Looking under methods: An experiment in play
Understanding the strength of interpretive qualitative inquiry requires going back to the basic question: What do we actually DO when we engage in qualitative inquiry? I’ve been writing about this in other blog posts. In the first of this 4-part series, I talk about why I got interested in the metaphor of remix; in the second post, I give a (glossed) perspective on some key complications of social (research) contexts in the 21st Century. In the third post, I sketch out a definition of remix as it might be applied to research methods. Here, I finish up by talking about what I consider the key processes in remix methods: Play, Borrow, Interrogate, Generate, and Move. For the past three years, I’ve been giving interdisciplinary workshops (mostly PhD...
Read MoreWhat is Remix? A research method oriented sketch
[this post continues discussion from previous posts:] Remix as a lens for qualitative methods Complications of social (research) contexts in the 21st Century Remix is a term that came into usage in the late 20th century to refer to the practice and product of taking samples form audio tracks and putting them together in new and creative ways. The history of remix is most often linked to the music form of Jamaican Dub, represented well by artist King Tubby. King Tubby–whose work influenced generations of hip hop artists engaged in dub, scratch, rap, and DJ–began deconstructing and reconstructing musical tracks in the late 60s. We’re now very familiar with the way songs are remixed in ways that extend or reinterpret them for different...
Read MoreComplications of social (research) contexts in the 21st Century
Mostly, this sketch is intended to help build the case for a remix approach to qualitative inquiry, as I’ve discussed in this earlier post. Despite its quick and dirty feel, perhaps it is useful. The past three decades mark tremendous growth in digital social interaction, from early experiments in virtual reality, text-based communities, and role playing games to today’s saturation in social media, where we are always on, tethered to mobile devices, enacting what Nielson in 2012 labeled “Generation C” (for connected). At the turn of the century, technologies for communication became much more pervasive through mobility and convergence. The collaborative and distributive features of the web were more fully realized at this time with the rise of...
Read MoreRemix as a Lens for Interpretive Qualitative Methods
In early 2011, I started getting all of my news of the world exclusively through my social media networks, specifically Twitter and Facebook. I wanted to immerse myself in the premise that “while people using media are simultaneously and instantaneously connected with large and multiple groups and networks, they are also increasingly ascribed with a deeply individualized and self-centered value system” (Deuze, Blank, & Speers, 2011, para 28). ‘Homophily’, a concept describing the way people tend to flock toward similar others, is one way to describe how our understandings of the world are idiosyncratic, narrowly channeled through our social networks, and therefore polarized. Not only did I experience homophily, but very soon, I found myself saturated...
Read MoreDeconstructing the term “Fieldwork”
I’ve been thinking a lot about how we use “Fieldwork” as an umbrella term, sometimes without really reflecting on what this means, or might not mean. Particularly in digital contexts, the activities of fieldwork must be so radically adjusted, they hardly resemble fieldwork anymore. How much do we have to shave the square peg of ‘participant observation’ to fit it into the round hole of Twitter? And how can I take seriously someone who doesn’t problematize this practice or the outcomes? I’d like to debunk, or maybe deconstruct the term. My desire to do this emerges from another quest; to help qualitative researchers embrace innovation and invention without constantly reinventing the wheel or embracing the...
Read MoreRemix Methods: Searching for Resonance (Part I)
As part of an ongoing project, this is my own remix, which means it will morph over time into something that has a different sort of coherence than you see here. I’ve been musing over three recent events that compelled me to start writing about ‘fabrication’ as a valuable and ethical tool within qualitative research. This essay is more about the conditions within which we are constrained as qualitative researchers, so while it’s on the way to making the case for bringing ‘fabrication’ to the scientific table, I don’t talk about it directly here. I caused a small firestorm when I mentioned in a conference presentation on ethics that I fabricated a dialogue in some early research on internet users. Simultaneous responses included,...
Read Moretwitter feed
- listening to fab talk on collage as qualitative analysis at #ICQI13 by Teri Holbrook. Wish network was better-i'd tweet pithy quotes
- listening to fabulous talk on collage as qualitative analysis at #ICQI by Teri Holbrook. Wish network was better--i'd tweet pithy quotes
- wow, not much tweets of #ICQI13 --maybe a different hashtag? or just not a twitter-ish conference?