Let me give some context about why I like this piece so much -- and, AJ, it's totally cool with me that you didn't seem to dig it (my belief in free speech and open'n'honest communication trumps everything else). There's this weird rift between some folks in academic: is the "best" research qualitative or quantitative? Inductive or deductive? Micro and unique or macro and generalizable? Emic or etic?
(For the record: it absolutely, positively doesn't need to be an either/or trade-off; however, the issue often gets framed in that way.)
Peshkin is defending the virtues of qualitative research, and in effect, laying out some reasons about why ethnographic research should be taken seriously. Ethnographic research is, at its heart, qualitative, and all these reasons that Pehskin lays out about the "goodness of qualitative research" form a pretty convincing case that qualitative research is valuable.
He says just as much in his introductory paragraph, and I'd consider that a "move." Let's call it explicit exigence. (I'm coining it!) Peshkin explicitly lays out the exigence of the piece -- the factors that put the engine into mention. What brought it about, what caused him to write it, what this is in response to. Busting out this "yo, some folks aren't seeing this correctly, so let's get the facts straight" message from the get-go is huge. To me, as a reader, that really helps me tune in; I have a heightened sense of why I'm reading this because the writer's telling me why he wrote it.
You can also notice a lot of "I language" in this article, particularly in the opening section. This meets two objectives: he explains what he did to prep/publish this piece, and he provides an overview of how he's structured the article. It's also worth mentioning that "I language" tends to be one of those "don't do this!" rules that well-intentioned people assimilate into their own "teaching writing" practices. Like anything writing-related, whenever we think about conventions or rules, we need to tie it into a particular context -- how and why X is being used and what the writer wants to accomplish by using it. Point is, "I" works here and this is a published piece in a scholarly, peer-reviewed academic journal, so... is it a crime to use "I" in academic pieces? Of course not. I say: as long as it's tied in some way, shape, or form to your overall argument/purpose and it relatively adheres to the conventions of the genre, rock out "I language" all you want.
Time to take the doggies for a walk.
(For the record: it absolutely, positively doesn't need to be an either/or trade-off; however, the issue often gets framed in that way.)
Peshkin is defending the virtues of qualitative research, and in effect, laying out some reasons about why ethnographic research should be taken seriously. Ethnographic research is, at its heart, qualitative, and all these reasons that Pehskin lays out about the "goodness of qualitative research" form a pretty convincing case that qualitative research is valuable.
He says just as much in his introductory paragraph, and I'd consider that a "move." Let's call it explicit exigence. (I'm coining it!) Peshkin explicitly lays out the exigence of the piece -- the factors that put the engine into mention. What brought it about, what caused him to write it, what this is in response to. Busting out this "yo, some folks aren't seeing this correctly, so let's get the facts straight" message from the get-go is huge. To me, as a reader, that really helps me tune in; I have a heightened sense of why I'm reading this because the writer's telling me why he wrote it.
You can also notice a lot of "I language" in this article, particularly in the opening section. This meets two objectives: he explains what he did to prep/publish this piece, and he provides an overview of how he's structured the article. It's also worth mentioning that "I language" tends to be one of those "don't do this!" rules that well-intentioned people assimilate into their own "teaching writing" practices. Like anything writing-related, whenever we think about conventions or rules, we need to tie it into a particular context -- how and why X is being used and what the writer wants to accomplish by using it. Point is, "I" works here and this is a published piece in a scholarly, peer-reviewed academic journal, so... is it a crime to use "I" in academic pieces? Of course not. I say: as long as it's tied in some way, shape, or form to your overall argument/purpose and it relatively adheres to the conventions of the genre, rock out "I language" all you want.
Time to take the doggies for a walk.
Zack: Without a doubt, what Peshkin was saying was important. It’s just he could have done it more effectively (for me, anyways), if Peshkin wrote clearer. Both, Kahn and Charmaz demonstrate you can can add some sugar to make the medicine go down much easier. Damn, I wish I had used that sugar line in my original post. In an effort to have a little more fun in my last post, I thought I would infuse it with all kinds of food imagery and alliteration. Yeah, I know it was a bit ham-fisted(!) at times but it was still fun. Anyhooters, I wanted to clear that up. Love the content, could have seasoned it to be more palatable (I promise to cool it with the food stuff from here on out).
ReplyDeleteLastly, “Explicit Exigence” is a goodie. You coined it first!
Kono: Welcome back! Although to be fair, we aren’t that much ahead of you. I’m glad you liked the food stuff. I was super starving while writing it most of it. While I had to look up a couple of words myself (love the dictionary widget, as well) it was the structure of Peshkin writing that really made it vexatious task for me. But, like I said, it’s just exercising those jaw muscles until they are able to chew through the more fibrous fare that is common in the land of academicese. Besides, I hear fiber is good for you.
Natalie: You and Zack have me really rethinking the Peshkin piece. I actually reread it after reading your post. Didn’t help too much but, hey, I did reread it.
AJ - glad to hear you gave it another chance, that's the best we can do in these situations. I loved your food analogy as well, it works perfectly for these articles that can feel so foggy.
ReplyDeleteAJ - glad to hear you gave it another chance, that's the best we can do in these situations. I loved your food analogy as well, it works perfectly for these articles that can feel so foggy.
ReplyDelete