Hearing the Voices of Students and Teachers: A Phenomenological Approach to Educational Research
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Abstract
Many contemporary researchers claim to use a phenomenological approach but seldom connect their methods to tenets from phenomenological philosophy. We describe a distinctive approach, grounded in the writings of French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty, for conducting educational research. Procedures are outlined for bracketing pre-understandings of a phenomenon, interviewing, and thematizing data with assistance of an interdisciplinary interpretive group. Using our approach, researchers capture the figural aspects of a phenomenon that dominate perception as well as the contextual background that is less visible but integral to understanding it. This phenomenological approach offers educational researchers a radical empiricism, a flexible structure, and a dialogical community of support.
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