Handbook of Qualitative Research

 

 

 

Introduction

“Qualitative research involves the studied use and collection of a variety of empirical materials–case study; personal experience; introspection; life story; inerview; atifacts; cultural texts and productions; observational, historical, interactional, and visual texts–that describe routine and problematic moments and meanings in individual’s lives.” (p. 3)

“Every researcher speaks from within a distinct interpretive community that configures, in its special way, the multicultural, gendered components of the research act.” (p.18)

“These beliefs shape how the qualitative researcher sees the world and acts in it. The researcher is ‘bound within a net of epistemological and ontological premises which – regardless of ultimate truth os falsity – become partilly self-validating” (Bateson, 1972, p. 314 in p. 19)

“The interpetive practice of making sense of one’s findings is both artistic and political.” (p. 23)