Phenomenology and Human Science Research Today 9789731997452, 9789731997445

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phenomenology and human science research today

Series post scriptum — OPO Editors: Lester EMBREE (USA), Ion COPOERU (Romania) Editorial Board: CHEUNG Chan-Fai (Hong Kong); Ivan CHVATIK (Czech Republic); LEE Nam-In (Republic of Korea; Zeljko LOPARIC (Brazil); Victor MOLCHANOV (Russia); Thomas NENON (USA); Rosemary RIZO-PATRON (Peru); Hans Rainer SEPP (Germany); TANI Toru (Japan); Roberto WALTON (Argentina); YU Chung-chi (Taiwan)

Massimiliano Tarozzi Luigina Mortari (eds.)

phenomenology and human science research today

¤

The present book has been supported by the Italian Ministry of University and Scientific Research, which provided the funding necessary for this publication.

¤ Zeta Books, Bucharest

www.zetabooks.com

© 2010 Zeta Books for the present edition All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronical or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. ISBN: 978-973-1997-44-5 (paperback) ISBN: 978-973-1997-45-2 / (ebook)

Table of Contents:

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Luigina Mortari and Massimiliano Tarozzi

Phenomenology as Philosophy of Research: An Introductory Essay . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Phenomenology as a Method: Concrete Studies Mia Herskind

Changing a Shared Repertoire in the Kindergarten: A Moving Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Giancarlo Gola

Narrative Research on Adult’s Informal Learning . . . . . . . . . .

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Solfrid Vatne

Development of Professional Knowledge in Action: Experiences from an Action Science Design Focusing on “Acknowledging Communication” in Mental Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Luigina Mortari and Chiara Sità

Analyzing Descriptions of Lived Experience: A Phenomenological Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

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Table of contents

Phenomenological Practice: Methodological Reflections Scott D. Churchill

Methodological Considerations for Human Science Research in the Wake of Postmodernism: Remembering Our Ground while Envisioning Our Future . . . . . 155 Letizia Caronia

Rethinking Post Modernism: On Some Epistemic and Ethical Consequences of the Researcher’s Commitment to Postmodern Constructivism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179 Joseph J.Tobin, Susanna Mantovani, and Chiara Bove

Methodological Issues in Video-Based Research on Immigrant Children and Parents in Early Childhood Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 204 Peter Willis and Sally Borbasi

The Ethical Work of Expressive Research: Revealing the Remoralizing Power of Pathic Action . . . . . . . . . 226

Phenomenology as Theoretical Perspective Christopher M. Aanstoos

Holism and the Human Sciences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249 Daniela Verducci

Going through Postmodernity with the Phenomenology of Life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270 Alan Pope

Metabletics in the Light of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism . . . . . . . . 294 Notes on Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 319

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to deeply thank the various people who, during the long preparation of this endeavor, provided us with qualified and helpful assistance. Without their care and consideration, this book would likely not have matured. First, we would like to thank all the chapter contributors, for their dedication and interest, and for all their patience throughout the peer review procedure and the complex editing and cross-reviewing process, which constitutes a rather difficult balancing act. Second, we would like to thank Zeta Books for its interest in publishing this book and particularly Professor Lester Embree for his nice feedback and invaluable insights, but also his encouragement throughout the overall process. Third, we would like to thank the Department of Cognitive Sciences and Education, University of Trento and its director, Professor Franco Fraccaroli, for generously providing us with the staff and resources to undertake this work. Finally, we would like to thank Dr. Elisabeth Behnke for her continued support, competent and passionate, throughout the editing of this book. Massimiliano Tarozzi, Luigina Mortari

Phenomenology as Philosophy of Research: An Introductory Essay Luigina Mortari and Massimiliano Tarozzi1

Phenomenology and human science inquiry What is phenomenology? This is definitely a phenomenological question. Sooner or later every phenomenologist has dealt with this question. The exigency to suggest a possible response to this key question has been clear since Husserl’s first books. Almost all of Husserl’s work can be read as a more or less direct answer to this propositional question and some of his most meaningful and important texts were meant as introductions to phenomenology.2 This need continuously to define itself is due, on the one hand, to the complex nature of phenomenology, which is never captured once and for all and is never dogmatic, which stays away from defining grids and rejects every oversimplification. There is no place for phenomenological orthodoxy, or for so-called “purism.” The “ultimate book,” one that defines phenomenological thought, can never be written. On the other hand, the need for continuous clarification itself is probably due to the fact that the essence of phenomenology can be found in its practice. In this sense, the proper quesAlthough both authors agree on the entire content of the present essay, Massimiliano Tarozzi is the author of the first, second, and fifth sections and Luigina Mortari is the author of the third, fourth, and sixth. 2 “Philosophy as rigorous science” (1911), Ideas I (1913), and “Phenomenology and theory of knowledge” (1917, but published posthumously) were three introductions to phenomenology (see Husserl 1965, 1982, and 1987) written within seven years. Another introduction to phenomenology is the article written for the Encyclopaedia Britannica in 1927 (see Husserl, 1997). 1

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tion is not “what is phenomenology,” but “how to do it.” This question requires an answer on the pragmatic level. Phenomenology is a way to educate our vision, to define our posture, to broaden the way we look at the world. This is why phenomenology is seen not only as a method (or style) for philosophical research, but also as a powerful tool for research in human science. In this essay, introducing a volume about the application of phenomenology in human science research, we will narrow our question in order to ask what the place of phenomenological thinking could be in this field. It is very difficult to define phenomenology properly. According to Herbert Spiegelberg there are as many styles of phenomenology as there are phenomenologists (see Spiegelberg, 1982 Introduction), and Amedeo Giorgi observed that “a consensual, univocal interpretation of phenomenology is hard to find” (Giorgi, 1985, pp. 23–24). Max van Manen devoted the first chapter of his well-known book on phenomenological research in human science to an attempt to define what is and what is not phenomenology in human science (van Manen, 1990, pp. 8–24). In this essay we refer mainly to phenomenology according to Husserl’s transcendental method, which is based on the idea that the core of phenomenology in human science is the phenomenological description of the invariant aspects of phenomena as they appear to consciousness. Following Giorgi, “the scientific method is descriptive because its point of departure consists of concrete descriptions of experienced events from the perspective of everyday life by participants, and then the result is a secondorder description of the psychological essence or structure of the phenomenon by the scientific researcher” (Giorgi & Giorgi, 2003, p. 251). Giorgi (1985) refers to phenomenology in terms of method, following four characteristics outlined by Maurice MerleauPonty in his 1945 preface to his Phenomenology of Perception (1962, pp. vii–xxi), where the French philosopher, too, wanted

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to answer to the question Qu’est-ce que la phénoménologie? Giorgi identifies four characteristics that qualify the specific nature of the method: description, reduction, search for essences, and intentionality. Starting from these, Giorgi establishes a phenomenological research method by suggesting a four-step procedure for data analysis. In a broader sense, however, phenomenology can contribute to the debate about empirical research in human sciences not only on the procedural plane (i.e., the techniques of data collection and analysis), but especially in terms of theoretical perspectives. In other words, the role played by phenomenology in research is mainly theoretical, deepening the theory behind the method or the understanding of the mode of inquiry (van Manen, 1990, p. 28). Michael Crotty suggests that there are four main elements for qualitative researchers (Crotty, 1998). They are our choice of methods; the way we can support this choice; our theoretical assumptions supporting this choice; and our understanding of what scientific knowledge is. These elements, which every researcher has to face in developing a research proposal, and which inform one another in a hierarchical pyramid from the more concrete to the more abstract, are (from the more abstract to the more concrete) epistemology, a theory of knowledge embedded in the theoretical perspective; theoretical perspective, the philosophical stance informing the methodology and providing a context, grounding its logic and criteria; methodology, a strategy, or plan of action, or process lying behind the choice and use of particular methods; methods, the techniques or procedures used to gather and analyze data (Crotty, 1998, p. 4). Different authors tend to place phenomenology at different steps of this imaginary stairway of increasing abstraction. Some place it at the method stage (Giorgi, 1985, 1992, 1997, 2009), others at that of methodology (Creswell, 2007; van Manen, 1990), while still others locate it at the level of theoretical perspective (Bentz-Shapiro, 1998) or even that of epistemological paradigm.

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The perspective interpreting phenomenology as a philosophy of research is prevalent in continental Europe, whereas a more functional and pragmatic reading of it generally prevails in the Anglo-Saxon world: in the English-speaking social sciences, phe­ nomenology is mainly seen as an approach aimed at exploring subjectivities and people’s lived experience (Crotty, 1996). However, Husserlian phenomenology is primarily an approach that investigates the objects of experience in order to draw up a theory of experience. With reference to research, phenomenology can be located in every one of the four previous elements. It can be an epistemological paradigm, an alternative to the idea of “normal science,” which is grounded in the positivist paradigm. But it can be also a methodological approach that can offer proper research procedures and original techniques, mainly for data analysis.

Phenomenology as a movement There are several research approaches and schools inspired by phenomenology; each offers both a research methodology and a set of procedures and tools to collect and especially to analyze data in empirical research in the human and social sciences. These approaches have already been broadly and critically examined in their historical development (Cloonan, 1995) and with reference to different disciplines and research areas like nursing (Cohen & Omery, 1994; Dowling, 2007) and psychology (Giorgi, 2006; Applebaum, 2006). A comparative outlook among different qualitative methods also exists (Creswell, 2007). That is why we eschew a thorough literature review in this paper.1 1 There are three main approaches to what we can define as the “classical” phenomenological method in research (Applebaum, 2007); (1) The Duquesne school, including in particular Giorgi, but also Colaizzi, Fischer, and Van Kaam, was inspired by descriptive phenomenology with a Husserlian framework; (2) hermeneutical phenomenology (van Manen, 1990) ” because of the influence of Lagenveld and the Utrecht School—is defined as “hermeneutical”

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The Continental European phenomenological tradition has not produced a variety of methodological “translations” to guide research employing the philosophy inaugurated by Husserl, although many researchers have been inspired by it. The exception is the Italian Paolo Bozzi’s studies of perception and his method, which he himself called “experimental phenomenology” (Bozzi 1989, 1990). His studies in experimental psychology are, unfortunately, not well known outside Italy. For Bozzi, phenomenology was more a philosophical horizon, a theoretical viewpoint, rather than a set of procedures. The same can be said for Piero Bertolini, the founder of phenomenological educational research in Italy (Bertolini, 1988).1 This is another reason why, in the present essay, we will refer to phenomenology as a philosophy of research, as a way of thin­ king about knowledge (how do we know what we know?) and as a way to look at the world and make sense of it. Following Crotty, we will position the following remarks on the epistemological plane, which has specific effects concerning our assumptions about the social reality under examination. We agree with because the Dutch approach is focused on the interpretive dimension, with the researcher as mediator of the meanings of the participants’ lived experience; (3) transcendental (or psychological) phenomenology, developed by Moustakas (1994), focuses less on interpretations of the researcher and more on the eidetic reduction process reaching transcendental knowledge. In addition to these three main North American approaches, one can add other like the phenomenographic method (Richardson, 1999), influenced by Ferente Marton (Marton, 1988), and the tradition of the Department of Education and Educational Research in Gothenburg, Sweden, along with other recent developments of the method such as Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis or IPA (Smith & Osborn, 2008). 1 Beginning in the 1950s, Piero Bertolini, who was Enzo Paci’s student, laid the foundation for what has become a phenomenological tradition in education in Italy. Since then, many researchers and scholars in education have been engaged in the epistemological and methodological debate around phenomenology and education. Some of them, led by Bertolini, established a group, mainly at the University of Bologna, and gathered around a journal— Encyclopaideia—as well as a series of books, and recently a Study Center, aimed at promoting the phenomenological approach in education.

