Welcome from the director

The University of Illinois, the College of Communications, the International Center for Qualitative Inquiry and the Department of Advertising and Consumer Studies welcome you to the Second International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry. More than 900 people from more than 55 nations have registered for the Congress. There are 16 preconference workshops. More than 800 papers will be presented and performed in more than 180 sessions.

The theme of the Second International Congress, Ethics, Politics and Human Subject Research in the New Millennium builds on and extends the theme of the First International Congress, which focused on Qualitative Inquiry in a Time of Global Uncertainty. The 2006 Congress explores experiences with and criticisms of Institutional Review Boards and their counterparts in other nations. Too often these state-sponsored systems of review rely upon narrow definitions of science, research, human subjects and ethics. These regulatory and ethical activities raise fundamental philosophical, epistemological, political and pedagogical issues concerning scholarship and freedom of speech in the academy. These issues cut across the fields of educational and policy research, the humanities, communications, health and social science, social welfare, business, and law.

Presenters at the 2006 Congress take up alternative conceptions of research, ethics and science. They entertain new ways of decolonizing traditional methodologies as they are used in indigenous communities. They trouble performative, feminist, indigenous, queer, democratic and participatory forms of critical ethical inquiry. The 2006 Congress examines how these new forms of inquiry advance the goals of social justice and progressive politics in this new century.

The Second International Congress offers us an opportunity to share our experiences, problems and hopes concerning the conduct of critical qualitative inquiry in this time of global uncertainty.

The International Association of Qualitative Inquiry (IAQI) was launched at the First Congress. A year later this new association has a newsletter and more than 1,000 members. Thank you for coming and being part of this truly international project.

Yours sincerely,
Norman K. Denzin
Congress Director

Conference welcome

Thursday, 5:30-7 p.m., Foellinger Auditorium

(1) Norman K. Denzin, Congress Director, Director's Welcome

(2) Robin Jarrett announces winners of Illinois Distinguished Qualitative Dissertation Award

(3)Marie Battiste, University of Saskatchewan; Michelle Fine, National Research Council, National Academies of Science, Keynote Addresses

(4)Opening Midwest barbeque, Levis Faculty Center, cash bar, 7:15-9 p.m.

Other congress activities

(1) Wednesday, May 3
Preconference registration, workshop participants only, 6-9 p.m., Illini Union Colonial Room

(2) Friday, May 5
After 6:30 p.m.: Open evening. Check out the dining and night life in downtown Champaign, Campustown and downtown Urbana.

(4)Saturday, May 6
Old-fashioned Midwest barbeque, 6:30-9:30 p.m., Levis Faculty Center, south patio. Includes barbecue chicken, vegetarian barbecue, side dishes and cash bar.

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PRE-CONFERENCE WORKSHOPS

May 4, Thursday

8:30-11:30

(1) "Case Study with Distant Habitants", Robert Stake and Brinda Jegatheesan

(2) "Doing Situational Maps", Adele E. Clarke

Situational analysis is a new method of analysis for qualitative research that can be used with interview, ethnographic, historical, visual, and/or other discursive materials, especially useful for multi-site research. There are three main cartographic approaches:
1. situational maps that lay out the major human, nonhuman, discursive and other elements in the research situation of inquiry and provoke analysis of relations among them;
2. social worlds/arenas maps that lay out the collective actors, key nonhuman elements, and the arena(s) of commitment and discourse within which they are engaged in ongoing negotiations---mesolevel interpretations of the situation; and
3. positional maps that lay out the major positions taken, and not taken, in the discursive data vis-à-vis particular axes of difference, concern, and controversy around issues in the situation of inquiry.
Through mapping the data, the analyst constructs the situation of inquiry empirically. The situation per se becomes the ultimate unit of analysis and understanding its elements and their relations is the primary goal.
This workshop will focus on the first kind of map, the situational map. It can be used to design and conduct research in a flexible and iteratively responsive manner across the duration of the project. That is, the situational map can be reconstructed over time to specify the emergent elements in the research situation of concern about which data have been and still need to be gathered. The maps thus capture and frame the messy complexities of the situation in their dense relations and permutations, and intentionally work against the usual simplifications so characteristic of scientific work. They also allow design from the outset to explicitly gather data about theoretically and substantively underdeveloped areas that may lie in situations of inquiry.
Participants are encouraged (but not required) to come to the workshop with a draft map and be prepared to discuss it in the group. The workshop goal is to help participants get a strong grip on the situation they are studying.
See www.situationalanalysis.com for more information on SA.

