Our virtual class: Thinking about science, ethnography, post positivism and education research

Our Virtual Class is officially scheduled for the week of Tuesday March 27 - Tuesday April 3, with  March 20- 27 designated as our class Reading Week.

However, I would encourage you to find times anywhere in the period from March 14 - April 1 to participate asynchronously in our Virtual Class discussion on this blog. That will give you more time to do the reading and viewing for this class, and to take time to reflect on the ideas and the ongoing discussion, without rushing things.

You are expected to:

• Respond in the 'comments' section at the end of this post.
• Add at least four substantive responses over the course of the March 14 - April 1 period. (Please space your responses apart by at least a day or two, and read everything up to that point so that you understand where the discussion has been so far). 
• By 'substantive', I mean 'full of ideas and meaning' -- they don't need to be very long, and each response should ideally be 1-2 medium length paragraphs long.
• Keep your responses closely connected to the video and article. While we may mention things from outside these two 'texts', each response should tie back to something in them -- a quote, an idea, etc.

I've chosen two things that everyone should read and view for our Virtual Class, with the hope that these will be helpful to you as you consider your own Masters research ideas for your graduating project, thesis or capstone project:

1) Please view this 16 minute TEDx video from 2016: Tricia Wang on The human insights missing from big data. This interesting and controversial video from the world of business research considers the relationship between data mining and ethnographic approaches (and other quantitative and qualitative approaches) in doing research that leads to making good decisions for the future. Although it comes from the world of business, we may be able to extend the ideas to educational settings as well.

(Optional: If you would also like to view another short video (6 min.) outlining ideas about research methodology in a straightforward way, you might take a look at Dr. Mark Peace's 'On Methodology' as well).

2) Please read this chapter from Phillips & Burbules (2000), Postpositivism and educational research.

I will not propose writing prompts for our virtual class, but will just ask you to pay attention to "stops" that you encountered in the video and the article, and then to respond to your classmates' responses as well.

The virtual class gives us the luxury of a longer, more slow-motion online discussion of some big ideas, with time to consider what we want to add and what others have said. I hope you enjoy it very much!

Ethnography: Jennette, YuXi, Kieran

·       Ethnography

• "Ethnography is the recording and analysis of a culture or society, usually based on participant-observation and resulting in a written account of a people, place or institution"
• A systematic study of people designed to explore cultural phenomena where the researcher observes society from the POV of the subject of the study
• Branch of anthropology and qualitative sociology
• Today, they are just as likely to focus on a particular aspect of contemporary social life (e.g. A study of Canuck fans)
• “Gerhard Friedrich Müller developed the concept of ethnography as a separate discipline whilst participating in the Second Kamchatka Expedition (1733–43)”
• Use of fieldnotes in researchers’ observation
• “you put yourself in a strange position; you must let go of your own presumptions and assumptions about a group of people in order to effectively learn anything about them”
• Objectivity and neutrality essential

Phenomenology

Phenomenology:

Started in the first half of the 20th century in Germany. The following are influential in the creation and proliferation of phenomenology: Edmund Husserl, Martin Heidegger, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Jean-Paul Sartre

Focuses on the nature of how a person experiences a situation. Ex: "lived experiences"


Explore the judgements, perceptions and emotions of people, and their experiences of situations in addition to reactions.


Methods provide descriptions and classifications.




(Jingyu and Sarah)

Phenomenology-Hui and Crystal

Pursuant to Wikipedia, ‘Phenomenology’ is defined as as “the philosophical study of the structures of experience and consciousness’. This concept was originally founded by Edmund Husserl. Husserl argued that phenomenology is a methodology to study the pure ‘phenomena’ and examine how things are appearing to their own consciousness. Phenomenology is driven by the action word of “describe”, to describe the phenomenon as accurately as possible to pursue pursue objectivity while trying to stay away from any pre-justices, any existing framework, but only to the facts. This type of methodology applies very well with study of lived experiences. There are some variations of phenomenology which may include transcendental constitutive phenomenology, naturalistic constitutive phenomenology, and etc. Groenewald (2004)’s paper on “A Phenomenological Research Design illustrated” is a phenomenological research.

Citation:
Groenewald, T. (2004). A  phenomenological  research design illustrated.   International  Journal of  Qualitative  Methods, 3(1). Article  4. Retrieved [INSERT  DATE]  from http://www.ualberta.ca/~iiqm/backissues/3_1/pdf/groenewald.pdf

Ethnography - Lilian & Naureen

The Definition of ethnography by Merriam Webster is:

the study and systematic recording of human cultures;  
also: a descriptive work produced from such research

............................................................................................................................................

We don’t think the definition serves the term justice, and so we’re providing some examples based on our own experience.