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Merleau-Ponty that phenomenology is first and foremost a stance, a posture of the researcher, a style of thought: “phenomenology can be practiced and indentified as manner or style of thinking that […] existed as a movement before arriving at complete awareness of itself as a philosophy” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, p. viii). The main purpose of the present introduction is accordingly to explore the possibility of identifying a phenomenological style of research in human science, specifying its features and its boundaries. After having clarified in what sense phenomenology can be seen as a style of thought, contributions of phenomenological theory, method, and stance will be examined along five main lines. First, although phenomenology represents an alternative to the form of knowledge characteristic of empirical investigation, it offers the latter a theory of experience that allows the researcher to think of the meaning of inquiry data and of the way in which that data can be elaborated as signs of the phenomenon under examination. Second, and more generally, describing human experience raises a key point for qualitative research as a whole. Hammersley (1989) called this the “dilemma of qualitative methods.” Typically, the qualitative researcher does not know how to reconcile subjective and objective knowledge. On the one hand, qualitative research successfully explores the empirical dimension of the subject, and this is extremely important, since social and human phenomena cannot be understood without taking into account subjective experience. On the other hand, today it is not possible to elaborate the subjective dimension empirically in a way that would fit the requirements of science as it is recognized by the scientific community. In other words, we can have credible but not reliable knowledge of subjectivity. Obviously, nothing can solve this dilemma. As we will show, however, phenomenology problematizes it. It poses the question in extraordinarily deep terms, but it also offers an original viewpoint, a

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theory of experience, that allows us to think of subjectivity as a space of rigorous knowledge about the world. Third, phenomenology offer us sophisticated and effective instruments for a descriptive practice that represents a fundamental standpoint from which to access the qualitative exploration of the human and social worlds. Fourth, to access phenomena requires a fundamental epistemic act: the epochē, which assumes vast relevance in empirical research, allowing the researcher to take a fresh and unprejudiced perspective toward the phenomenon under examination. Fifth, and finally, phenomenology is also a way of being, a stance encompassing a passive-receptive way of being, an open attention, a reflective discipline—three postures that allow the researcher to become a phenomenological heuristic tool.

Toward a phenomenological theory of experience Phenomenology as a theoretical perspective informing a me­thodology In addition to being a research method and a style of thinking, phenomenology is also, and perhaps mainly, a theoretical perspective offering a framework that encompasses a methodology. Phenomenology can also be seen as one of the pillars of a scientific paradigm. We define paradigm, according to Kuhn (1962), as “the entire constellation of beliefs, values, techniques shared by members of a given scientific community” (Kuhn, 1962, p. 75). Paradigms are frameworks that function as maps or guides for scientific communities, determining important problems or issues for their members to address and defining acceptable theories, methods and techniques. In particular, a paradigm offers to the researcher a conception of reality (ontology) and an idea of scientific knowledge (epistemology), before generating specific procedures for research (methodology). In this sense, phenomenology can offer the researcher relevant thou­ghts

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about ontological and epistemological questions. In particular, in phenomenology the ontological (what is reality?) is closely related to the epistemological (How do we know what we know?). It is not true that the ontological problem only pertains either to a metaphysical or a positivist perspective. According to the Husserlian philosopher Roberta de Monticelli, even though post-Heideggerian phenomenology is usually seen as a philosophy that refutes ontology, phenomenology is an ontology, the study of being and of real and possible things, since it focuses exclusively on the way things appear, and on the relation between appearance and reality (De Monticelli, 2007; De Monticelli & Conni, 2008). Phenomenology is ontologically revolutionary as far as the relationship between appearance and reality is concerned. This is a key point for researchers. In particular, a phenomenological ontology, according to Husserl’s Göttingen circle (Besoli & Guidetti, 2000), accepts the existence of things outside the mind that thinks about them. So it is a somewhat realistic ontology. Many people believe that a realistic ontology should correspond to an objectivist epistemology (Lincoln & Guba, 1994). This is an idea of knowledge where it would be possible for researchers to “converge onto that reality until, finally, it can be predicted and controlled” (Lincoln & Guba, 1985, p. 37). An objectivist epistemology conceives of the knower and the known independently and makes it possible to know reality for what it is: a faithful mirror of the objective order of things. However, phenomenology goes beyond the paradigmatic Manichaeism, and allows the researcher to accept, at the same time, the existence of the “things themselves.” To accept a world and the things in it as existing outside of our consciousness does not imply that their meanings exist independently of our consciousness (Crotty, 1998). Beyond the paradigm clash that has often led to obdurate, dogmatic, and prejudiced positions, the theoretical contribution of phenomenology on the ontological plane is undeniable. It rests above all on the theory of experience that phenomenology

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provides to empirical research. Many qualitative methodologies, not only the so-called “phenomenological” method, need a theory of experience that offers an ontological background that can make sense of the idea of data, of sample, of description, of coding, of participants, and handle all these concepts critically. We are thinking particularly of grounded theory, which, as Kathy Charmaz rightly stressed, has produced some significant ambiguities in its application, precisely because it fails to take the epistemological question into account (Charmaz, 2000). The “external world” is a big problem, a thorny challenge for all of us who do qualitative research, and particularly for those who do it in such practical fields as education or nursing and must produce useful results for practitioners. This is the dilemma, and at times the anguish, of the qualitative researcher: seeking lines of coherence, recurrences, and rational structures within a reality that is itself complex, with the awareness that every attempt to make order of its multidimensionality is plagued by the need to avoid reductionism and oversimplification.

Phenomenology and qualitative research To take this ambiguity into account, and o live within this dilemma, means that the researcher cannot take for granted the ontological and epistemological underpinnings of doing qualitative research. For example, what does “data” mean? What does it mean to “collect” or “gather” data? The term “data” is the plural past participle of the Latin verb dō (to give). As such, it connotes something fixed, established, given. It alludes to a vision of reality coherent with positivist assumptions, where the objects are there, in the world, and is very far from the theoretical claims of qualitative research. Where understanding the subjects’ meaning is more important than collecting unbiased data. Moreover, the verbs “to collect” and “to gather,” referring to data, require an action of epistemic investigation that includes assembling reality

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samples that can be objectively analyzed by a neutral observer. Not surprisingly, some prefer to “construct data” instead of “collecting” it (Morse & Richards, 2002). Qualitative research needs a philosophy that can provide a perspective with which to ponder some basic questions that should not be taken for granted by researchers. What is the epistemic nature of data in qualitative human (and social) research? What does it mean to collect data? What are “personal accounts”? What is the correspondence between an empirically generated theory and reality? How can researchers observe and/ or describe without a theory of experience? Qualitative researchers cannot avoid these basic questions, although the answers need not be absolute or authoritative. Researchers do, however, require some ontological and epistemological answers to these questions, answers that are consistent with their methodological choices. If these questions are not considered as problematic, the methodological choices embedded in qualitative research, tend to borrow natural science’s assumptions about reality, adopting what Husserl called a “natural attitude.” Too often qualitative researchers embrace this naive realism based on an objectivist notion of mirroring knowledge—not only through epistemological laziness, but also because of the evident advantages deriving from fitting with the dominant scientific paradigm. On the other hand, phenomenology offers an alternative theory of experience as a theoretical horizon in which researchers can find space for the various epistemic acts they exercise. It is not interested in “mere facts,” but in their impact on flesh and blood subjects, nor does it attempt to objectivize facts photographically; instead it is interested in analyzing the meaning that such facts assume for the subjects and the way in which their consciousness intends those objects. Phenomenology is seeking realities, not pursuing Truth. For phenomenologists, reality is a thick forest where the tangles of meaning that subjects and ob-

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jects assign each to other are interwoven. This underbrush of reality is a lifeworld made of interconnected, lived experiences, and our knowledge of phenomena comes to life through them. Subjects, then, are embodied in that world, and that is why their visions of reality are so meaningful and revealing of the social reality that we, as researchers, intend to explore. However, this does not mean that phenomenological reality is only a social or discursive construction that arises at the crossroads of interconnections among social actors.

The “realism” of phenomenology The object of phenomenological research is the participants’ experience of phenomena, the way in which consciousnesses give meaning to their world in an intersubjective dimension. Experience, where phenomenological social research is located, is the description of the phenomenon as it appears to the researcher’s consciousness. In this sense, phenomenology invites us to take what we see seriously. It is a philosophy of attention, of the careful description of the visible profile of things, while ever attentive to their hidden one. This descriptive attention is very far from relativism, subjectivism, or skepticism in regard to knowledge. Visible phenomena are entities to reckon with, as are social phenomena. They are not epiphenomena of a reality far from our knowledge, or mere subjective projections of human perception that cannot be shared. Phenomenology, as a method, aims at researching rigorous knowledge and presupposes the existence of a phenomenon to which we are faithful. Faithfulness to the phenomenon is the “principle of principles” as Husserl states in his 1913 Ideas I (Husserl, 1982, §24). Of course, the hidden profile of things, the essence of phenomena, the products of phenomenological reduction are not objective, universal or eternal truths. We do not know their exact ontological nature, and we do not really care. As phenomenological

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researchers, we know the many ways, different and various, in which objects present themselves to our knowledge, although limited in number and quality. A chair can never appear to my consciousness as a pen; a cup can have different shapes and colors, but it always will be a convenient container for liquids. This is the “realism” of phenomenology, according to Husserl—an intersubjective, rather than an objectivistic realism, based on the principle of faithfulness to the phenomenon, which is extremely significant for social research. What phenomenology provides to a theory of experience seems particularly original and important. In fact, on the one hand, it overcomes the objectivist assumptions of countless qualitative inquiries that do not adequately consider the theoretical underpinnings of the research methodologies they employ or that try to emulate the natural sciences. On the other hand, it prevents researchers from falling into anti-scientific positions. Such positions are often supported by postmodernism, although they threaten to deprive the research of its meaning. Postmodern social constructivism advocates, among other things, a world that does not exist independently of our consciousness of it; the idea of “empirical” knowledge as co-construction; the absolute centrality of subjects as individuals; and an overemphasis on language as the space in which the world is built. In sum, social constructivism refutes notions like science, truth and reality, while phenomenology seeks a better understanding of such terms (Giorgi, 2007). Phenomenology also refutes an empiricist conception of reality. Its purpose is to reach a meaningful comprehension, prioritizing lived experience (Erlebnis), rather than aspiring to a full explanation. Experience is not conceived as a model of the external world, a “cast” of objective reality. Knowledge is not a mirror of nature. What is interesting is the way in which we experience things. In phenomenology, this originates a theory of reality based on the concept of intentionality and on the forms and

