Transcript Feminist Grounded Theory

Using Grounded Theory
in Feminist Research
By Angela Bakken
Key Theorists
• Glaser, Barney. (1930 - )
• American Sociologist; One of the founders of GT
• Strauss, Anselm Leonard (1916 – 1996)
• American Sociologist; Founder of GT & Qualitative Analysis
• Dewey, John. (1859 – 1952)
• American Philosopher, Psychologist, Leading Activist & Education Reformer
• Mead, George Herbert. (1863 – 1931)
• American Philosopher, Sociologist, Psychologist. Founder of Social Psychology
• Blumer, Herbert George. (1900 – 1987)
• American Sociologist; Symbolic Interactionism & Methods of Social Research
• Corbin, Juliet
• Charmaz, Kathy
Brief Review
• Grounded Theory:
• Developed in 1967
• Glaser & Strauss; The Discovery of Grounded Theory
• Shift the sociological focus from theory verification to theory generation.
• Sociological landscape to theory development.
• Strauss & Corbin; 1990; Basic of Qualitative Research
• 1998; New/Revised Ed.; Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures
for Developing Grounded Theory
• GT is the discovery of theory from data systematically obtained from social research.
• Feminism:
• Difficult to pinpoint exactly.
• Beginning of mass movements against social injustice occurred by women in the
1920.
• Women’s suffrage
Feminism
• If history has taught us anything, it’s that feminism takes diverse
forms.
• Feminist perspective essentializes multifaceted theoretical positions.
• Literature reveals a shared set of epistemological features:
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Valuing women’s lived experiences as a legitimate source of knowledge.
Appreciating the influence on context in the production of knowledge;
Respecting the role of reflexivity in the research process;
Rejecting traditional subject-object dualisms;
Attending to gender, power, with transformative social action.
Why Feminism?
• If there is a central reason why feminists do feminist research it
revolves around the need to know and understand better the nature
of the hurt we sustain as a group - a group which is subordinated on
the grounds of our female gender.
• This is not `knowledge for its own sake' but rather is knowledge
explicitly dedicated to bringing about change and improvement in our
situation as women.
Feminists View
• Women are non-existent in male studies of social realit.
• Women do not speak out
• Marginalized
• Invisible
• Socially; not given the right to speak out.
Many different views
• Problem of women as one of having been `left out' - of positions of
power, from written history, and from everyday conversations.
• Problem as one of having been actively excluded through a more or
less deliberate, even if unconscious effort by men.
• Question the kinds of situations women have been left out of or
excluded from, and not want to be included (or fight for) positions
that are elitist and oppressive.
• Matter as originating from men's fear and contempt for women, or
from men's greater physical power, or from a determination not to
lose historical and economic advantages over women, or from
habitual socialization, or a combination of these.
More views…
• See the answer in asking men to change their ways
• Matter of having to make demands in the face of inevitable resistance,
requiring a far more concerted attack.
• Devote their energies to the reform of social institutions to include women.
• May turn away altogether from men and the organizations they control
and concentrate instead on strengthening women as a group from within
and to examining all existing knowledge with a view to constructing new
knowledge in women's interests.
• Will seek to increase their education and income levels, own their own
homes, `reclaim the night', organize collectively for equal pay, or seek each
other out for support.
Feminists view themselves as…
• Radical feminists, socialist feminists, humanist feminists, separatist
feminists, ‘Femocrats’, liberal feminists and so on, to express in
shorthand form their different positions on `the problem'.
• All of these different `feminisms' lead to women's differing interests
in topics for research, differing preference for techniques, differing
theories for interpreting what they see as going on, and differing
conclusions about what new actions to take.
Feminist Method
• Conducting of scientific investigations and generating theory from an
explicitly feminist standpoint.
• Importance of feminist methods are in how the research is obtained
and how it helps the feminist movement.
• Feminist research is research which is carried out by women who
identify as feminists, and which has a particular purpose for knowing
(a `why'), particular kinds of questions, topics and issues to be known
about (a `what'), and an identifiable method of knowing (a `how'),
which distinctly draw on women's experience of living in a world in
which women are subordinate to men.
Methods and Methodology
• Feminist researchers, depending on their definition of `feminism', will develop
methods and preferences for techniques that they see as yielding the best results
for women.
• Some women may use standard:
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Open-ended interviews
Surveys
Collect numerical information
Perform statistical computations, in order to establish matters of extent or amount regarding
women's position vis a vis men's.
Others will undertake secondary analysis of documentary material and policy papers or
research and develop new policy and assess its impact on the position of women.
Other women will concentrate on directly hearing the stories of women - perhaps using more
or less in-depth interviews or ethnographies, recording verbal information, and writing them
up and publishing.
Still others will work more as members of groups of women doing their own self-directed
research, much as did the CR groups of early `second wave' feminism.
All of these techniques and methods continue to be subjected to healthy internal debate
about whether or not, and in what ways, they may further perpetuate or alternatively
contribute to interrupting patterns of oppression of women.
