Explores the grounding of cultural critique in ethnography as a process of knowledge construction, using concepts from philosophy, anthropology, and sociology of knowledge to identify a theory of knowledge that may inform a postcritical ethnography. The paper proposes a critical ethnography that is more authentic both to its wider social project…

This response to McKenzie's "post-post" concerns about environmental education research draws upon empirical, conceptual, anecdotal, metaphorical, imaged and poetic means to help the researcher "reassemble" the researcher/ed by attending to her/his relational body and embodiment of various, often hegemonic, socially constructed environmental…

This article examines the problem of learning to learn from the perspective of research on the organization and quality of students' knowledge. This approach is based on the assumption that students' learning competencies can be studied through the analysis of the outcomes of schooling. The article synthesizes findings of a long-term research…

The key element in comparative history is the problem of cultural and social differentiation and difference on the one hand, assimilation and similarity on the other. Comparative historical science relativizes local, national and regional conceptions of history and interpretations of self and other by systematically linking historical experiences,…

This paper addresses a variation of the traditional validity question asked of qualitative researchers. Here the question is not "How do we know the qualitative researcher's question is valid?" but rather, "How does the qualitative researcher choose from among a multitude of apparently valid or at least plausible…

This manuscript examines the uneasy relationship between qualitative and quantitative research. The multiple perspectives of qualitative researchers, quantitative researchers, and critical theorists should be "harmoniously engaged in an earnest dialogue, lifting the discussion to a new level of insight, making progress toward workable…

This article introduces this issue of the journal, a compilation of articles that share the common goal of drawing correlations between social representations and the dialogue that formulates them. Most of the articles were written by researchers working on a common project that aims to analyze the social representations of bilingualism in…

New narrative research shares the epistemological presuppositions of the broad current of postfoundationalism. It says that there is no position outside of our language (or our form of life) that allows us to check whether statements we make about reality are true or false. This is, however, not the same as relativism or subjectivism. The…

Responds to Hoshmand's article on alternate research paradigms in counseling psychology, viewing it as a distinctly valuable contribution likely to be seen as a future classic with impact on the discipline. Reviews Hoshmand's article with an ecumenical and eclectic view of epistemology. (NB)

The hypothetical deduction model of educational research should be replaced by one that distinguishes between the logical structure of hypothetico-deduction and its methodological application. Such a framework explores relationships between three levels of explanation: observation sentences, observation categoricals, and theory formulations. (SK)

Suggests that traditional research techniques obscure aspects of human systems. Advocates a change from structure-based to process-based systems thinking. (SK)

Since its original inception in the 1960s grounded theory has been widely used by many qualitative researchers. However, recently epistemologically different versions of grounded theory have been presented and this epistemological diversity among grounded theorists and the erosion of the method will be the major focus of this paper. The first…

Case studies are put to a variety of uses in investigating environmental and sustainability issues in higher education. These uses include: to document, describe (in detail), contextualize, investigate and/or explain information that characterizes and qualifies what is of interest in this area. The focus of the case study is often an event, a…

The purpose of this article is to describe the basic paradigm of the epistemological belief system and to offer new ideas about the conception and study of personal epistemology, namely an embedded systemic model and coordinated teams approach to research. The epistemological belief system approach to personal epistemology is distinguished from…

This paper examines the possibility of a Kuhnian paradigm in research on educational communications and technology. It discusses Kuhnian metaphor and its attraction as a viewfinder. It turns to anthropology for explanation of how beliefs and behaviors become social fact, then takes a critical look at usage of this metaphor in the field as a social…