A social scientist and a feminist

As an emerging researcher, I affiliate myself to a grey area between the critical and interpretive educational research paradigms as discussed in James Scotland’s ‘Exploring the Philosophical Underpinnings of Research.’ During my three year academic career at Capilano, I have focused my coursework, and have conducted most of my research, in the fields of Women’s and Gender Studies and Anthropology. Women’s and Gender Studies is aligned with the critical research paradigm: it is heavily theory-based, “seeks to address issues of social injustice and marginalism,” and is directed at “interrogating values and assumptions, exposing hegemony and injustice, challenging conventional social structures and engaging in social action.” In contrast, anthropology adopts the interpretive research paradigm. By definition, anthropology is the study of culture, past and present, through holistic, and comparative perspectives. Anthropological research fulfills various requirements of the interpretive paradigm including, but not limited to: seeking to understand through the perspectives of the researched group, accepting ideologies without questioning them, and not dominating the participants. These two fields of study, and opposing paradigms, largely define my academic interests, and educational research preferences.

As a researcher, I believe it is important to understand and accept how circumstance has shaped reality, aligning myself with the ontological position of the critical paradigm, that “reality has been shaped by social, political, cultural, economic, ethnic, and gender values.” However, I hold that the ontological position of the interpretive paradigm – that reality is subjective and varies from person to person – is also valid.  Both the interpretive and critical paradigms hold the epistemological position of subjectivism which is based on real work phenomena, however, the critical paradigm links this with societal ideology. I align myself stronger to the epistemological position of the critical paradigm, that “knowledge is both socially constructed and influenced by power relations from within society.” As well, I believe that whether, or not, it is appropriate to simply accept ideologies (interpretive) or to challenge them (critical) is subjective, and should be based on the nature of the research being undertaken. It would be inappropriate to question the ideologies or values reached about a researched group in an ethnography, just as it would be inappropriate to ignore injustices and otherwise in Women’s and Gender Studies-directed research.

In my academic career, I am bias towards undertaking research that uses qualitative research methods and that will result in qualitative data. My biases are also evident in the subject matter of my research endeavours – whenever possible, I have construed assignments to apply a feminist perspective. I found a connection between my preferred educational research paradigms and course work in Women’s and Gender Studies 222: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. This course approached Women’s and Gender Studies with an anthropological lens, by evaluating gender roles in different cultures while maintaining cultural relativism. The final project for this course, ‘Cultural Artifact Analysis,’ required students to choose an open-ended “artifact” from a culture different from our own, and apply feminist concepts and explanations, without imposing judgement. The interpretive paradigm, especially in the form of anthropological research, as well as the critical paradigm, especially in the form of feminist research, frame my interests and beliefs as an emerging researcher.