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modes in which it is possible to be aware of objects, as Husserl explained in his Fifth Logical Investigation (Husserl, 1970a). Objects, and research data that summarize, represent, and symbolize them, do not live in the mind. They are not mental events, as an extreme subjectivism or skepticism seems to uphold. Nor are they “things” that exist objectively in the world (or at least I can doubt their existence). But they are phenomena offered to our consciousness. They are clues, signs that allow us to describe, or to intuit, opinions, perceptions, circumstances, symbols, representations, and visions. Therefore, what a phenomenologist uses in his/ her research are not facts or objects, not pieces of the world, but phenomena. Phenomena do not interfere between us and things, preventing our seeing them and perceiving their givenness. Instead, according to phenomenology, phenomena are the ways in which things themselves appear to us and exhibit their own being. Subjects inhabit the lifeworld. The researcher extracts his/ her data from this world. So they are not fragments or samples of the world, but perceptions, intentional acts of consciousness that give meaning and organize that world. It is not a matter of purely objective visions, individual constructions, psychic phenomena, mere single representations, but rather of intentional objects, phenomena that reveal the things’ hidden profiles. Husserl’s phenomenology is a description of the experience attentive to its invariant features and to the intersubjective value of our perceptions. The possibility of building an ontology of the real (so essential for human science research) therefore lies in the theory of experience provided by Husserlian phenomenology. It soon becomes clear to what degree Husserl advocates realism—a realism that is very distant from the naive realism of the “natural attitude” or the empiricism of the hard sciences. Husserl wrote in his Nachwort to the Ideas: “That the world exists, that it is given as existing universe in uninterrupted experience which is con-

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stantly fusing into universal concordance, is entirely beyond doubt. But it is quite another matter to understand its indubitability which sustains life and positive sciences and to clarify the ground of its legitimacy.”1 To clarify the legitimacy of the belief in the existence of the external world (the qualitative researcher’s dilemma) is a phenomenological imperative for anyone who is doing scientific research. The phenomenological theory of experience is an attempt to clarify the legitimacy of what seems obvious and what we take for granted. This attempt draws on an ontological and epistemological background within which qualitative research can flourish, and delineates a middle path between two antithetical extremes: on the one hand, a neo-positivist objectivism that a-critically assumes the existence of objects in the world and believes in the possibility of discovering universal laws that govern them; and on the other hand, a postmodern subjectivism, skeptical and relativistic, that denies the possibility of a rigorous thinking about the world, and thwarts the urges to investigate the phenomena beyond their discursive construction.

The epistemological primacy of description According to Husserl, if science is to be called such—a systematic and rigorous investigation—it needs to capture the profile of the investigated object itself (Cohen & Omery, 1994, p. 139), which is its essence. Husserl therefore describes phenomenology as a science that investigates essences, and, moreover, as a science that deals exclusively with with “essences and essential relations” (Husserl, 1965, p. 116). An essence is a set of qualities that are necessarily related to the thing (Husserl, 1982, pp. 7–8); essence can be defined as the “emerging structure of the thing” (De Monticelli & Conni, 2008, p. 10). This emerging structure exposes the essential features of an entity or of an event, mani1

Husserl, 1989, p. 420.

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festing its specific identity. When the essence of a thing is put into words, others who have not experienced it firsthand can nevertheless intuitively capture its essential qualities, the core qualities a reality needs in order to be what it is (De Monticelli & Conni, 2008, p. 14). Phenomenology claims that in order to grasp the essence of a thing, it is necessary to take phenomena as the object of the analysis. This epistemological thesis is based on the ontological assumption that the essence of a thing discloses itself in its manner of appearing. By affirming that the essence reveals itself in the appearing of the phenomenon, phenomenology places itself beyond the old metaphysical dichotomy between being and appearing, which has always been at the core of Western philosophy. This ancient dichotomy not only implies a scission between being and appearing, but also introduces a radical axiological asymmetry to the detriment of appearing, because it affirms that the phenomenon is a mere appearance that conceals the real being, which does not appear above the surface (Arendt, 1978, p. 25). Phenomenology dismantles this old metaphysical dichotomy, along with the prejudice of the supremacy of being over appearing, by affirming that being and appearing coincide (Arendt, 1978, p. 19), and therefore “nothing else stands ‘behind’ the phenomena of phenomenology” (Heidegger, 1996, p. 31). On the assumption of the primacy of appearance, we are invited to consider that just because we are destined to live in a world that appears—that is, a world made up of things that are meant to be seen, heard, touched, tasted, and smelled—it is reasonable to assume that what appears is worthy of consideration, since it shows what it is. Consequently, the phenomenologist’s task is not to leave the world of appearances by releasing thinking from the bonds of phenomena, but rather to concern him/herself with appearances, because what appears constitutes the real matter of research (Arendt, 1978, p. 27). The phenomenon is not something inci-

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dental, but is being disclosing itself. Starting from this ontological assumption, phenomenology claims to be the science of phenomena, that is, of what appears in its dative evidence. Phe­no­menology is a return to phenomena, to everything that appears in the manner of its appearing. Heidegger (1996, p. 30) captured the essence of phenomenology by defining it as the science that makes possible ἀποφαίνεσθαι t¦ fainÒmhena (apophaìnesthai tà phainòmena), which means “to let what shows itself be seen from itself, just as it shows itself from itself.” Jean-Luc Marion states that the difference between phenomenology and other science is that, in general, scientific research is concerned with “proving,” while phenomenology is concerned with “showing”; showing a phenomenon means “to let appearance appear in a way that manifests its most perfect appearing, so that it is possible to receive it in the exact way it gives itself” (Marion, 1997, p. 13, my translation). So the phenomenon is not something incidental, but is being coming to presence, and it is up to phenomenology to capture the essential specificity of each phenomenon. In order to capture the emerging structure of the phenomenon, phenomenology indicates description as a fundamental cognitive act; as Merleau-Ponty explains, “it is a matter of describing, not of explaining or analyzing” (1962, p. viii). A careful description of phenomena entails being attentive to what is given in intuition. Husserl himself, in the course of his lectures, was famous for the descriptions he developed “‘with intense care and scruple,” (Moran, 2000, p. 64). Since it does not focus on causal explanations, but on the description of what is evident to the eye, phenomenology is referred to as the science of description. The act of description enables the actualization of phenomenology’s key imperative, which prescribes going to the “things themselves.” Indeed, in the Logical Investigations, description is defined as the act of capturing the givenness of the phenomenon in the manner in which it is directly given in intuitive essence, without presupposing anything about it.

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Since the thing itself is not objectively meant as an entity out there but as a lived experience, an act of consciousness by which the mind grasps the objects, the objects of description become “cognitive acts,” or “acts of consciousness.” The description must bring to the eye pure events of consciousness, clarify them completely, fixing in accurate conceptual expressions what each time is given in direct self-evidence each time (Husserl, 1982, pp. 151–152); Thus, the phenomenological method consists of describing the flow of cognitive acts (Erkennisse), or mental lived experiences, and the products of thoughts that emerge from this flow (Husserl, 1982, p. 68–69); if this description allows access to the essence of the process of knowledge, phenomenological work is at the base of every scientific investigation.

The principle of faithfulness Description will ground the scientific method if it is rigorous, and it is rigorous when it captures evidence, because science is grounded on evidence. In order to be rigorous, it must capture the phenomenon as it appears in its original givenness, that is, in the “dative” element in the experience. To capture the phenomenon in its original givenness means to bring the object of attention to “fullest clarity” (Husserl, 1982, p. 153). But when the mind’s gaze moves to the lived experiences in order to study them, they generally appear “with a low degree of clarity” (ibid.). The basic methodological question raised by phenomenology is how to capture the phenomenon in its original givenness, bringing it to full clarity. As regards this issue, Husserl suggests applying a heuristic principle that defines the “principle of all principles,” that is, the principle of faithfulness to the phenomenon. Working out this principle means describing the phenomenon as it appears, as it manifests itself to consciousness: “everything originally … offered to us in ‘intuition’ is to be accepted simply as what it is presented as being, but also only within the limits in which it is presented there”

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(Husserl, 1982, p. 44). The principle of faithfulness should help avoid the misconstructions and impositions placed in advance on our own experience both by everyday common sense and by science itself, so as to revive our living contact with reality and remain close to the deepest experiential evidence (Moran, 2000, p. 4). According to Husserl, the mental maneuvers for gaining a faithful intuition of the phenomenon are at the center of it. In order to activate the fidelity principle, it is necessary to take as guiding criteria for the investigation two subsidiary principles: the “principle of evidence” and the “principle of transcendency.” Any perspective of thought proceeds from assumptions; the gnosiological assumption at the base of the phenomenological method states that every phenomenon has its own manners of presenting itself to the eye of the experiencer (Husserl, 1982, p. 10). These are its modes of givenness. Proceeding from this assumption, the “principle of evidence” requires that the investigation process move only in the directions suggested by the phenomena in their way of appearing. The cognitive procedure adapted to the way phenomena manifest themselves finds its legitimization in the typical phenomenological ontological assumption that the other’s being reveals itself in the forms of its appearing. However, stating that no discontinuity exists between being and appearing is not the same as claiming that the whole essence of a phenomenon becomes immediately manifest. As much as a heuristic procedure can be rigorously detailed and entirely possible for a phenomenon, it is inevitable that a fuzzy area remains; this is due to the fact that the being of one thing does not make itself completely transparent to our gaze, since each entity has its own specific mode of transcending appearance. The manifestation of a phenomenon entails at the same time the revealing and the concealing of its essence. It seems that in the way phenomena are revealed, a concealing, too, is always involved, and the search for valid knowledge cannot do without considering it; the search for the phenomenon’s hidden side needs the application of the “transcendency principle,”

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which requires us to “go beyond what at any time is truly given, beyond what can be directly ‘seen’ and apprehended” (Husserl, 1964, p. 28). Reaching what is not immediately apparent may be a hard and tricky task, but is nevertheless possible, since the hidden profile of a phenomenon is suggested by the apparent one. While the “principle of evidence” requires sticking to what is revealed in the shape of the offering givenness, the “transcendency principle” suggests looking for the invisible profile of the phenomena, following the traces left by the evident profile. The establishing of heuristics capable of gathering data that are faithful to the phenomenon means, therefore, simultaneously cultivating a tension that keeps the gaze rooted on evidences and a disposition to let them guide us beyond what is immediately manifest in order to have access to what our gaze in its natural attitude cannot see, remaining faithful to the clues suggested by the apparent profile. Whereas it is an undoubtedly complicated heuristic practice to try to apply both principles in phenomenological investigation, it is likewise true that this is the necessary condition for engaging in the search for the widest and deepest knowledge possible.