(3) "Interpreting, Writing Up and Evaluating Qualitative Materials", Robin Jarrett and Angela Odoms-Young

This workshop explores the related processes of interpreting, writing up and evaluating qualitative data. Case study examples will be highlighted to provide an overview of techniques that can be used to discover meanings and examine social processes and social interactions in qualitative data. Issues discussed include: deductive and inductive approaches to data analysis, integrating multiple data sources, data reduction and data display techniques, and using findings for theory development. Attention will be given to writing up qualitative data to reflect its rich descriptive nature as well as multiple voices and perspectives, the use of qualitative data for intervention development, targeting written products to scholarly/applied journals, and communicating research findings to different audiences. This workshop will also examine the relevant criterion for maintaining and assessing data quality.

(4) "Performing Autoethnography", Tami Spry

What is involved in the performance of one’s autoethnographic text? From work in the field of performance studies, we will look at issues of performativity in terms of how it relates to the conception and construction of autoethnography. How is the everyday body and the aestheticized body involved in the textual construction of autoethnography? How can the body be accessed as an always and already creator of knowledge? How is the form of autoethnography effected by performativity and performance? How does the performance of autoethnography speak to cultural and social experiences? We will begin with a brief overview of autoethnography, but participants will be expected to have familiarized themselves with autoethnography and related works. Please bring a short work in progress, and be dressed to move.

(5) "Research Ethics for Protecting Indigenous Knowledge and Heritage: A Conversation", Marie Battiste

A dialogue with a series of performances.

(6) "Mixed-Method Social Inquiry: Possibilities and Strategies", Jennifer C. Greene

This workshop will introduce participants to the domain of mixed-method social inquiry, with a focus on understanding the commitments and opportunities afforded by a “mixed method way of thinking.” The idea of using a mixed-method approach to meaningfully engage with difference will be advanced for dialogue and critique. In addition, conceptual questions to be addressed include, “Just what is being mixed in mixed-method social inquiry?” and “What are various legitimate purposes for mixing methods in social inquiry?” Practical issues to be discussed include key issues in mixed-method inquiry design, analysis, and representation.

(7) "Questions of Design, Method and Ethics in the Study of Whiteness and Priviledge"

Note: Because of a scheduling conflict, Michelle Fine will not be able to direct this workshop. It will be directed by the Illinois Whiteness Faculty and  Student group.

(8) "Heartbeats: Writing Performance Texts", Mary Weems and Carolyne White

This interactive, learning community-based pre-conference workshop is for qualitative researchers from all disciplines interested in exploring a non-traditional way of expressing the results of their research.  It will be conducted by Mary Weems with the assistance of  Carolyne J. White. Weems will share her imagination-intellect theory and the importance of developing it from both a personal and professional perspective.  Using examples of her own work, she will share her approach to writing from the space between the conscious and unconscious, and the importance of freeing up the heart-mind to allow thoughts and ideas to flow from a more creative, and passionate place.

12:30-3:30

(9) "The Critical Use of Focus Groups", Gregory Dimitriadis and George Kambrelis

For this workshop, we will explore the complex and multifaceted phenomena of “focus group” research both theoretically and practically. At the broadest possible level, focus groups are collective conversations or group interviews. They can be small or large, directed or non-directed. Focus groups have been used for a wide range of purposes over the past century or so. The U.S. military (e.g., Merton), multi-national corporations, Marxist revolutionaries (e.g., Freire), literacy activists (e.g., Kozol), and three waves of radical feminist scholar-activists, among others, have all used focus groups to help advance their concerns and causes. These different uses of focus groups have overlapped in distinct and often disjunctive ways, and all have been strategic articulations of pedagogy, politics, and inquiry. We will discuss these conceptual issues as well as related strategies for conducting rich focus group sessions. Among other things, we highlight: how to recruit participants; how to choose spaces for hosting collective conversations; how to develop and use leading questions; how to follow up on key themes developed by group members; how and when to manage the group; and how to understand the empirical material that emerges from these groups. We also offer up close and personal examples that illustrate the productive possibilities, the inherent dangers, and the contingency involved in focus group research.

(10) "Red Pedagogy and Critical Pedagogy: New Developments", Sandy Grande

Note: Because of a scheduling conflict, Joe Kincheloe and Shitely Steinberg  will not be able to direct this workshop. It will be directed by the Sandy Grandy who will draw  on her 2004 book, Red Pedagogy. Using a community-based reesearch approach, it will ask participants to explore the personal, political and cultural connections between geographies of power, and  identity, conceptions of democracy and sovereignty, and radical, critical and red pedagogy.