I took a course on video ethnography and it was very relevant because we learned how to consider aspects of visual data that commonly go by unseen; from facial gestures to landscape and cultural elements. The course focused on video data collection and analysis. (Lilian)

A few years ago, I read this book called “Gang Leader for a Day” where a sociologist student in Chicago decided to conduct non-traditional ethnography research in order to understand gang culture. Basically, Chicago having huge inequities between rich and poor, he wanted to understand how the poor were living. He started by just going door to door in the projects asking people if he could observe their livelihood, which unexpectedly turned into building a relationship with a person who was a member of one of the prominent gangs in the area (oh and his mom too!). What he ended up learning through this ethnographic experience was how these communities actually served as their own economy, bartering with people in the neighborhood. And especially fascinating is how the gangs served as law enforcement, protecting the neighborhoods they live in (since the police dared to show up). (Naureen)

Great read – here’s a link with more details! http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/16/books/16grimes.html

Phenomenology - Katy and Haynam

Phenomenology is the study of "phenomena" - it is a s study of conscious experience of a specific phenomena or object.  The focus of the study is the subjective observer and their individual conscious experience and the meaning of this experience.

Phenomenology is a branch of philosophy.  Championed by philosophers such as Husserl, Heidegger, Merlau-Ponty and Satre in the 20th century these men believe phenomenology is the foundation of all philosophy (rather than just another branch of philosophy).

The other branches of philosophy are:
Epistemology (knowledge)
Ontology (being or what is)
Logic (reasoning)
Ethics (right and wrong)

Phenomenology allows us to appreciate first-hand experiences of students and recognise they are all different. Phenomenology is also important when considering the positionally of the researcher.  Each researcher will have a different conscious experience of a given phenomena or object and therefore their phenomenological approach affects the research they undertake.

Notes related to Toni Lazarova's guest talk

Here is a link to Toni's garden-based learning workbook for teachers.  You are free to use and share it! It has lots of great ideas for activities for home economics, science, math, language and arts activities.

You can contact Toni at antonia_lazarova_@hotmail.com

Whiteboards related to her presentation:

I forgot to include this in our course outline!

Our wonderful guest speakers for next week!

Joanne Price

I, Joanne Price, am an educator in “abeyance”: privileged to have had the opportunity to study and journey with many of the root-prints of this elusive word.

 Since beginning my PhD seven and a half years ago I have engaged with contemplative practices … acts of remembrance and creation through the world of walking and the world of dreaming. This journey led me to an amazing place in the territory of my own culture in mid Wales. An area of woodland known as bwlch or gap, situated between farmland and mountains, a kind of connecting place of the end points of human experience. 

I was taken, alone, on a move to one of the really dark backgrounds of our age. It was traumatic to learn about the losses that happen to forgotten peoples in our own homelands. Even on encountering many of my ancestors, especially creatives and lesbians who were not seduced into thinking they had to conform or escape, I felt tremendous loss. A loss of life, land, and language from realising that although we were raised to respect nature, we still weren’t aware of the power of relationships among people and places, spirits, trees, waters, wildlife, and wild plants. It was really tough because I encountered thinking that exacerbated climate change and directed violence toward others including the non-human and more-than-human worlds. 

And yet this journey is also teaching patience, to remain hopeful when the response is slower than it should be. To let go of the temptation to present lies and withdrawals, and stay still enough to encounter an enduring silence capable of ushering us closer to the wonder, wisdom, and infinite possibilities of the past. Moving us into an era of true stewardship because the wonderful thing is, the response is growing and all together it is going to be healing for Wales and Canada and the relationships with our only home. 

As a passionate advocate of life’s diversity, I am for the land and ancestors past, present, and future. I am for the protection of sacred places and their capacity to nourish the well-being of all those who feel different. We must learn to walk our own paths, have the courage to sing our own songs, and find the words to gift this world its fullest and richest meaning.

*****************************************************

Philip Kimani Karangu was born and raised in Kenya. Philip, a current first year PhD student at UBC completed his Master of Arts in Curriculum Studies at UBC in 2017. His research focused (and will continue) on improving education in refugee camps around the globe such as Dadaab in Kenya (world’s largest refugee camp). He completed his teaching certificate at Machakos Teachers Training College and his Bachelor of Education from Kenyatta University in 2013 (Kenya) with a focus in History and Kiswahili. Philip has taught in primary schools in Kenya and his last position was head teacher and Kiswahili teacher at a charity-run primary school.

Introduction to sensory ethnography

First of all, what is meant by terms like ethnography and phenomenology? Where do these practices

and ideas come from?

And then, how is visual or sensory ethnography different from more 'classical' ethnography?



How might ethnography, senory/ visual ethnography and phenomenology play into educational research? What stories can these approaches tell that other approaches might leave out?

Homework readings for our March 13 class

Homework readings for Tuesday March 12

This week we'll read 3 articles that focus on visual research approaches that include photo, video, or drawings.

1) O'Donoghue, Donal (2007) "James always hangs out here": making space for place in studying masculinities at school. Visual Studies, 22(1), 62-73.




2) Pink, Sarah (2007) Walking with video. Visual Studies, 22(3), 240-252.

3) Merriman, Brian & Guerin, Suzanne (2006). Children's drawings in child-centered research. Irish Journal of Psychology, 27(1-2), 48-57.

When reading your article, consider the following:

•what does the particular visual research method offers and what it doesn't offer.
•how does this method compare to interviewing both in terms of collection strategies and analysis methods