Questioning
• Questioning normal scientific reasoning is another form of Feminist
Method.
• Strong feminist supporters of this are Nancy Hartsock, Hilary Rose, and
finally Sandra Harding.
• Normal ideas in science are supposed to be objective in reasoning, but this
questioning of science draws attention to the fact that nothing can be
looked at with an objective view.
• Instead everything is completely subjective especially when it comes to
looking at women.
• Questioning science argues that science needs to be approached with the
knowledge that it is already subjective in order to gain information.
• By approaching science with this view, it is only then possible to gain an
objective opinion.
Questioning cont…
• Through questioning science Anne Fausto-Sterling came up with
alternatives to the concept of having only two sexes, male and
female.
• She argues that through biological development there is a possibility
of having five sexes instead of two.
• She believes there are male, female, merm, ferm, and herm.
• It is important who to recognize more than two sexes because gender
isn't as black and white as the scientific community leads it to appear.
Conscious Raising
• Consciousness Raising is a popular feminist method that is often referred
to.
• It is based on the idea that women have never been allowed a come
together in a comfortable environment to share their political thoughts,
and discuss their situation in society.
• Consciousness Raising allows for groups of women to get together and talk
about different problems relating to their gender. Ideas like marital abuse
and conflict, abortion and rape.
• By sharing their ideas and thoughts they can feed off of each other and
learn about their sexual situations from the women around them.
• The ultimate goal is for women to realize that they can become a strong
political force if they join together as a gender.
Criteria for Feminist Research
Research may be more likely to address women's oppression if its:
• understands that all research is essentially value-driven and always results in
some kind of new action or practice, and consequently examines its own values
and contribution to altering (or perpetuating) existing situations;
• is `driven' by the interests of the women whose problematic situation was the
reason for the raising of the research questions in the first place;
• involves as many such women as is desirable and feasible in the collaborative
design and conduct of the research;
• involves maximum attention to the benefits for the women involved (eg. way
beyond merely enjoying the chance to talk about things, and reaching towards
genuine self-generation of understanding and new personal ways of being and
acting), and less emphasis on the benefits to a single researcher (tertiary
qualifications, improved cv, published books or articles, career promotions, etc.);
Criteria continued…
• questions, and otherwise disrupts the reproduction and perpetuation of
power relationships that subordinate women `subjects' as objects of
someone else's study; and instead embraces as many women as is
desirable and feasible as participants in a joint effort;
• respects and values women's experiences and their accounts of them,
creating a collective `culture' for the respectful sharing and examination of
all relevant participants' experiences;
• hears and reflects back exactly what is of most concern and interest to
women;
• does not only `study down' but also researches other powerful or elite
parties' contribution to women's oppression (eg. that of men,
professionals, bureaucracies, television, radio, videos, magazines, etc.);
• uses conceptual language which accurately names the phenomena (eg.
`criminal or illegal assault in the home' rather than `domestic' or `family'
violence; `wife beating' rather than `spouse abuse'; or `women's resistance
to isolation in the home' rather than `suburban neurosis');
Criteria continued…
• makes claims only which the women thus described recognize as their `truths' or
as valid or `objective' for them, and not claims which they may identify as
distorting or stereotyping or as making them appear invisible, deviant or deficient
in comparison to men;
• contextualizes and substantiates various truth claims so that other women can
make their own judgments, rather than attempting to identify something as a
single irrefutable truth;
• attempts to represent the richness, complexity, interconnectedness, and
contextualized nature of women's experiences, rather than representing
women's experiences in categories which are either not useful or which too
greatly distort or diminish understanding;
• contributes to women being able to identify new or better ways of understanding
their situation;
• results in women being able to identify ways to change and improve their
situation.
Can men do feminist research?
• If a feminist is a woman who knows that she and other women are oppressed on grounds of
gender from personal experience, then a man will not be in a position to either be a feminist or
do feminist research. However a man can come to realize that women are oppressed on grounds
of gender from his own experience and that he and other men collectively benefit from the
oppression of women and take a position against this.
• Men can be pro-feminist, and can engage in pro-feminist research (for example if they can fulfil
the conditions set out previously in this paper). However this may prove difficult for men if they
must therefore hand over the control of the design and carrying out of `their' research to the
critical reference group of women (who determine whether it meets their interests and resolves
their problem or not). They may also be less likely to research women's experience directly
(although this might be an initial phase, perhaps through the study of feminist research literature,
or by the conduct of local, small-scale participatory action research with and for - and not on women in their own lives).
• They might be more likely to research their own dissatisfaction with elements of patriarchy and
turn their attention to how the structures of subordination of women by men (and of some men
by other men) are put in place and held in place. The methodological approach of feminists will
be relevant to men seeking to research their experiences and those of other men in order to
transform subordinating practice. Objectifying, disempowering methods will have as little place
in their research as it has for feminist researchers. It may be more appropriate to talk about men
carrying out anti-patriarchal research rather than pre-feminist research.