Epochē The epochē, as the epistemological device that allows us to fulfill a phenomenological way of knowing, is necessary to put into effect the principle of faithfulness to the phenomenon. There is no space here to discuss all of the various aspects of the phenomenological approach as these aspects are related to our research practices. However, in the present introduction, one basic device of the phenomenological method, should at least be mentioned.1 Epochē can be understood in two senses. One is broader and trivial, referring to the general bracketing attitude of the re1 For further discussion of the phenomenological notion of epochē see Tarozzi, 2006

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searcher who suspends his/her experiences, as much as possible, in order to take a fresh perspective toward the phenomenon to be investigated. The other, more specific, is the “fundamental phenomenological consideration,” which is the premise of the phenomenological reduction. The two levels are closely related, but here we shall emphasize the latter. “Suspending judgment” and “bracketing” are expressions that have been becoming more and more common in social psychology, communication, social research, and education, and often in ordinary discourse as well. However, beyond their simplistic meaning, generically indicating a non-conditioned attitude that is sufficiently open, available to listen, unbiased, and non-judging, here we are interested in the phenomenological roots of this attitude that is theoretical before being methodological. For phenomenologists, the epochē not only reminds us that we are always embedded in our prejudices and pre-comprehensions, so that we should distance ourselves from them and suspend judgment about them, but represents first and foremost a transition that introduces us to a cognitive and heuristic path of reduction. The reduction, which is first “phenomenological” and then “transcendental,” is supposed to transform our natural attitude, modifying our naive experience of things and allowing us to accomplish a cognitive act toward the world, to keep ourselves faithful to the phenomenon, and (at the end of the reduction process) to recall and evaluate the same prejudices and precomprehensions that we had frozen at the beginning with the epochē. According to Husserl’s Introduction to Ideas I, phenomenology invites us to bracket all previous habits of thinking overcoming the walls built by these habits while wewere looking at reality with a “natural” attitude—and in so doing, learning to see authentically. In this way the German philosopher not only discusses the bias that distorts the possibility of scientific research itself, but questions the same legitimacy of our knowledge of a world where things (and the data that should represent

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them) are supposed to lie: he brings up for discussion the natural world, at hand, existing here, for us. Epochē, to which Husserl refers from 1913 onward (see Husserl, 1982), is an ancient notion. It date back to the Hellenistic philosophies, and in particular to Skepticism. Among ancient and modern skeptics, it was (and is) the attitude of those who neither accept nor refuse, neither assert nor deny. Epochē means denying assent to non-manifest things, trusting neither the senses nor reason, and so remaining without opinions. To refuse in that way any dogmatic attitude would lead to ¢tarx…a, to imperturbability, so actively sought by Hellenistic schools. Therefore, according to skeptics (and for ancient skeptics, like Pyrrho in particular), the epochē has to do with the search for true happiness beyond the material world, so it is an attitude that can be chiefly located on the ethical level. However, the skeptical, relativistic, or nihilist attitude is not the attitude proper to phenomenology. Thus epochē should be redefined and located in a broader semantic and theoretical context. From the time of the Ideas, Husserl drew on the Greek term ™poc» by recalling the etymological roots of the Greek verb ἐπέχω (to suspend, to interrupt), which indicates the act of stopping, of ceasing. Therefore performing the epochē is like finding the primary point from which to begin every cognitive and epistemic activity. The epochē is not just a form of doubting, but the beginning of a process of authentic knowledge. We do not doubt about things we bracket; we just avoid using them, we do not put them at the basis of our reading of the world, we refrain from assigning them a value. It helps us to unmask and disclose things, to interrogate ourselves about the meaning that the world assumes for us (and for all those intentional subjects with whom I am intersubjectively interconnected). The phenomenological epochē is similar to Descartes’ methodical doubt since it rises from a analogous need, but does not

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coincide with it. The methodical doubt already introduced in the First precept presented in the Discourse on Method, and further developed in the profound Meditations on First Philosophy so appreciated by Husserl, is very far from being a denial of knowledge: instead, it is a means (never an end in itself ) of reaching certainty. In The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology Husserl recalls the meaning of the Cartesian epochē starting from Descartes’ Meditations. Since he wanted to establish philosophical knowledge in an absolute way, Descartes begins with “a sort of radical, skeptical epochē” (Husserl, 1970b, p. 76). A skeptical epochē is an act “which places in question all his hitherto existing convictions, which forbids in advance any judgmental use of them, forbids taking any position as to their validity or invalidity. Once in his life every philosopher must proceed in this way; if he has not done it, and even already had ‘his philosophy,’ he must still do it. Prior to the epochē ‘his philosophy’ is to be treated like any other prejudice” (ibid.). Within the Crisis at least two levels of epochē are identified. One referring to the suspension of assent to the enunciations of objective sciences (this is combined with the suspension of judgment concerning the naive experience of the world), to their criteria for truth, and to the very idea of objective knowledge of the world. The other introduces the reduction to the “absolutely unique, ultimately functioning ego” (Husserl, 1970b, §55, p. 186), i.e., to an analysis leading toward the absolute ego, the ego as an ultimate functional center of all constitution. This is the transcendental reduction, which is aimed at revealing the transcendental subject, the intentional consciousness that represents the phenomenological residuum (everything that is left after the epochē) of the transcendental reduction. This second level, where the epochē would be the means required to reach transcendental subjectivity and the absolute ego, is less interesting for our

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purposes, and we cannot share with Husserl the idealistic turn behind this position, evident since the Ideas. Instead, we are interested in the epochē as a way to modify the obvious and ordinary experience of things, a way that leads not to the absolute self, the ego cogito, as its phenomenological residuum, but to a pre-predicative experience of the world (experience as an object of empirical inquiry, lived by an intentional consciousness). In the second section of the first book of the Ideas, Husserl clearly outlines the move carried out to neutralize the natural attitude toward the world. With this, “I am not negating this ‘world’ as though I were a sophist; I am not doubting its factual beings as though I were a skeptic; rather I am exercising the ‘phenomenological’ ™poc» which also completely shuts me off from any judgment about spatiotemporal factual being” (Husserl, 1982, p. 61). In doing so, one should suspend, neutralize every cognitive position assumed before the world—mainly, the idea of reality as belief in an already given world. This is not merely a skeptical doubt or a nihilist negation of reality, but the cessation of an ingenuous belief regarded as “natural.” Husserl is not concerned if our ethical and social behaviors presuppose and accept the unquestioned assumption of the existence of a natural world, in natural, practical life. He is more interested in the challenge of establishing a rigorous knowledge than in the existential implications of living following a natural attitude toward things. We should not forget that in the first decade of the 20th century, Husserl was seeing the first acknowledgments of his phenomenology, and he was well aware of the need to explain the basis of the phenomenological approach, and its specific differences, to the broader philosophical. and psychological community. In particular, being as far from experimental psychologism as from positivism and from skepticism, Husserl wanted to stress that phenomenologically oriented philosophical thinking is still a Kantian rigorous way of thinking, different from

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common thinking. It is a form of knowledge aspiring to scientific validity, in the sense of the Greek epistēmē (even if it is not equal to the empiricist model of science). Husserl thus assigns an epochal task to phenomenology: namely, the revolution of philosophical thinking, which requires the adoption of a rigorous habit animated by the intent of rebuilding philosophy as “rigorous science” (Husserl, 1965). And according to Husserl’s intentions, the notion of the epochē can still enlighten the possibility of constructing a scientific and empirical knowledge of human experience. Obviously “scientific” and “empirical” have a substantially different meaning from the analytic and neo-positivist signification, which claims an undisputed correspondence between things and their scientific description. But how does the epochē take shape within a rigorous theory of knowledge? What is its theoretical space within the investigation, beyond the self-reflective attitude of the researcher? The phenomenological suspension of assent is not the simple positivist attention toward avoiding polluting the research setting with the researcher’s bias. As Husserl himself observed: “The ™poc» in question here is not to be mistaken for the one which positivism requires, but which indeed, as we had to persuade ourselves, is itself violated by such positivism. It is not now a matter of excluding all prejudices that cloud the pure objectivity of research, not a matter of constituting a science ‘free of theories,’ ‘free of metaphysics,’ by groundings all of which go back to the immediate findings, nor a matter of means for attaining such ends, about the value of which there is, indeed, no question” (Husserl, 1982, p. 62). As mentioned above, in the Anglo-Saxon social sciences research, many simplistic views of the phenomenological approach are circulating. These views tend to oversimplify the theoretical moment of the epochē by narrowing it to a simple bracketing act that suspends every evaluating attitude toward the facts and subjects involved. But the Husserlian epochē is more than this: it is a matter of suspending ingenuous assumptions about the phenom-

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enon under inquiry, and so of exhibiting a self-reflective stance that allows the phenomenologist to recognize, and to make explicit, his/her prejudiced assumptions in order to gain access to an eidetic knowledge of the phenomenon. And from here, it is possible for the researcher to describe a lived experience or to build a theory grounded in the experience. However, there are some practical as well as methodological problems: theoretically, the epochē tends to put the subject who is bracketing the world outside the reality upon which s/he is supposed to suspend judgment; so, thus as Spiegelberg pointed out, the epochē would cut the subject off from the reality of other people (Spiegelberg, 1969, pp. 157–159; cf. Spiegelberg, 1982, p. 139), which is obviously impossible in the investigation. The impossibility of putting the epochē into practice is one of the reasons behind the hermeneutical turn in phenomenology, back to Heidegger, who denied the same theoretical possibility of the epochē. Actually, many researchers have observed that is very hard to bracket empirical reality in carrying out research. How can it be possible? How can a researcher step aside from him/herself and from his/her ways of giving meaning to the reality experienced? According to Merleau-Ponty, we believe that transcendental epochē is only a Kantian regulative idea—one that cannot be completely accomplished but, at the same time cannot be avoided. And this is because, ignoring the dimension of the epochē runs the risk of taking things and their perceptions for granted, implicitly assuming some prejudices and pre-comprehensions about the phenomenon we wish to explore. What is important, however, is to mark the detachment intentionally. This can only be done using some expedients such as, for instance, a research journal and a research team as means to realize the epochē in the research activity. By the way, the epochē does not eliminate anything, does not cancel the experience of the world, nor the assumption of it or

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assumptions about it—even those based on naive beliefs or prejudiced knowledge of it. Our scientific and pre-scientific knowledge is not denied. We only refrain from confering validity on such knowledge. Everything that was obvious becomes a phenomenon, a meaning for someone’s consciousness. But our precomprehensions and anticipated knowledge have to be appropriately registered and documented in order to be recalled when, after a careful description of the phenomenon, we recover what we put into brackets. In some sense, we can say that basically, the epochē attitude is the research itself. The phenomenologically oriented researcher is seeking those data that can resist the reiterated attacks of the epochē, and this is one of the main research devices. It is through this device that we can profess our respect for the fundamental principle of faithfulness to the phenomenon, as we showed earlier. This principle requires the researcher to describe the phenomenon as it appears to the consciousness that intends to study it, by respecting its boundaries and the limits through which it appears to consciousness. The faithfulness to the phenomenon allowed by the epochē is a principle particularly important in human science research, where the phenomena to be explored are embedded in complex networks of meanings and can be only described by heuristic devices that researchers spread out on the reality under examination. Without the epochē, the researcher’s “natural” attitude, which is always extremely prejudiced, primarily becomes evident in statistical elaborations of isolable and controllable variables, which unavoidably tend to anticipate the direct experience of the phenomenon. These techniques and their underlying habits produce a prejudiced description through the use of codified and rigid languages and procedures. To mathematize reality (seen as social facts) means to betray it, being constitutively unfaithful to the phenomena in order to utilize a tool that allows us to scrape some scanty and impoverished information (numbers and measures) about the reality that one

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wanted to explore. But qualitative research too sometimes risks betraying the phenomenon, seeking data as facts, isolating variables, looking for linear causes behind the phenomena. Without the epochē as the basic epistemological attitude, there is the actual risk, in whatever qualitative methods as well, of taking an anticipated knowledge of phenomena for granted by imposing observation grids, coding systems, and analytic categories defined a priori and based on pre-comprehensions or drawn from literature. The epochē is not an end; it is neither an ethical principle nor an existential attitude (even if it is correct to think so). Instead in human science research it is a cognitive device, and as a typical feature of an empirical investigation within a phenomenological approach, it allows the researcher to bracket the natural world—as well as the naive thoughts produced about it and contained within it—in order to build rigorous knowledge. Then a phenomenology intended in this manner, introduced by an epochē that is likewise intended in this manner, can also be interpreted as an epistemology: a reflection about what makes knowledge into a science, a thinking that addresses the scientific nature of the science. Both the epochē as a basic cognitive and heuristic act and the principle of faithfulness to the phenomenon introduce a dialectical play between evidence and transcendentality, between an empirical and an eidetic approach, between the search for “truths” and the awareness of the impossibility of succeeding. Thus phenomenology is a troublesome path between the clear awareness of the senseless belief in an objective reality and the tireless research of the hidden profile of things—a never-ending exploration, dramatically adventurous, always open, and extremely complex.

