Engaging Complexities: Working Against Simplification as an Agenda for Qualitative Research Today. Adele Clarke in Conversation With Reiner Keller

Abstract

In 2005, Adele CLARKE first published her book on "Situational Analysis," a well-received elaboration of grounded theory methodology. Situational analysis (SA) combines older as well as more recent traditions of pragmatist sociology, especially those of the Chicago School and social worlds/arenas theory by Anselm STRAUSS, with FOUCAULT's perspective on discourse, feminist thinking, and post-positivist epistemology. In this interview with Reiner KELLER, she explains the theoretical foundations and academic motivations of this approach, and describes the concrete analytical strategies proposed by SA. In due course, she recounts her past experiences, from her very first encounters with qualitative research up to more recent influences from feminist studies and science & technology studies. CLARKE also clarifies where SA is positioned within the broader field of qualitative methodologies, and discusses questions regarding the contribution of SA to the analysis of complex social change. SA is designed to offer an analytical heuristic able to confront these complexities with a considerably expanded set of strategies for doing qualitative research. URN: http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs140212

Keywords

• grounded theory methodology
• discourse
• symbolic interactionism
• science studies
• epistemology
• social world
• mapping
• situational analysis
• Strauss
• Foucault