the radicalized critical consciousness and the renewed emancipatory practices of each participant" (p. 15)

The Question of Validity
Park is more explicit about the criticism on PR's objectivity and validity: knowledge is not objective is not valid. Park argued that this presumption comes from the epistemological prejudice of positivism, which stems from natural science and the emphasis on instrumental knowledge. He argued that the validity of interactive and critical knowledge should be claimed differently: Does the research produce communal understanding through a broad sense of empathy and connectedness? Does this research produce knowledge that leads to transformation and emancipation both internally and with respect to the external world?

Finally Park argued that even that process of establishing the validity of PR should also be participatory, taking the form of participatory evaluation.

Recovering Popular Knowledge
The PR enterprise is to recover popular knowledge to recreate the participants' authentic life. From this viewpoint, Park argued that PR is more effective in the less developed areas of the world, in which indigenous community/knowledge/communal life still remains.


//
Gaventa, John. (1991). Participatory research in North America. Convergence. 24 (2-3), 19-28.
Fals-Borda & Rahman. (Eds.). (1991). Action and knowledge: Breaking monopoly with participatory action research. New York: Apex.

Moments, Mixed Methods, and Paradigm Dialogs

Denzin, Norman K. (2010). Qualitative Inquiry. 16 (6), 419-427. doi: 10.1177/1077800410364608

Denzin examined mixed methods community, who calls for triangulation in qualitative inquiry. The paradigm wards of the 1970s and 80s, he noted, were played out against a post-Vietnam wars and civil right movements, resulting in flourishing qualitative program evaluation. Now, he sees the current paradigm war plays out against federal interventions, regulating sets of auditing criteria. He calls this current moment the “politics of evidence” (p. 425) Against this positivistic backlash, Denzin called for moral research:

Inquiry has always been and will always be a moral, political, value-laden enterprise. We seek only a politics of hopes, models of social justice to lead us forward.

As members of a larger moral community, we all need to draw together so we can share our problems and experiences with these new discourses. We need a moral and methodological community that honors and celebrates paradigm and methodological diversity. As fellow travelers we need research agendas that advance human rights and social justice through multiple forms of qualitative research. (425-426)

The action research dissertation

: A guide for students and faculty. Herr, Kathryn & Anderson, Gary L. (2005). Thousand Oaks, London and Delhi: Sage.

1. Introduction (1-7)

The authors note that action research, despite its similarities with QUAL (even with QUAN), is different in that "research participants themselves are either in control of the research or are participants in the design and methodology of the research" (p. 1) and action is central to research. They stated as the most important feature the shifting locus of control from professional researchers to research subjects. They noted several terms indicating research in collaboration with practitioners or community members: PAR, community-based PAR, participatory rural appraisal, feminist action research, emancipatory praxis... The authors choose action research as an umbrella term of these.

The authors defined action research as (1) inquiry done "by or with insiders to an organization or community" (p. 3) (2) action-oriented, (3) a reflective process, meaning "deliberately and systematically undertaken and generally requires that some form of evidence be presented to support assertions."(p. 3). Interestingly, the authors argued that "what constitutes evidence or, in more traditional terms, data is still being debated" (p. 3). (4) It is value laden. The authors rightly pointed out that although action research hopes for solving pressing problems or improving situations, what constitutes improvement or a solution is not self-evident. That reflects conflicting values and an unequal distribution of power and resources. Here they stress the importance of reflexivity: "[T]he notion of reflexivity is crucial because action researchers must interrogate received notions of improvement or solutions in terms of who ultimately benefits from the actions undertaken"(p. 4)

The authors observe a researcher's double burden: action (improvement of practice or social change) and research (valid knowledge production), which sets up a conflict between the rigor and the relevance of the research. Similarly, action research demands a form of intervention which is not honored by traditional researchers. The authors pointed out such interventions constitutes a spiral of action cycles--plan-act-observe-reflect (kemmis 1982, p.7)

