Critical communicative methodology

Research methodology based on intersubjective dialogue and an egalitarian relationship between the research team and those being researched (Gomez & Latorre, 2005).Current societies are characterized for using dialogue in different domains, seeing it as necessary for social progress and for avoiding different social conflicts (Castells 1996; Flecha, Gómez & Puigvert, 2003; Habermas, 2000). Critical communicative methodology is characterized for its dialogic orientation in different aspects of the research (Gomez & Flecha, 2004).

Introduction

The critical communicative methodology is based on the direct participation of people whose reality is being studied throughout the whole research process, so that research becomes the result of the plurality of voices (Gómez et al., 2006; Flecha & Gomez 2004). In other words, the subject of research is directly included in the research itself, providing its interpretations, experiences and opinions enriching the research. The definition states that when using the critical communicative methodology, the researcher leaves his or her position of power and become well disposed to accept the best arguments, overcoming the division between researcher- subject and person researched- object, avoiding exclusion. Specifically, Julio Vargas Clavería and Jesús Gómez Alonso (2003), in their article named Why Romà do not like mainstream schools: Voices of a people without territory; argue that educational researchers have long ignored the Romani people and that this lack of attention has contributed to the persistence of educational inequity of the Romà community, proposing therefore a new approach to romaní educational research based on intersubjective dialogue, and the emergence of an egalitarian relationship between the researcher and the researched individuals.

This methodology has been used in international research projects such as Workaló (2001–2004); which is a Research and Technological Development (RTD) that forms part of the Fifth European Union Framework Programme; or INCLUD-ED (2006–2011), which is an Integrated Project of the Sixth Framework Programme.The main results of the Workaló project as well as different proposals with the objective of defining strategies for the inclusion of cultural minorities focusing on the Romani Community; were presented on the 29th of September, 2004 in the Workaló Conference in Brussels.[1] More recently, the results of the INCLUD-ED project, were disseminated across Europe, on the 18th of November 2009, in a Conference at the European Parliament, in Brussels,[2] as well. In addition, the critical communicative methodology was introduced in the First International Congress of Quality Inquiry (May 2005) celebrated in the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign in May, 2010.[3] The last edition (2010) has incorporated a round table about this methodology.[4]

Theoretical framework

The critical communicative perspective arises from different theoretical contributions. Jürgen Habermas (1984,1981), in his theory of communicative action, argues that the relationship between subjects should be based on validity claims rather than on power ones, seeing the relevance of the subject's interpretations following Alfred Schütz phenomenology (Schütz & Luckmann, 1974) However, this research perspective also draws from George H. Mead´s symbolic interactionism (1934), which stresses that interactions make people's interpretations change, and therefore knowledge not only depend on the individual subject. Harold Garfinkel´s ethnomethodology (1967) framework is considered for a better understanding of the subjects insights in their contexts (Gómez et al., 2006). The critical communicative perspective includes the contributions of objectivist and constructivist orientations but giving most of the emphasis on the processes of critical reflection and self- reflection and on intersubjectivity (Beck, Giddens and Lash; 1995), in which meanings are constructed through interaction, reaching consensus. The researcher brings into the dialogue his or her expertise and knowledge about the developments taken place in the scientific community which is contrasted with what social agents thoughts and experience (Touraine, Wieviorka, Flecha; 2004). Also others authors such as Jerome Bruner or Amartya Sen, have recognized the relevancy of the critical communicative methodology personally and in writing when joining members of the INCLUD-ED Consortium.[5]

Postulates

Communicative techniques are based on the creation of a favorable context for communication and understanding which entails the assumption of the following postulates of the critical communicative methodology:

Communicative data collection techniques

The critical communicative methodology allows the use of any type of technique, quantitative and qualitative, as long as it is always carried out with a communicative orientation. Communicative or dialogic research does not deny the use of any technique. In fact, always the research has to be developed following a communicative organization and communicative principles. Three main strategies for communicative data collection can be established:

References

  1. retrieved 18th of January 2010.
  2. retrieved 13th of January 2010
  3. retrieved 13th of January 2010
  4. Concretely, in a workshop titled “Collecting, analyzing and interpreting qualitative and spatial data in social transformation perspectives”, examples of research studies that apply the critical communicative methodology will be exponed, available in: http://www.icqi.org/workshop.html, session 29, retrieved 13th of January 2010
  5. To check it go to http://www.ub.edu/includ-ed/method2.htm, retrieved 13th of January 2010.

Bibliography

External links

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