1. Introduction to Social Science Research Methodologies For: MA Critical Theory and Practice & MRes in Design T.E. Rosenberg Source: ‘Researching Society and Culture’ 2 nd edition: ed. Clive Seale

3. Methodology Methodology is defined in the OED as the ‘science of method’. Methodology may be thought of the regulative principles (regulated by philosophic, political, religious etc. persuasions) that subtend the ‘volition of the research’. ‘ Methods’ are the particular individual, or, ensemble, of techniques deployed in carrying out research.

4. Competing Philosophies of Science Karl Popper (1902-1994) Popper proposed a single model of scientific explanation – the hypothetico-deductive; relying on falsification rather than verification to establish ‘truths’. Thomas Kuhn Rejects the ‘rationalist’ idea of development; he proposes that ‘mature sciences’ are characterised by ‘paradigms’ – producing methodological brackets. Paul Feyerabend Believes that all methodologies have their limits; and, rather than there being ‘one true method’ or indeed an ‘advanced paradigm’ he believes in ‘diversity of thought’ - in effect in epistemological anarchism.

9. Naturalists and Interpretivists Naturalists: Argue that the methods for the ‘natural sciences’ are also applicable to researching social forms; they argue that research is about establishing ‘universal truths’. Interpretivists: Advance that the methods of the ‘natural sciences’ are, if not inappropriate, then, not always appropriate in dealing with social ‘facts’ (?); they argue that research is in fact (sic) about ‘meanings’ and not scientific truths.

15. Relativism Relativists argue that there aren’t universal truths; and that there is no one reality… on the contrary there are many truths and many realities. ‘ Different cultures employ radically different conceptual schemes defining what exists in the world, how things are organised in time and space, what sorts of relation obtain among things, and how some things influence others… [from this standpoint] it is not possible to give rational grounds for concluding that one such scheme is more congruent to reality than another’. Daniel Little

17. There are no truths outside the Gates of Eden (Dylan) The social sciences cannot produce a ‘correct version’; at any one time it can only lay claim to having a ‘feasible version’ of any number of possible versions? ‘ The check of the independently real is not peculiar to science…… Reality is not what gives language sense…. Both the distinction between the real and the unreal and the concept of agreement with reality themselves belong to our language’. Peter Winch

31. Indexicality and Reflexivity Indexicality and reflexivity are key to understanding the ethnomethodological view of language The meaning of words is contingent on the context of use and relationship to other words. Words ‘index’, rather than referring to determined meanings. Language is, in addition, reflexive – reflecting everyday activity as ordered or sensible.

32. Structuralism Structuralism is intrinsically concerned with language; seeing it as the determining deeper structure which shapes the meaning of our actions. Structuralist believed that phenomena as diverse as myths, restaurant menus, boxing, music scores and kinship rituals are surfaces whose deeper meanings are determined at a deeper level as a system of signs. ‘ Social action itself is, for the purposes of structuralist analysis, a surface manifestation (appearance/surface) of a series of deeper master patterns (essence/depth), internalized at the level of cognition.

33. Post-structuralism Post-structuralist thought is associated largely with French theorists like Derrida, Foucault, Deleuze and Guattari; a list of other influential thinkers would include Irigaray, Kristeva, Levinas, Spivak, Lyotard. They are concerned to comprehend life not as ‘something composed of identities, objects and subjects, but of difference, complex relations and instability’. Foucault’s studies (sexuality, ethics, health, madness, discipline, government) are ‘concerned with the different modes by which human beings are made subjects’. Foucault proposes that ‘with the development of modernity and modern capitalism, a new regime of social power emerges that takes life itself as its object’ (bio-power) operating through thoroughly heterogenous ensemble[s] consisting of discourses, institutions,architectural forms, regulatory decisions, laws,administrative measures, scientific statements, philosophical, moral and philanthropic propositions’. In other words ‘ discursive formations ’.

34. Post-structuralism and Post-Modernism Post-structuralist research is concerned with the formations and regimes that, at one and the same time, produce and also overwhelm the human subject. Theorists of postmodern culture include poststructuralist but are also include those of other theoretical dispositions. Postmodernist thought is incredulous of modernist (out of Enlightment) metanarratives (grand explanatory schemes). ‘ Postmodernism introduces instability and uncertainty into knowledge claims and practices’ and it promotes a ‘more pragmatic and situated model of research’. ‘ Media images are a central object of study for those interested in postmodernism. Importantly, the image tends to be analysed not in terms of the meaning or ideology encoded within it, but in terms of intensities, affects and desires it arouses in the consumer, and the way this relates to new forms of selfhood, collective experience and control’.

35. Validity and Power Validity refers to ‘truth value’. But whose truth? And how do we know if true? Reliability concerns the consistency with which research procedures deliver their results (regardless of the truth). For example, if the same questionnaire was presented to the same individual on two separate occasions would he or she answer in the same way. Replicability refers to the consistency of the whole research project. Can it be proved through repetition?

36. Validity and Power The heart of the Western knowledge project, which includes both conventional and postpositivist orientations, is research. The purpose of research is to study the world (the Other). The desire to explain (through research) is… a symptom of the desire to have a self (the researcher) that can control knowledge and a world that can be known (i.e. converted to the Same)’. Research Method in the Postmodern p85 J.J. Scheurich. Validity is the determination of whether the Other has been acceptably converted into the Same, according to a particular epistemology. The world is the raw untamed Other, as in raw data and as in rejected, invalid research. It must be cooked into a valid research-based theory so as to be visible and knowable; the coarse, untheorized, polyvocal Other is considered to be insufficient unto itself. It must be given meaning and appropriate form. It cannot be accepted as knowledge in its raw or rejected form; it must be re-formed (reformed) by valid theory so that it can acceptably exist within the boundary line drawn by particular validity criteria. Research Method in the Postmodern p85 J.J. Scheurich.

37. Research Ethics Methods are ‘human products with institutional histories and micro-politics of their own’; consequently there isn’t a set of neutral techniques that can be applied to investigate socio-cultural contexts, which renders the researcher’s position beyond question and which absolves him/her of responsibility.