The authors also observe that "there is more writing about action research than documentation of actual research studies" (p. 6) They suggest that "a dissertation may represent the documentation of a successful collaboration and be used as a case study of not only the process but also the product of the collaboration" (p. 6).
2. Action research traditions and knowledge interests (8-28)

The authors noted two bands of action research: business-oriented administration and emancipatory practice linked to anticapitalist, grassroots movement. They asserted that "action research is working with an oppressed community ti identify what Freire(1970) called generative themes, or issues that the community agreed had highest priority" (p. 9) Participatoy action research (PAR) emphasizes the aspect of this internal/participatory process from insiders. The authors noted, "Participatory action research (PAR) tempers this expert knowledge with the expertise of locals about their own problems and solutions" (p. 10).

The authors defined participatory research by and large in the legacy of Freire (1970 Pedagogy of the Oppressed). He viewed research as a form of social action in which generative themes are identified and used as a basis of literacy instruction through collaboration. Focusing on Freirean-inspired participatory research, Brown and Tandon(1983) argued that traditional action research concentrated on an individual or group level of analysis, whereas emancipatory participatory research tends to focus on a broader societal analysis. Such PR often creates a resistance to the research.

On the other hand, coining the term co-operative inquiry, Heron (1996) undertook experiential approaches to action research, emphasizing intersubjectivity among researchers and participants: "[T]here is the possibility of reciprocal participative knowing" (p. 11)

The authors remarked that both the trends (liberation or humanistic psychology) are concerned with using PR for humanization.

The authors pointed out the danger of co-optation in doing action research. They argued that the nature of social institutions is keeping its status quo, thus, if action research lacks a critical spirit, it runs the risk of legimitizing the current status quo.

They noted emerging critical approaches to action research from feminist and critical race theorists to a lesser extent.

Epistemologically, the authors trace back to Jurgen Habermas (1971, Knowledge and Human Interests), who argued knowledge production is never neutral and always pursued with some interest. He argued three types of interest: technical interest (controlling over the natural and social realm), practical interest (gaining understanding through interpretation), and emancipatory interest (the release of human potential and the investigation of ideology and power relation). Depending on types of interest, the authors argue that research aims vary. They see action research in tune with emancipatory knowledge interest, which aims at critical reflection on power constraint imposed on our understanding. However, they stated:

"[W]hile certain methodologies tend to be associated with certain knowledge interest, we don't see a conflict in using statistical methods toward emancipatory ends, as long as it forms part of a cycle of ongoing critical reflection" (p. 28).

[Here, again, the authors place action (participatory) research as a paradigm distinguished from qualitative or qualitative methodology, while slightly emphasizing their position in the emancipatory stream. HOWEVER, when participants utilize or emulate certain methods, which are considered dehumanizing, would it be considered emancipatory? The positionality of participants as insiders would make a difference, while outside researchers conduct surveys, for instance...But I am not quite sure right now.]

3. The continuum of positionality in action research (29-48)

The authors explore different implications of positionality between insiders and outsiders. Here PAR is defined as either reciprocal collaboration or outsider(s) collaborating with insider(s). They assert that although reciprocal collaboration is ideal, many different positinalities are possible and valuable as long as researchers are aware of them and honest about them. The issue of positionalities is also important to the authors because it affects the criteria for quality or trustworthiness of the study they conduct.

4. Quality criteria for action research (49-68)
The authors reject validity (QUAN) and trustworthiness (QUAL/naturalistic researchers) as criteria for action research because the terms do not acknowledge action-oriented outcomes. Instead, they propose five validity criteria which are associated with the goals of action research.