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Phenomenology as a modeling work on oneself If we assume that the epochē is a cognitive device, and that this device is the essential tool for gaining rigorous access to the essence of the phenomena, then in order to develop a scientific posture, the researcher must work on him/herself and model his/her mental stance in order to allow the possibility of a good way of encountering the world of experience. In other words, acquiring a scientific method does not mean learning mere techniques of inquiry, understood as tools which are objectively available, but shaping or modeling oneself in order to turn oneself into a heuristic tool (Mortari, 2007). “Phenomenology cannot be reduced to a set of procedures” (Benner, 1994, p. xvii), it is a way of entering into a relationship with things. In order to outline what it means for a researcher to become a phenomenological heuristic tool, it is necessary to identify the mental stances that characterize the phenomenological gaze. An analysis of Husserlian writings shows that these phenomenological stances are the following: a passive-receptive way of being, an open attention; a hospitality toward the phenomena and a reflective discipline.

A passive-receptive way of being Knowledge is valid if the researcher succeeds in capturing evident data from the phenomenon, i.e., data that accurately reveal the essence of the phenomenon. “Data,” in French, is “donné,” which means “given,” or “gift,” what the phenomenon gives about itself. If the data is a gift, it is necessary to understand the specific quality of the cognitive act that is able to receive the gift. A cognitive act that is true to the essence of what is given as a gift is not an act that grasps the datum and forces it into its conceptual grid, but an act that receives, that accepts the datum precisely as it is given (d. Husserl, 82, §24, p. 44). It is a receiv-

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ing act. To receive, or accept the datum in its original profile, without further manipulation, is a fundamental dynamic stance of phenomenological epistemology. By accepting the original givenness, phenomenology becomes a science that is able to bring about an absolute beginning, and to be a principium (Husserl, 82, § 24, p. 44). According to Stein (1991, p. 25, my translation), the mind is receptive when “anything that approaches it is received in the corresponding manner and with the depth due to it.” The problem emerging at this point is to understand how to prepare the mind to receive the datum, how to be receptive. What makes the act of receiving so difficult is the fact that our mind tends to live in a preconceived world, in the sense that we always experience the world through filters such as systems of categories, linguistic constructs, folk assumptions, and practical concerns, which make direct access to things impossible. An experience is always subjected to the words that define it. This original loss of evidence is typical of ordinary attitudes, as well as scientific research, since in order to build knowledge about phenomena, the mind subjects the experience to specific epistemic procedures through which phenomena are absorbed into our mental schemes. Instead of going to the things, allowing them to manifest themselves in their essence, scientific thought imposes specific conditions on their appearing, dissolving any other alterity they may have. This process of the operationalization of phenomena with our epistemic devices is evident in the processes of the mathematicization of reality and experimental procedures, where instead of letting the phenomenon appear in its givenness, the cognitive act imposes the geometry of its gaze. If in quantitative research phenomena can only be saved inasmuch as they can be elaborated through algebraic formulas (Arendt, 1958), in a scientific experiment an “attack” on things takes place (Heidegger, 1966, p. 88). With this kind of operationalization, the mind, rather than preparing itself

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to capture the phenomenon in its originally offered givenness, reduces it to the measure imposed by human reason through its epistemic devices. When instead of letting the phenomenon appear in its givenness, the mind’s eye imposes the geometry of its gaze, the possibility of faithful knowledge vanishes. To take on a receptive attitude means to create a void in the mind, an empty space where the datum can be received without being grasped beforehand within our own conceptual grids. However, to empty our mind does not mean erasing all the ideas that we routinely use, because this cognitive move is impossible; instead, it means weakening pregiven theories, silencing our expectations and our desires, and deactivating the epistemic obsessions that tacitly act within ourselves. This is one of the paradoxes of phenomenology: a faithful knowledge of the essential qualities of a phenomenon can only be attained when the researcher downsizes the power exerted by the theories at hand (Scheler, 1999, pp. 166–168). Scheler teaches us how to d-activate the logic of tension, a logic of acquisition that interprets knowledge as grasping data within the conceptual toolbox available—how to adopt a logic of relaxation by which the mind grants the phenomenon the possibility of meeting our thoughts starting from the self, or in the words of Levinas kath’auto. This is ethical knowledge, for it leaves the phenomenon in its transcendency. This receptive attitude of the mind is well expressed by Heidegger when he speaks of a “gaze that surrounds [the object] with delicacy” (1992, p. 79, my translation), pitting this attitude against the intruding gesture of strong reason, a positivist gesture that grasps things by absorbing them within the grip of its conceptual grids. Phenomenological knowledge, on the other hand, after bracketing previous validated knowledge, shuts off the tendency to seize things, and lets the thing present itself to us as we present ourselves to the thing (Heidegger, 1968, p. 41).

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According to a Heideggerian perspective to be receptive, means waiting, not awaiting: “in waiting we leave open what we are waiting for” (Heidegger, 1969, p. 68). Nothing must be done except to wait—to wait for the other to present itself. We can go to the things themselves if we wait for something without representing anything (Heidegger, 1969, p. 69). When thinking happens in the form of a waiting free from the habit of wanting, when it is thus an action without activity, when it is passivity, the phenomenon can reveal itself in its essence. Waiting is thus the distinctive feature of phenomenological thinking. Waiting does not entail expecting, because expecting already foresees something, by entering the field of representation and of its represented object; rather, waiting consists in “weaning ourselves from will” (Heidegger, 1969, p. 60) and in this releasement there is a higher mental activity. To “keep waiting” is an empty orientation, a passive, non-oriented attention, and this openness-without-representation is the way left to the other to reveal itself from itself. Passivity is therefore an essential mode of phenomenological being. To be passive is not the sign of a lesser degree of existence, but rather indicates a more discreet way of relating to others: it means retreating in order to let the phenomenon find its own way to reveal itself in its givenness. In a managerial and technical approach to research, the researcher has the responsibility of exerting control over the thing; in the phenomenological approach, the responsibility is to deactivate one’s tendency to exert any form of control. The responsibility of the phenomenologist is to let the other be, to come to presence in its own way. The passivity of “not-being-in-search-of ” must not be confused with a sort of withdrawing from posing other questions, because the search for knowledge feeds on such questions. The essence of thinking is interrogative. The qualifying feature of the phenomenological approach is to be open to the other’s questioning: raising questions, in phenomenology, does not develop

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beforehand, ignoring the lived experience, but emerges from listening to the other. Furthermore, when the questions have been formulated, they must be kept as open as possible, so that every answer can be transformed into a further question. Thinking preserves itself in its interrogative essence when the answer it obtains does not suppress the need to raise new questions.

Open attention The receptive attitude manifests itself in the capacity to pay attention to the object; therefore attention is another fundamental stance of the phenomenological researcher. To pay attention is to devote one’s thinking to the things themselves “surrendering to them in a totally disinterested way” (Stein, 1991, p. 37, my translation). In order to express the quality of attention, Stein uses the metaphor of “keeping one’s eyes wide open.” Attention is the capacity to direct one’s gaze to a phenomenon, remaining focused on in; it is an uninterrupted tension toward the intentional object in its changing modes of givenness (Husserl, 1973, p. 80). If attention is the “disposition to receive the datum distinctly” (De Monticelli, 2000, p. xxi) by which the other shows its reality, the knowledge attained will be true and valid in proportion to the attention the researcher is capable of devoting to the other. For the other to feel invited to manifest itself authentically in its essential qualities, the researcher must devote as much as possible of his/her attention. Moreover, in order for attention to predispose the mind to capture the phenomenon in its offering givenness, it needs to be open and continuous in time. Attention is open when it is not pre-oriented to look for something specific; it implies a receptive posture of the gaze, where the subject grants the other its way and time to come to presence, which is the only possibility for an adequate self-presentation. In order to be openness that faithfully receives the

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phenomenon in its original way of appearing, attention needs to be actuated as a negative, passive effort that leaves the mind available and permeable to the encounter with the phenomenon. It is a matter of maintaining the heuristic act free from any available references, either ordinary or scientific. Performing an open attention that is not oriented beforehand means keeping thought as untied as possible from the grip of conceptual and procedural tools ordinarily used. The open mind is a mind that approaches the phenomenon “in absolute poverty, with an absolute lack of knowledge” (Husserl, 1960, p. 2), with a gaze that explores experience in a manner unsullied by assumptions. It is open attention that allows the researcher to be a radical empiricist who only counts what is given in experience. An open or allocentric disposition is therefore nourished by the disciplined exercise of the epochē, which works toward silencing any knowledge at hand. Through the epochē, one tries to realize the retreat of the subject from him/herself that allows reality to manifest itself. Attention is thus called to clear the mind, cleaning it and relieving it from the mind load that—like a thick blanket—will not allow this reality to manifest itself. When the mind is able to produce an open, non-oriented attention, it becomes like a crystal that in its transparency lets itself be traversed by the oncoming reality. Attention is continuous when the subject works toward maintaining a gaze that is concentrated for as long as possible on the phenomenon. This is a difficult task, in that attention tends to be intermittent, due both to environmental noise and the inner cognitive flow, since while the subject is focused on observing, nothing can stop imagination, desires, epistemic obsessions, and more from infiltrating the cognitive act of observation, distracting the subject from his/her task. However, since an act of knowledge inspired by the principle of faithfulness requires going all around the phenomenon, assuming a continuous presence of the gaze, the researcher is supposed to cultivate a form of