Feminist Research Review:
Three Basic Characteristics
1. Focus on women.
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About women
Conducted by women that are feminist
2. Obvious discrimination between “male” quantitative methods, and feminist
qualitative ones.
3. Feminist research is political in that it promotes active engagement in
changing their lives.
These common aims include seeking to overcome biases in research, bringing
about social change, displaying human diversity, and acknowledging the
position of the researcher.
Characteristic #1: Focus on Women
• It is essential for women researchers to initially establish their
research, beginning from the recognition of their own oppression,
that they are subjected to as woman in a male dominated society.
• The process of realizing their oppression, can lead to theory, but also
greater political action.
Characteristic #2:
• Social emphasis given to subjective experiences of women, that is to
say, the importance of experience and every day life.
• These different ways through which individuals “exist”, also reveal the
gender implications which are impressed in distinguishable areas of
various aspect of life.
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Exploitation of time
Self-comprehension
Different forms of emotions
Use of language
Attempting to comprehend the lives and experiences of women means that
we are interested in an actual specific form of material life.
Characteristic #3
• Feminist theory and methodology is grounded on commitment to
praxis.
• This political commitment reflects the essentially materialist theory of
knowledge that underlies feminist research.
• The ultimate test of knowledge is not whether it is “true”, but whether or not
it leads to progressive change.
• The orientation of feminist research towards this direction also stems from
the necessity for investigation and analysis of social realities in multiple levels.
• Our culture is deeply and fundamentally structured socially, politically,
ideologically, and conceptually by gender as well as by race, class, and
sexuality.
In other words…
• A theory should be composed of elements that correspond to the daily
reality of this special area that is researched and that emanates from
various data.
• Be fully comprehensible and possible to be generalized, as it represents a
social fact
• Should proceed in a control of elements that compose the phenomenon in
question.
• A theory is a lot more than granting knowledge, or illustrating a picture.
• It attempts to make the individuals that use it capable of explaining and
predicting events, thus giving directions for action.
Symbolic Interaction
• George Herbert Mead
• Adopted Dewey’s theory of inquiry in his own philosophy of science.
• Pragmatism informed the development of symbolic interactionism.
• Three tenets:
• Humans act towards things on the basis of meanings things have for them.
• The meaning of things is derived from the social interactions one has with
others.
• Meanings are taken and modified through in interpretive process.
Symbolic Interactionism & Feminism
• “…symbolic interactionism sees meaning as social products, as creations
that are formed in and through the defining activities of people as they
interact.” (1967, 5)
• In other words, meaning derives from social interaction, and a person’s
conduct influences the actions of others.
• Feminist inquiry is also grounded in the idea that knowledge is generated
through social change.
• Feminism has been shaped by social, cultural, political, historical, and
linguistic forces.
• According to SI, acting on the basis of the meaning of symbols is
interpretation.
• Making meaning from symbols, or interpretation, is also central to the
process of generating substantive theory in GT.
So therefore…
• Language is used in GT to symbolize the social process.
• Feminist researchers emphasize the interpretation of language and
symbols to derive meaning.
• Feminist scholars focus on the way in which language maintains ideologies
and gender hierarchies.
• GT approach use detailed description, metaphors, storytelling to describe
their experiences.
• Feminist research is important because it is through women’s own
experiences and especially through their life crises, that they are able to
view and to understand the world around them.
• Feminist researchers reject Cartesian-subject object dualism and embrace
the assumption that all research encompasses subjectivity, partiality, and
bias.
Important to note…
• Feminist researchers’ views on subject-object dualism may not be
consistent with GT as per Glaser’s perspective.
• This feminist view fits with interpretive forms of GT and promotes
compassion and understanding.
• The main area where many contend that feminist research and GT
diverge is the assumption that different priorities drive each
methodology.
• Feminist research is compelled by an overarching interest in gender,
power relations, and social transformation.
In summary…
• Grounded Theory in research provides the opportunity to elaborate
and continuously re-elaborate the material within the interviews.
• Feminist approach allows a contribution to women with awareness of
women’s roles.
References & Resources
• Biber, Hesse, S.N. (2006). Feminist Research: Exploring, Interrogating &
Transforming the Interconnections of Epistemology, Methodology &
Methods. Handbook of Feminist Research, Chap. 1; 1-25. Retrieved from:
www.sagepub.com/upm-data/43563_1.pdf
• Plummer, M. & Young, L.E. (2010). Grounded Theory and Feminist Inquiry:
Revitalizing Links to the Past. Western Journal of Nursing Research, 32(3),
305-321.
• Westmarland, Nicole (2001). The Quantitative/Qualitative Debate and
Feminist Research: A Subjective View of Objectivity [28 paragraphs]. Forum
Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 2(1), Art.
13. Retrieved from: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs0101135.