Goal1: the generation of new knowledge-->dialogic and process validity
Goal2: the achievement of action-oriented outcomes-->outcome validity
Goal3: the education of both researcher and participants-->catalytic validity
Goal4: Results that are relevant tot eh local setting-->Democratic validity
Goal5: A sound and appropriate research methodology-->process validity

Process validity: the manner in which research is conducted, including triangulation
Outcome validity: whether action occurs [What is action? In many emancipatory participatory research, action may be intrinsic and they may lack agency to implement the research results but their research has implications of policy change. Thus, actions that may be qualified in more conventional action research may not be appropriate here.]
Catalytic validity: does research lead its participants and researchers to know the reality and transform it? This validity has to do with transformative potential.
Democratic validity: is the research done in collaboration with all parties? In particular, it draws on locality (Cunningham, 1983): does problems emerge from a local context and the solutions are appropriate to that context?
Dialogic validity: peer review.

[I WONDER whether it is appropriate to apply these criteria to both business-oriented and emancipatory action research.]

Reason and Bradbury (2001, Handbook of action research) defined action research as "an emerging, evolutionary and educational process of engaging with self, persons and communities that needs to be sustained for a significant period of time" (p. 12, as cited p. 58).

In short, the authors depart from current QUAN and QUAL validity criteria for action research.

About GENERALIZATION.
The authors take on Robert Stake's (1986) position on naturalistic generalization to illustrate their own. He explained naturalistic generalizations as a way of leading audiences to vicarious experience and helping them think of their own problems in a new way:

A person would be described as an individual, with uniqueness not just in deviance scores, but as a key to understanding the interactions. A reader senses the experience of teamwork in this particular situation. It is a unique situation in some respects, but ordinary in other respects. Readers recognize similarities with situations of their own. Perhaps they are stimulated to think of old problems in a new way (p.99)

In writing dissertation, the authors emphasize that students clarify the evolution, documenting the decisions made. They acknowledge that in naturalistic inquiry, methodologies evolve, yet it should be documented. Secondly, they stress that the students think through their multiple roles in this research as researcher, as outsider, as facilitator, etc.


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Brown & Tandon
doi: 10.1177/002188638301900306 Journal of Applied Behavioral Science September 1983 vol. 19 no. 3 277-294

Heron, J. (1996). Co-operative inquiry: Research into the human condition. London: Sage.

Cunningham, J. B. (1983). Gathering data in a changing organization. Human relations, 36 (5), 403-420

Stake, R. (1986). An evolutionary view of educational improvement. In E.R. House (Ed.), New directions in educational evaluation (pp. 89-102). London: Falmer.

A Critique of Experimentalism

Howe, Kenneth R. (2004). Qualitative Inquiry, 10 (1), 42-61. doi: 10.1177/1077800403259491

Howe criticized neoclassical experimentalism—appropriating medical research as a model for all science research--saying “it gets the shoe on the wrong foot” (p. 49); On the other hand, mixed-methods experimentalism—predominantly in education field--is an advance over neoclassical experimentalism. Yet, it also places quantitative methods and centering technocratic perspective, what works for the research, and randomized experiments, thus Howe wrote this, too, is retrograde. He argued that it focuses on the question “whether interventions are effective in achieving given outcomes” (p.54).

Howe argued that there is no preset of criteria to determine what constitutes “scientific” research. Instead, researchers should decide what is counted as science or scientific, he said, adding such decisions are value laden.

Pointing out the pervasive influence of interpretivism on social science, Howe drew attention on Cronbach’ (1975) generalizations decay and Giddens’s (1976) double hermeneutic. What Cronbach meant by generalization decay is generalizations are fallible and subject to change over time. Double hermeneutic means that there are two types of interpretations in social science—one by researchers and the other by their audience. Howe pointed out, “For ‘critical’ researchers, making generalizations decay—generalizations documenting oppressive relationships, in particular—is an explicit goal of social research” (51-52).

Criticizing the mainstream mixed methods experimentalism, Howe looked into mixed methods interpretivism. He stressed that the outcome of this type of research are open to end and determined by stakeholders, thus, for him, inclusion and dialogue are central to this research approach. He put qualitative methods at the front versus QUAN. More importantly, the role of participants divides this approach from mixed methods experimentalism.