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“attention insomnia, symbolized by the eyes of Athena’s owl” (Zambrano, 2003, p. 50, my translation). Only a continuous attention can capture things as they happen, capturing the other in his/her existence. The fluid and constantly changing reality of a stream of consciousness would require an unlimited attention, a sustained gaze that does not yield to digression—a stubborn, persistent look. To define attention as a mental act that should be “stubborn and persistent” should not, however, lead us to consider it a violent imposition of the gaze; the gaze of open attention is not similar to a ray of light that strikes things but, in the words of the phenomenologist Edith Stein, is more like an auroral ray, which approaches things delicately. The moment we look at ourselves in the act of observing, we realize that paying attention often takes the shape of an imposition of our logics, of our linguistic devices onto the other’s being: imposition of interpretations, of beliefs that come to our mind independently from an act of will, of theories that the mind of the researcher tends to produce uninterruptedly. On the contrary, when attention moves in accordance with the principle of respect for reality, it must be fed by the precise posture of the gaze that expresses itself in its ability to remain free from the grip of conceptualizing thought and the pressure to systematize. However, attention is not only supposed to be continuous, but must also be passionate, nurtured by feeling, because feeling strengthens thinking. As Dante puts it, love “moves the sun and all the other stars.” It is the capacity to feel the quality of reality that mobilizes attention and intention. It is the sincere passion for truth, the hope of attaining useful knowledge, and the confidence that a meaningful outcome will be achieved that infuses energy to the work required in the search for rigorous knowledge. When the hope of attaining valid knowledge falters, together with the confidence in the other and in the ability to enlighten the gaze, one can either give up the search, or the search becomes

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a form of obstinacy about things, which does not leave room for the mind to breathe. It is a feeling positively oriented toward reality that lets the research breathe. For this reason, Zambrano recognizes the love for things as an essential posture, a passion for reality that allows research to find the right direction. There is a condition that is necessary to the development of this type of attention: namely, one must cultivate a mental posture which is at the same time tensive and distensive. A continuous attention focused on the other requires the mind to activate all its resources and to be able to produce a fertile tension toward the other. Attention is a deliberate concentration of energy; it is therefore a tension, an effort, a source of remarkable stress. If we want to avoid this tension being translated into an attitude of domination over the other, it has to be reconciled with the capacity of distension, which consists of approaching the other after suspending—and keeping in suspension—any personal interest, any expectation, any attachment to one’s own theories. When this inner distension is fully present, the mind is capable of producing a focused and relaxed attention, which disposes the mind to receptivity. This is because attention is nothing but receptivity taken to extremes. To allow the gaze to be relaxed and receptive, the mind’s task is to remove, to relieve the mind’s substance to the point of making it as transparent as possible. It is not possible to turn one’s full attention toward an object if at the same time the mind is busy considering other contents of consciousness, because in this case the cognitive energies are consumed in other directions. Only when attention is capable of focusing intensely on the object, can the latter offer itself in its givenness. Having attention focused on the object is thus the necessary condition for carrying out a cognitive act that is put into play in accordance with the principle of respect for the other’s way of appearing. In this sense, phenomenological attention is radically different from mere curiosity or interest in the other, a form of mental dispersion that keeps us distracted and far

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from the essence of things; the phenomenological gaze is an orderly way of looking at things by letting ourselves be absorbed in the changing modes of the phenomenon’s givenness. Open attention focused on the object, a non-oriented way of relating to things nourished by a disposition toward nonresistance (Scheler, 1999) is therefore a cognitive act that characterizes the phenomenological method. Only cognitive acts that are at the same time capable of concentrating on the datum and receiving the phenomenon in its way of appearing, without any attachment to the world of ideas, desires, and expectations we identify with, can enable the mind to capture the other’s original quality.

Phenomenology as hospitality toward the phenomena The difference existing between positivist and phenomenological epistemology is now evident. According to the positivist approach, in order to acquire certain and evident knowledge, it is necessary to control the phenomenon studied by employing a preestablished method of research; in this way, positivist epistemelogy takes possession of the other, absorbing it into the network of its devices. Against this logic of imposition, phenomenological epistemology applies the logic of reception, that is of receptivity and response to the way in which the other manifests itself. To receive phenomenal reality in its unique way of coming to presence is only possible when the mind suspends its habit of resorting to predefined categories in order to allow appropriate categories to arise from the actual experience. Phenomenology is the experience of receiving, leaving room to the other, making oneself hospitable toward its difference. For a correct interpretation of the mental attitude of hospitability, knowledge should be conceived as listening. Listening does not simply mean hearing or eavesdroping, but entails an attention intensively focused on the other. Heidegger defines listening as pledging obedience to the logos of things.

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Authentic listening requires from the mind the development of an allocentric attention directed toward the other, an “external concentration” (De Monticelli, 2000) that makes us really present to the other. Whenever, instead of working on ourselves in order to become as receptive as possible to the unveiling of the other, we let ourselves be taken in by the technical obsession that entrusts the validation of research to tested techniques and devices, we find ourselves in a state of absent-presence where the other remains alien to us. In other words, while positivist epistemology activates the principle of “prehension” over things, phenomenological epistemology is guided by the principle of “distension” (Scheler, 1999, pp. 166–168). Phenomenological knowledge does not grasp the other, but rather follows the traces of its appearing. According to a Baconian perspective, science must “penetrate inside” nature’s secrets. This intrusive idea of research is functional for the acquisition of knowledge that allows the subject to exert his/her dominion over the surrounding world; however, the human sciences cannot share this instrumental logic, because the human being must be understood, and not dominated. The “face of the other” forbids any sort of control and calls us to a radical responsibility, one that consists of activating a method capable of receiving the other in his/her uniqueness and of preserving his/her difference. An investigation that applies predefined categories to the specificity of each experience risks making the other’s uniqueness invisible and to miss its difference. When the other falls into the a priori net that I carry with me in order to catch it, its being gets objectified, and consequently its alterity falters (Levinas, 1969). The imposition logic of a preconceived method allows us to attain general knowledge, but hinders the perception of the other’s original profile, where all powers originate (ibid.). Granting the other the possibility of manifesting itself, so that its alterity is preserved, implies activating of a logic of reception: stifling the categories that filter the other’s act of appearing and turning the mind into a void that is

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permeable to the traces of its coming to presence. A thinking that receives conceives the other as infinite, and while thinking it infinite, one becomes clearly aware of the impossibility of capturing it within the epistemic nets of the mind and the need is therefore felt for an ethical imperative to leave it absolutely other, that is, transcendent (Levinas, 1969). Compared to the epistemology of modernity, characterized by the logic of control, the epistemology of receptiveness implies the ethical move of bracketing one’s epistemic tools and suspending the automatic recourse to one’s competence, thus activating a contraction of the epistemological imperialism of the knowing subject. The contraction of the ego allows the other to manifest itself in its original profile, so that the researcher can sense its manner of being (Scheler, 1999, p. 173). Being capable of receiving the other implies a sort of “disappearing of the self” (Moran, 2000, p. 347). To make the mind receptive to the essence of things is at one with the practice of an ethic of a weakening of the ego, the weakening of the tendency of a knowing subject to exercise prehension of the other in order to achieve, on the contrary, a passive presence. Passivity is not a lack of respect for the object; rather, it can be defined as a different way of remaining in a meaningful presence: a presence replete with the absence of the self. The ethic of a weakening of the ego, which asks the mind to withdraw from the object pursued (Weil, 1997) in order to leave room for the other, is one of the essential features of phenomenological epistemology, because weakening the narcissistic attachment to the products of one’s own cognitive activity is an essential condition for making the “principle of fidelity” workable, in accordance with the phenomenological virtues of respect and humility: it is only by weakening the capacity of prehension at work in habitual epistemic devices that it is possible to enable the mind to receive the other’s original appearing. Research always needs ethics; the ethics of phenomenology finds expression in two ethical virtues, respect and humility.

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Having respect and humility means to be able to open up to the maximum reality that can meet us, receiving it in the way it lets itself be known, and avoiding the imposition of pre-consumed interpretation schemes that cannot reveal the essential individuality of that thing. The ethic of respect and humility is the essential element of a research practice that can part company from the arrogance typical of a certain type of science. Knowledge that relies upon the principle of fidelity to the phenomenon preserves the other’s transcendency and irreducible difference. A radical difference can thus be found between positivist and phenomenological research: while the former considers knowledge as a mental act that “uses” the object by governmentalizing it within a predefined research project, the latter “follows” the traces left by the other’s appearing. A full attention concentrated on the other presupposes that it is available to meet it without relying on the devices that the researcher finds readily accessible. It can be said that phenomenological research is characterized by a thinking that “asserts” the other’s way of being, in the sense that it recognizes the other in its uniqueness. To think is to thank (Heidegger, 1969): to thank the other for its revealing, which allows the epistemic relation to be established. When the other is revealed in its manner of being and recounts its lived experience, it exposes itself to my gaze and gives its appearing to me. Whoever receives a gift cannot abstain from thanking, and a thanking thinking is a mode of cognition that approaches the other with delicacy. It faithfully follows the other’s appearing and searches for a deep comprehension of its worlds of meaning, with the utmost respect for its uniqueness and its difference.

The reflective act For the act ofinvestigation to be scientifically grounded, how­ ever, it is not sufficient to apply the heuristic actions typical of phenomenology—seeing, clarifying, analyzing, conceptualizing

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in a faithful manner—to the data that offer themselves. It is also necessary to accompany the act of searching for knowledge with a “scientific reflection on the essence of the procedure itself ” (Husserl, 1982, p. 151), in order to understand how “perfect clarity and insight” have been reached, how the essence of the phenomena has been outlined, how conceptual expressions have been formulated to be fully faithful to the profile of the appearance of the phenomenon. In other words, it is not simply by enacting the research acts that one can generate scientific knowledge of things; one must also reflect on such acts in order to ground the method logically and rigorously (ibid.). There is a difference between thought and reflection: they both are cogitationes, or acts of the mind, but whereas thought looks at something alien to itself, reflection ponders thoughts and is therefore a cognitive act of the same quality as the object it approaches. And as Husserl reminds us, “the phenomenological method operates exclusively in acts of reflections” (ibid., p. 174). Through continuous reflections on the methodical procedure actuated, one ought to be able to verify that the methodological propositions name with “perfect clarity” the heuristic acts actually carried out and that the concepts used can really adapt in a faithful manner to the datum. Reflection is an act of thought that conceives thoughts as acts and becomes aware of them (Levinas, 1969). Reflection can have as its object not only present experiences, which are currently happening as reflection unfolds, but also past events, which the act of recalling brings to the evidence of the gaze of consciousness. Husserl also discusses a reflection on anticipated experiences, which attests a move forward of the gaze of consciousness (Husserl, 1982, p. 175). The subject who reflects listens to his/her own thinking and listens to his/her own hearing. Reflection means “adverting” to the flowing thought and paying attention to it (ibid., p. 176); it means that the I “directs itself” toward its own lived experiences (ibid., p. 180). It is only through an act of reflection