(11) "Ethics and Human Subjects Research", Clifford Christians

(12) "Speaking Practically: Working with and Navigating Ethics and Review Committees", Julianne Cheek

This workshop will give participants the opportunity to discuss issues around navigating ethics and review (e.g. funding) committees when undertaking qualitative research projects. It will adopt a dialogical format in which participants will be encouraged to contribute to the discussion and to provide examples to form the focus of the second part of the workshop. These can be examples of what they have done in particular situations, or issues they are facing at present.
Structurally, the first part of the workshop will be a review about how Julianne Cheek and her colleagues have navigated ethics (IRBs) and funding bodies with respect to the intersection of qualitative inquiry, ethics and the politics of evidence. The second part will involve focused and interactive small group work. Participants are asked to bring to the workshop issues or problems from the field pertaining to ethics and/or the politics of evidence that they wish to discuss and explore. These issues/problems will form the basis of the small group work thereby providing focused, grounded discussion and practical feedback to participants about their particular issue/problem. In this way the workshop is designed to be both dialogical and practical as its structure draws on the research realties in which participants live and work.

(13) "New Experimental Writing Forms", Yvonna Lincoln

Participants should come with some qualitative data, analyzed and organized in a systematic fashion, if at all possible, as writing will be a part of the workshop. Exploration of experimental forms--pleated, layered texts, poetry, fiction, "messy 0/00 texts, autoethnographic stories, and performance ethnographies--will be undertaken, in part via performance and dramatic reading, and participants will begin writing experiments utilizing their own data. Small research projects, dissertation data, or other ethnographic studies provide good fodder for writing exercises.

(14) "Performance Ethnography", Norman Denzin

A performance ethnography workshop. Small groups will prepare performance texts based on epiphanies, racialized memories and self-identity.

(15) "State of the Art: The Latest in Qualitative Software Advances", Ray Maietta and Cesar Cisneros

This session is based on the premise that the use of qualitative software does not threaten the methodological integrity of qualitative researchers’ work. Highlighting both innovative and classic features of ATLAS.ti, HyperRESEARCH, MAXqda, and NVIVO we demonstrate how off-screen manual methods used to analyze qualitative data can be employed and enhanced with qualitative software.
Areas of focus include:

Variety of data formats
Episode Profiles
Memo writing as stand alone method
Codebook and theme evolution
Strategies for data review and presentation

(16) "Preparing Educational Researchers", Elizabeth St. Pierre(Chair), Wanda Pillow, Patti Lather, Jerry Rosiek and Michael J. Feuer

The National Research Council’s 2002 report, Scientific Research in Education, encourages developing a strong community of educational researchers and a particular “culture of science,” and its 2005 report, Advancing Scientific Research in Education, makes three recommendations regarding the preparation of educational researchers. In a 2005 article in Educational Researcher, Eisenhardt and DeHaan also delineate five areas to consider in the doctoral training of researchers. Given that there is quite a debate about what counts as “quality” educational research, it follows that there is a great deal of interest in how schools of education engage this complex and politically charged issue. Workshop presenters and participants will engage recommendations from various sources and move toward making some of their own.

(17) "Writing Autoethnography and Narrative in Qualitative Research", Carolyn Ellis and Arthur Bochner (FULL)

This workshop will focus on writing personal narratives and reflexively including researchers' selves and their interaction with participants in ethnographic projects. Topics covered will include: narrative truth; ethics; developing scenes, characters, conversation, and dramatic action; writing vulnerably and evocatively; truth and memory; writing as inquiry, evaluating and publishing autoethnography.

 

 

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Sponsor Links:

Women and Gender in Global Perspectives Program
Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities
Center for Advanced Study
Asian American Studies Program
Bureau of Educational Research
The Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory
Department of Kinesiology
Gender & Women's Studies Program
Department of Advertising
College of Communications
Center for Qualitative Inquiry
IRB Office
The Education and Social Research Institute (ESRI),
Manchester Metropolitan University, UK
Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Department of Speech Communication, Souther Illinois University
Department of Educational Administration and Human Resource Development
Texas A&M University
VERBI Software-Consult-Sozialforschung GmbH, Germany
Sage Publications
National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA)

Partner Links:

International Institute for Qualitative Methodology 6-10, University Extension Centre University of Alberta 8303 112 Street Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G2T4 Email: qualitative.institute@ualberta.ca http://www.ualberta.ca/~iiqm/

The Education and Social Research Institute (ESRI),
Manchester Metropolitan University, UK
http://www.esri.mmu.ac.uk