In conclusion, Howe noted that the contrast between the technocratic experimentalism and democratic interpretivism gets at the political dimensions of educational research. [Here Howe’s democratic interpretivism can be framed as “participatory” research, although he does not mention.]

Qualitative Inquiry Under Fire

: Toward a new paradigm dialogue. Denzin, N. K. (2009). Walnut Creek, CA: Left coast press.

1. Introduction (13-24)
Denzin defined the current regime of qualitative research as conservative evidence based or scientifically based research (SBR). He finds this trend in a nostalgia toward positivism and sees it as a continuation of the paradigm wars of the 1980s, being implemented as part of a conservative political backlash. "American postpositivists in the 1990s and the in the first decade of the new century were aligned with SBR movements that were gaining force under conservative political regimes..."(p. 21)
Denzin stated that "Mixed methods are direct descendants of classical experimentalism and the triangulation movement of the 1970s" (p. 17, Denzin 1989 "The research act: a theoretical introduction to sociological methods") The advent of the mixed-methods movement called for the paradigm wars of the 1980s, asking whether methods and perspectives could be combined and compatible. Morse(2003) warns that ad-hoc mixing of methods would threat validity; others deconstruct validity; Hesse-Biber and Leavy (2008) emphasized emerging methods that blur the boundaries between QUAL and QUAN methods and seeks to reveal subjugated knowledge underpinning everyday life. Amid the blurring boundariesDenzin noted an emerging confluence that focuses on the value of multivocal texts, as Guba and Lincoln (2005) suggested, which emphasizes a shared commitment to social justice and human rights. Within this context, Denzin write: "It is time to take stack, time, time to be reflexively self-critical" (p. 21)

2. Interpretive research after 9/11/01 (25-38)
Denzin argued that the conservative backlash after 9/11 attempted to regulate interpretive inquiry by enforcing bio-medical and evidence-based methods. Thus, he called for a radical change in critical interpretive inquiry.

4. The Elephant in the living room or extending the conversation about the politics of evidence (57-82)
Denzin describes the evidence-based model of research in qualitative inquiry as an elephant sitting in a living room. The evidence-based research movement and emerging standards and guidelines for conducting qualitative inquiry is at the brink of an global tendency.
Denzin pointed out three basic positions on the issue of evaluative criteria: foundational, quasifoundational, and nonfoundational. Foundational argues for a shared set of criteria, QUAL or QUAN, such as validity, credibility, transferability, confirmability, warrantibility, tranparency); Quasifoundational concerns about criteria for qualitative research, such as reflexivity, theoretical grounding, iconic; nonfoundationalists "stress the importance of understanding versus prediction. They conceptualize inquiry within a moral frame, implementing an ethic rooted in the concepts of care, love, and kindness" (p. 61).

For Denzin, "Inquiry is always political and moral" (p. 82). Likewise, "Objectivity and evidence are political and ethical terms" (p. 82). He stresses that ways of knowing are always partial, moral, and political.

5. The art of interpretation: The stories we tell one another (85-114)

The theory & practice of learning

By Peter Jarvis, John Holford, Colin Griffin

e-book : www.myilibrary.com?id=7668
[get e-reader: 2 week loan period]

Constructing grounded theory : a practical guide through qualitative analysis

Charmaz, Kathy. (2006). Sage.

S/S library. H61.24 C45 2006

Learning as Transformation: Critical Perspectives on a Theory in Progress

Mezirow, J. (2000). Learning as Transformation: Critical Perspectives on a Theory in Progress. San Francisco: Jossey-Basse.

How Critical Reflection Triggers Transformative Learning

Mezirow, Jack. (1990). In J. Mezirow & associates (Eds.), Fostering critical reflection in adulthood: A guide to transformative and emancipatory learning (pp. 1-20). San Francisco & Oxford: Jossey-Basse.

Mezirow argued that central to adult education is reflecting upon prior learning to determine its validity against present circumstances. He called this critical assessment of assumptions critical reflection, which bases reflective action. He stated, "the most significant learning experiences in adulthood involve critical self-reflection--reassessing the way we have posed problems and reassessing our own orientation to perceiving, knowing, believing, feeling, and acting" (p. 13).