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that the mind can become aware of the quality of its lived experiences. The entire stream of experiences lived in the mode of unreflected consciousness “can thus be submitted to a scientific eidetic study (ibid., p. 176). Husserl explains that each subject lives its experiences, which actually and intentionally include a variety of things. The fact that the subject lives them does not entail that they are present to its gaze. But each experience missing from the gaze can, according to an ideal possibility, be “seen” in so far as a reflection is focused on it, making it an object for the subject. The same is true for the possible gazes of the subject that are directed to the components of the lived experiences and their intentional objects (what they eventually become consciousness “of ”). Reflections, too, are lived experiences, and as such can become the substratum for new reflections, ad infinitum, according to a general principle (ibid., pp. 178–179). Lived experiences that are actually lived, and later exposed to the gaze of reflection, are given as really lived (ibid., p. 175). It is not easy to perform reflection, because it requires stopping, interrupting the free flow of being and thinking; this is because reflection originates from a change of one’s position toward the world. However, this decision made by the mind is a difficult one, because it appears to lead in a direction that is opposite to the free flow of being, which earns the subject a conscious gaze, the only one where a perception is held of one’s own continuity. It is not only the case that the decision to reflect, to stop and think, is not an easy one to make, but it is also rather difficult to maintain this decision because of the effects it produces, since reflection always produces a modification of consciousness so as to make the freedom of the cognitive process suffer from it (ibid., pp. 176–177). The flow of consciousness is modified when, for instance, joy becomes the object of reflection and the inner quality of this positive feeling ends up being compromised; the lived experience “fades away” under the reflective gaze (ibid., p. 176). In a few cases, this modification of the quality of the lived experi-

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ence can be perceived problematically, but this impression of loss of intensity in the lived experience can disappear if one persists in the reflection, because by bringing its object to clarity, reflection allows the subject to reach a lived experience that, having been modified by the reflective act, acquires a different quality. Two sorts of reflections are possible: not only one that we can define as first-level reflection, focused on the cognitive and emotional experiences, but also a second-level reflection that thinks about the acts of reflection themselves: “But also, with respect to the rejoicing which has subsequently become an object, we have the possibility of effecting a reflection on the reflection which objectivates the latter and thus making even more effectively clear the difference between a rejoicing which is lived, but not regarded, and a regarded rejoicing; likewise, the modifications which are introduced by the acts of seizing upon, explicating, etc., which start with the advertence of regard (ibid.). Reflective acts can, therefore, become the object of phenomenological analysis through “reflections at a higher level” (ibid., 177). If, in reflecting, the gaze shiftsfrom an element given to conscience to the very act of intending the datum, then in a higher-order reflection the object of givenness has the same quality of the reflective act. It can be said that by the term reflection, one indicates the acts by which the stream of lived experiences is analyzed in all its possible aspects (cf. ibid.); in other words, it is “the name of the method of consciousness leading to the cognition ofany consciousness whatever” (ibid.). “here the phenomenological task is to investigate systematically all the modifications of mental processes falling under the heading of reflection …” (ibid., p. 179).

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Husserl, E. (1960). Cartesian meditations [1931]. Trans. D. Cairns. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, E. (1964). The idea of phenomenology [1907]. Trans. by W. P. Alston and G. Nakhnikian. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff. Husserl, E. (1965). Philosophy as rigorous science [1911]. In E. Husserl, Phenomenology and the crisis of philosophy. Trans. & ed. Q. Laurer. New York: Harper, 71–147. Husserl, E. (1970a). Logical investigations [1900-01]. Trans. J. N. Findlay. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Husserl, E. (1970b). The crisis of european sciences and transcendental phenomenology [1936]. Trans. D. Carr. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Husserl, E. (1973). Experience and judgment [1939/1948]. Trans. J. S. Churchill and K. Ameriks. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Husserl, E. (1982). Ideas pertaining to a pure phenomenology and to a phenomenological philosophy. First book [1913]. Trans. F. Kersten. The Hague: Martinus Nijhof. Husserl, E. (1987). Phänomenologie und Erkenntnistheorie [1917]. In E. Husserl, Aufsätze und Vorträge (1911-1921). Ed. T. Nenon and H.R. Sepp. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, 125-206; Fenomenologia e teoria della conoscenza. Trans. P. Volonté (Milano: Bompiani, 2000). Husserl, E. (1989). Epilogue [1930]. In E. Husserl, Ideas pertaining to a pure phenomenology and to a phenomenological philosophy. Second book. Trans. R. Rojcewicz & A. Schuwer. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 405–430. Husserl, E. (1997). The Encyclopaedia Britannica article (1927-1928). In E. Husserl, Psychological and transcendental phenomenology and the confrontatiopn with Heidegger (1927-1931). Trans and ed. T. Sheen and R.E. Palmer. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 33-196. Kuhn, T. (1962). The structure of scientific revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Levinas, E. (1969). Totality and infinity. Trans. A. Lingis. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. Lincoln, Y. & Guba, E. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Lincoln, Y. & Guba, E. (1994). Competing paradigms in qualitative research. In Handbook of qualitative research. Ed. N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 105–117.

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Phenomenology Concrete Studies

Changing a Shared Repertoire in the Kindergarten A Moving Process Mia Herskind

Abstract: The plan of this paper is dual: on the one hand, it con­cerns kindergarten employees aim to develop a new repertoire in Kindergarten and how this process is experienced by those who are involved; on the other hand, it concerns qualitative research and considerations of how the embodied nature of learning is grasped methodologically (Merleau-Ponty, 1962; van Manen, 1990; Moustakas, 1994) and related to research questions that concern learning processes, not only as reflective and discursive, but also as pre-reflective, corporeal, situated, and emotional (Wenger, 1998; Bourdieu, 1990; Gebauer & Wulf, 2001; Stern, 1998). The study emphasizes that observations of the employees’ actions and movements, in their shape, intensity, and timing, gave in­ sight into existing tensions and dilemmas that did not came forward in the interviews. In this way the theoretical notion of embodiment enriched the analysis: it reveals how a socially in­ duced shame or embarrassment was embedded in the body.

Introduction This paper is based on a study of how kindergarten employees, attempting to stay at the forefront of political and societal demands concerning children’s health and physical activity aim to develop a new shared repertoire in their ongoing practice so that day-to-day life in the kindergarten can become more oriented toward movement and physical activity. The research

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focuses on the processes in which the employees experience and incorporate the content, beliefs, and attitudes of a physical education program. The findings show that an increased focus on making children’s daily life more physical breeds tensions and dilemmas in practice; these are reflected in the employees’ bodies and movements, and reveal new distinctions between the good and the not so good professional, where the “not so good” feels excluded, shameful, and embarrassed. In this way the study is a contribution to a current debate about and research into both organizational learning (Wenger, 1998; Easterby-Smith, Crossan, & Nicolini, 2002 ; Elkjaer & Huysman, 2008; Strati, 2003, 2007) and research concerning the increased propensity to articulate body, movement, and physical education in relation to healthy and unhealthy living and the implications it has for the people involved (Evans, Davies, & Wright, 2004; Evans, Davies, & Rich, 2008; Quennerstedt, 2008; Herskind & Ronholt, 2007). The chapter begins by offering theoretical and methodological considerations and designs, followed by a presentation of the research topic before turning to analysis, findings, and discussion of the central issues.

Theoretical and methodological considerations Embodiment The focus of the present study is kindergarten employees and their effort to bring the content, beliefs, and attitudes of an educational program into everyday practice. The design of the study should therefore bring in methods that are capable of grasping the employees’ actions, experiences, and emotions—their doing, thinking, and feeling. Giving attention to learning as a social phenomenon, the study indicates a “practice turn” in the study of learning (Schatzki et al., 2001), a turn in which a traditional

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understanding of learning as something that takes place inside the heads of individuals as a result of teaching is rejected. Instead, learning occurs and knowledge is created mainly through actions, conversations and interactions between people (Easterby-Smith, Crossan & Nicolini, 2002). In continuing this underlying understanding of learning, which is based on epistemological considerations introduced in Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of the “lived body” as a mediator to the world (Merleau-Ponty, 1962), the study is inspired by the concept of “embodiment”—a concept used in various human sciences as an expression of a non-dualistic perception of body-mind and subject-world (Csordas, 1994; Weiss & Haber, 1999; Schilhalb et al. 2008; Gebauer & Wulf, 2001). To embody something means to incorporate or include something. The French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1990) offers a theoretical framework to explain this. What we learn does not exist as something that happens due to a curriculum; but as a result of incorporating the existing conditions of behavior as they really are, and not as they are consciously grasped. “Incorporation” refers to the process in which the dispositions that determine how the subject acts, thinks, and assesses are embedded in the body (ibid., p. 58). Learning processes therefore exist as a bodily embedding, not only of movements, but of culture as well. The German sociologists Gebauer and Wulf (2001) have, with theoretical inspiration from Bourdieu and his theory of “habitus” and “practical sense” (Bourdieu, 1990, pp. 66–79), developed a conceptual framework that identifies and recognizes bodies and movements as “the medium by means of which human beings participate in the worlds of other human beings and by which they themselves become a part of the society. The movements develop connections and create chains of alternating worlds. In the movements, nature meets the society, the individual and the general overlap each other” (Gebauer & Wulf, 2001, p. 21, my translation). In this definition, movements fill out the space between the individual and the surrounding world.

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Movement and emotions The concept of embodiment also concerns emotions. In order to understand how they relate to moving bodies in practice, I will employ the theory of developmental psychologist, psychotherapist, and researcher Daniel Stern concerning “affect attunement’” and “vitality affects” (Stern, 1998). The main thrust of the theory is that we are able to match other peoples’ mood and emotions because of our ability to “read” or attune to the form, vitality, and intensity of their movements and voices. This ability is due to an innate general capacity called amodal perception, which means that what is sensed in one sensory modality can be transferred to another. What is transferred is what Stern and other developmentalists call abstract representations of qualities of perception (ibid., p. 51) that exist in some unknown supramodal form (ibid., p. 51). These abstract representations are not sights, sounds, touches, and objects, but rather shape, intensity, and temporal qualities. Stern uses dance performance as an illustrative example: when the dancer moves, and we are moved, this relies not only on our sensation of the specific emotional categories such as fear, anger, sadness, disgust, surprise and happiness that come through in the dance, but also on our perception of what is better captured in dynamic kinetic terms such as the surging, fading away, fleeting, explosive, bursting, crescendo, or decrescendo quality of the dancer’s movements (ibid., p. 54)1. These qualities, so-called vitality affects (ibid., p. 53), do not fit into and cannot to be described in a valid way within the existing emotional categories; they are more transient and fleeting yet represent great daily value. In daily life they are elicited by changes in motivational states, desire, and tension, and are present in all the vital processes of life, such as breathing, falling Antonio Damasio, who has a background in neuro-physiology, terms these emotions “background feelings” (Damasio, 2000, pp. 285–287). Like Stern, he describes them as feelings (emotions) expressed as tension, relaxation, surging, dragging, stability and instability, fatigue, excitement, etc. (ibid., p. 286) 1

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asleep, waking up, having thoughts, and so on. These vital processes impinge on the organizm all the time and they will have a bodily presence whether we are conscious of them or not. It is the omnipresence of these affects that makes Stern’s theory relevant in considerations about the embodied nature of experiences, knowledge, and emotions. Stern’s theory encourages one both to identify vitality affects in the shape, intensity, and timing of participants’ movements, and to broaden the concepts and vocabulary used in descriptions of movement practice and moving bodies.1

Methods and design Based on the above-mentioned considerations concerning lear­­ning processes and their cultural and embodied nature, interviews and observations were chosen as pivotal methods of research. The interviews contributed a first-person perspective on “lived experience” (van Manen, 1990) that in a phenomenological frame of reference, concerned first and foremost the employees’ immediate experiences and pre-reflective perceptions of their daily life. But their conceptualizations, categorizations, and reflections about being employees in Kindergarten were also included. The observations were chosen to gain an understanding of practice as it emerges both as an “institutional choreography,” and at a more individual level—in the employees’ movements—as form, intensity, and timing. Both are considered as 1 Stern (1998) aims to build a bridge between the inner and the outer world through a microanalytical work in which data (of infants’ communication with others) are interpreted in relation to essential concepts, the data thereby forming narratives of how infants mentally construct a subjective world of their experience of self and other. This ability is highly relevant in relation to both general and clinical questions about intersubjective relating: the experience of connectedness (ibid., p. 157), of being attuned with someone else or having a sensation of sharing inner experiences. Stern emphasizes that it is not behaviorism, but rather a technique that involves observations of behavior together with what he calls “informed speculations” about how behavior can be mentally construed (ibid., p. xvi).