In this light, he classified two distinctive learning paths: instrumental learning and communicative learning. Instrumental learning occurs while involved in task-oriented problem solving. In the process, Mezirow asserted, "reflection is significantly involved when we look back on content or procedural [sic] assumptions guiding the problem-solving process to reassess the efficacy of the strategies and tactics used." (p. 7) It also involves "the process of learning to control and manipulate the environment or other people," thus the results can be empirically demonstrated. (p. 8). On the other hand, communicative learning involves understanding the meaning of others' values, feelings, decisions, and such abstract concepts of justice, love, democracy and commitment. Mezirow emphasized that this learning has even greater significance in adult learning. It focuses on achieving coherence rather than exercising more effective control. It is like a "building block of understanding" (p. 9) by integrating further insights, which involves "hermeneutic circle," which move back and forth between parts and a whole of what we seek to understand. Thus, reflection in this learning ensures identifying similarities and unfamiliarities in order to give them coherence.

Precisely, Mezirow defined as critical reflection "challenging the validity of presuppositions in prior learning" (p. 12). He argued that although critical reflection may be an integral part of making decision, it cannot be an integral element in the immediate action process. He contended that this transition requires transforming their own perspectives. He argued that perspective transformation occurs in response to "disorienting dilemma"(p. 13): a divorce, death of a loved one, job change, an eye-opening discussion, book, culture shock, etc. He put it:

"Anomalies and dilemmas of which old ways of knowing cannot make sense become catalysts or "trigger events" that precipitate critical reflection and transformation." (p. 14)

Mezirow pointed out psychic distortions as something that hinders adults from learning: unwarranted anxiety that impedes taking actions, which resulted from traumatic events in childhood (Roger Gould, 1978, transformation: Growth and change in adult life). Mezirow wrote, "Adulthood is a time of regaining such lost functions. The learner must be helped to identify both the particular action that he or she feels blocked about taking and the source and nature of stress in making a decision to act" (p. 17). In this light, educators "can provide skillful emotional support and collaborate as co-learners in an educational context" (p. 17).

Mezirow defined as transformative learning the process of learning through critical reflection via either instrumental or communicative learning, and acting on the learned insights derived from transformation of their perspectives. Emancipatory education is "an organized effort to help the learner challenge presuppositions, explore alternative perspectives, transform old ways of understanding, and act on new perspective" (p. 18).

Looking at educational approaches, Mezirow asserted that they are adaptable as research methods for study the nature, significance, and changes in perspectives. He wrote:

"In transformative learning, the line between learning, education, and research often becomes mercifully blurred. The educator becomes a co-learner, helping the learner explore alternative ways of interpreting his or her experience." (p. xix-x, Preface)

The search for a separate theory of adult learning

: Does anyone really need andragogy? Hanson, Ann. (1996). Boundaries of adult learning (pp. 99-108)

Hanson pointed out the self-conflict of Knowles's andragogy: while it demonstrates "a strong humanistic and individualistic commitment," it simultaneously may dehumanize children (p. 100). For Hanson, the distinction between pedagogy and andragogy is artificial, for the rationale for andragogy is also relevant to pedagogy. More, andragogy is problematic, she argued: it effectively moved the issues of knowledge, power and control. Centered on autonomous, self-directed learners, andragogy obscure the system of their learning as a social, cultural and political construct. Hanson wrote: "Theories of adult learning which do not take account of culture and power do adults little service, even if they aim to produce self-directed learners." (p. 101) [WHY? she doesn't explain]

More critically, Hanson argued that the goal of self-direction, a western value presented as universal, left unexamined. Even critical self-reflection is not always beneficial, for they are characteristics of seriously depressed people, she argued.

In contrast, Hanson called for reflective learning, in which learners "reflect critically on a situation or piece of knowledge, to understand its meaning, to be able to incorporate the new concept into their own understandings sufficiently to transform perspectives." (p. 106) To do so, Hanson emphasize contextualizing learning within questions of culture and power.

[Why do learners need to transform their perspectives? Does this author say anything about it?]

Andragogy

: An emerging technology for adult learning. Knowles, Malcolm. (1996). In Richard Edwards, Ann Hanson, & Peter Raggatt (Eds.), Boundaries of adult learning (pp. 82-98). This edited chapter originally appeared in M. Tight (Ed.), Adult learning and education, London: Croom Helm, 1983. Original first published in 1970.

Knowles proposed the term andragogy to better formulate technology for adult education as opposed to pedagogy. He argued pedagogy means, specifically, the art and science of teaching children; andragogy means adult learning. At the heart of angragogy, he contented, lies the principle of ego-involvement. He put it:

"The important implication for adult education practice of the fact that learning is an internal process is that those methods and techniques which involve the individual most deeply in self-directed inquiry will produce the greatest learning. This principle of ego-involvement lies at the heart of the adult educator's art. In fact, the main thrust of modern adult educational technology is in the direction of inventing techniques for involving adults in ever deeper processes of self-diagnosis of their own needs for continued learning, in formulating their own objectives for learning, in sharing responsibility for designing and carrying out their learning activities, and in evaluating their progress toward their objectives." (p. 96)

Centered on the view on individuals as autonomous and self-directed entities (Ann Hanson, 1996), Knowles proposed four assumptions.

1. Self-concept=self-directivity
Adults see themselves as a self-directing producer or doer. Thus, adult should be treated with respect, be involved in mutual inquiry with the teacher, and are given responsibility of their learning. To do so, Knowles proposed students' participation in planning their learning. He stated:

"Every individual tends to feel committed to a decision (or an activity) to the extent that he has participated in making it (or planning it). Teachers of adults who do all the planning for their students, who come into the classroom and impose preplanned activities on them, typically experience apathy, resentment, and probably withdrawal. For this imposition of the will of the teacher is incongruent with the adults' self-concept of self-directivity. [To an extent, it is true to education for children.]
Accordingly, a basic element in the technology of andragogy is the involvement of the learners in the process of planning their own learning, with the teacher serving as a procedural guide and content resource." (p. 87)

Thus, Knowles wrote, "The teacher's role is redefined as that of a procedural technician, resource person, and co-inquirer; he is more a catalyst than an instructor, more a guide than a wizard." (p. 88) [It is not irrelevant in participatory environment. Yet, the teacher's role should not be diminished to a catalyst. As Gramsci mentioned, teachers as organic intellectuals should be directive. In a sense, they cannot be indirective, as they bring their own socioeconomic and cultural background.]

2. Experience
Emphasizing adults' experience, Knowles stated, "An adult is [sic] what he has done [sic]" (p. 89). According to Knowles, adults are distinct from children in that they have more and different kinds of experience; adult education, therefore, should respect their experience and built upon it. In this regard, he wrote: "Adults have acquired a larger number of fixed habits and patterns of thought, and therefore tend to be less open-minded" (p. 90). [I do not agree on this]

Therefore, Knowles emphasized participatory experiential techniques, writing: "Indeed, 'participation' and 'ego-involvement' are boldfaced words in the lexicon of the adult education, with the assumption often being made that the more active the learner's role in the process, the more he is probably learning." (p. 90)

3. Adults' readiness to learn is parallel to their social roles.

4. Adults' orientation toward learning is more on problem-centeredness.

Knowles defined as the central dynamic of learning the learner's experience of interacting between him or her as an individual and the environment. Thus, the critical function of the teacher is "to create a rich environment from which students can extract learning and then to guide their interaction with it so as to maximize their learning from it" (p. 96)

[Does Knowles indicate any concrete adults or general adults? Do all the adults involve in their learning in the same way? Here, there is only abstract adults, which is critical oversight.]