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narratives that can provide information about (1) how the institutions learn and adopt new ideas and (2) how the employees experience their participation. The observations were video-recorded, and selected examples from the video material were transcribed and reconstructed as text (Ronholt, 2002). The whole design of the study was inspired by the ethnographic method (Hammersley & Atkinson, 2007), which meant that the investigator was more or less immersed in the culture for a period of time. Initially, the descriptions of the project and the educational program were analyzed and the people who were responsible for the project and program were interviewed. Four institutions among the twenty that participated in the program were selected for a deeper institutional analysis, the main criterion of the selection being that the employees, in their own minds, were well under way in the process. Observations and interviews followed. A total of fifteen interviews and fifteen observations were carried out, not in a prearranged order, but chosen in order to get still more information in a continuous process. By watching, listening, and asking, and by collecting flyers, posters, and local curricula, data were collected and described. The study was previously described in full in a report commissioned by the promoters of the educational program (Herskind, 2007). Below is a short presentation of the background of the study, followed by findings, discussion, and conclusion.

 ovement and physical activity: M A topical theme in the kindergarten In the past ten years, the preschool area has been exposed to enormous political attention in Denmark, as well as in other Western countries (Wood, 2004). It is also during this period that physical activity and physical education have won a more central position in preschool curricula, a position that is bolstered both by new legislation about kindergarten curricula, and

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by an increasing number of educational programs and partnerships between municipalities, sports organizations, and children’s institutions, all aimed at upgrading the kindergarten employees’ competence to attend to body and movement as ele­ments in the kindergarten’s daily routines. The pivotal political intervention in preschool in Denmark is the Law of Nursery Curriculum (2004), which, among another five subjects, positions “Body and Movement” as a main subject in the curriculum. This central position has to be considered in connection with the governmental health program “Lifelong Health” (2002), which emphasizes the importance of the initiation of early interventions in children’s institutions to prevent and combat obesity and lifestyle diseases, preferably as “networks and joint responsibility” across institutions (schools, after-school clubs, athletic associations, and kindergartens), all in order to create continuity in health work with children. Even so, the role of the health-promoting perspective is not very dominant in the executive order of the Nursery Curriculum, since it is being articulated more as an open discussion including both a health discourse and a developmental psychological discourse, legitimizing a negotiation about how to practice a meaningful body and movement pedagogy. However, another more limited interpretation is simultaneously presented in the policies and recommendations from the Ministries of Interior and Cultural Affairs, first of all in the government health program, Lifelong Health, which recommends physical activity and sport as significant interventions in the prevention of lifestyle diseases. The recommendations rest on acknowledged scientific studies about correlations between the intensity, the duration, and the frequency of physical activity and physiological parameters (Wedderkopp et al., 2004). In arguments like this, physical education is more and more frequently regarded as a reliable intervention in the war against obesity and other lifestyle diseases. As such, the preschool institutions as well as schools become increasingly involved in the

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“obesity vortex,” which is not just a Danish but also a global phenomenon (Gard, 2004). Reducing a social phenomenon to a question about stimulus (physical activity) and response (cardiovascular and muscular parameters) makes the reasoning very simple, which, very conveniently, seems to be in line with increasing political demands to evaluate and rank institutions and their activities (Herskind & Ronholt, 2007). It is against the background described above that the present educational program “Moving Children” was initiated in a partnership between a county and a nationwide sports organization. It aimed to qualify the kindergarten employees to give the children positive experiences with physical education; to prepare them for a healthy lifestyle; and to diminish the social imbalance among children, which is assumed to be connected with poor motor skills. That the intervention was presented as an educational program was substantiated in a critical perspective on kindergarten employees’ bodies and their movement competences: “Not all kindergarten employees feel that they are in familiar territory when it comes to targeted prioritization of movement challenges and tasks. Some seem to have forgotten their experiences with body and movement and are alienated from physical activity” (“Moving Children” project description). In this way, the project links the aim of children’s future healthy habits to the bodies of the employees’ that evidently are shown to lack something— which raises the question of how the employees experience is being considered as inadequate and lacking in some respects.

Findings and dicussions At first glance, the project was successful. The interviews revealed that the kindergarten employees participating in the educational program felt that they had expanded their horizons and climbed mountains, that they had acquired competencies and skills, and that they had brought new and more physical activities

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into their own kindergartens. Despite the success, however, there were also signs of problems and difficulties. The employees, who were supposed to bring the new repertoire into the kindergarten and make it something shared, expressed a degree of resignation and tiredness; they were uncertain of how long they would have the energy to continue. Colleagues backed them up at the meetings, praised them, and said “well done,” but in practice, there was something missing. However, they neither understood completely what it was nor did they have the words to describe it. The problems and difficulties did not emerge as a coherent narrative, but in the cracks and chinks of the success stories. The following narratives are fragments of the observations, emphasizing the lived experience as it was expressed from moment to moment in movements and bodies in everyday life choreography. The narratives are interpreted and discussed in concepts adopted from Etienne Wenger’s theory of “Communities of Practice” (COP) (Wenger, 1998) which is based in the above-mentioned practice turn in the studies of learning. The theory offers a conceptual frame of reference that is very useful in describing practice as actions, conversations and interactions between people. In Wenger’s theory of COP (1998), practice is a negotiation of meaning, which is conceptualized as a “mutual engagement,” a “joint enterprise” and a “shared repertoire” (ibid.). However, a pivotal point in Wenger’s understanding is that “mutual,” “shared” and “joint” do not imply homogeneity, but are quite precisely linked to questions about differences, conflicts, competition, pain, tensions, etc. A “shared enterprise” is therefore neither a “haven of togetherness nor an island of intimacy insulated from political and social relations” (ibid., p. 77). It is a negotiated enterprise in which the participants are characterized by differences and partialities.

Flapping arms and dynamic bodies Mette (a kindergarten employee), her colleague Christian, and fifteen children are gathered in the local hall one Tuesday

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morning. Mette completed the “Moving Children” course about six months previously and finds that since her first days on the course she has become better at “seeing the children,” reading their interests and adjusting her plan as she goes along. However, her teaching is still somewhat mechanical. This is where her colleague Christian influences the process through his bodily-sensuous presence so that both Mette and the children have an experience of participating not in Mette’s project, but in a shared practice. When Mette starts a game or a dance, Christian underlines with both his body and his voice not just the movement, but also the atmosphere or feeling of the game. He raises his arms up high and roars an enormous “ARRRHHH” with his voice when he runs after the children. The children shriek and scurry away with—not Christian—but an enormous monster on their heels.

Analysis and interpretations: Mutual accountability Using Etienne Wenger’s concepts, Christian’s actions can be interpreted as an embodied negotiation of meaning, in which he expresses mutual engagement (ibid., p. 91). Christian has previously expressed his mutual engagement verbally, when the employees decided to participate in the project together. Now he expresses his engagement in a bodily way, through motion. His way of moving is at the same time a clear signal to the children that “this is how we join together in our ‘movement practice.” The energy and expressiveness that emerges shows the children what movement practice is. It reduces the need for words and explanations. The two colleagues also express mutual accountability toward the kindergarten center as a joint enterprise. It is not a case of an “arbitrary movement” practice. It has a quality and a form of expression that makes it legitimate both in the existing pedagogic practice in the kindergarten center and in relation to the political and societal demands in terms of what can be done in a kindergarten center. This means that movement

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practice must not be too technical or too competitive and must not exclude the weak. This is where Christian’s flapping arms and his movements in and out among the children and Mette, on his knees, feet, and stomach, his voice’s energy and intonation, express a special level in the mutual accountability. The result of the collaboration is that a new shared legitimate repertoire of actions and forms of practice is created. After this story of success, I will present a case that offers insight into the source of the participants’ feelings of tiredness and despondency in relation to the task. It is a story about how a colleague verbally says one thing and bodily does something else.

The legitimate word and the opposing body It is an ordinary Thursday morning at the playground. Mette is telling and showing the children how to play “What time is it, Mr. Wolf?” Another employee, Lone, is standing a little off to one side with Viktor, among others, who is a bit reluctant to join the game. “Listen to what they say,” says Lone to Viktor. Viktor is hugging Lone’s leg with both arms, and Lone ruffles his hair. “Look,” she says, pointing at the other children, “it’s fun.” Lone raises her arm and points to the others. Viktor may hear the words, but neither the voice’s intonation nor the body’s movements support the message. The leg Victor is leaning against reassures him that he is welcome to stay where he is, in this safe place. When Victor gets his hair ruffled affectionately, the words “look, it’s fun” do not fit her actions. Through Lone’s care, Viktor is acknowledged in his insecurity about it being best and safest not to join in.

Analysis and interpretation: Negotiation of identity Even though Lone’s participation does not support Mette’s initiative, it is nonetheless a form of mutual engagement in joint enterprise. The problem is just that Lone—in a purely bodily

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sense—is performing a different theme than the body-movement theme that is on the agenda. The practice Lone is engaging in, namely, care, is usually highly legitimate in the kindergarten. For the same reason it is difficult to talk about Lone having done anything wrong. Similarly, it has been difficult for other professionals responsible for initiating physical activity to say anything to those colleagues who practically grab hold of children and put them on their laps when movement practice is on the program. The high degree of legitimacy given to caring actions has made it difficult for employees to discover that colleagues are working against the joint enterprise in a bodily way. And if they have become aware of the problem, it has been difficult to talk to their colleagues about it. Behind the lack of verbalization of the problems probably lies a fear of expressing negative feelings. According to Wenger’s definition of identity, the employees have, through their participation, contributed to a mutual engagement and accountability through a certain “partiality” (1998, p. 92). A employee may “over time” have demonstrated her responsibility, both practically and in terms of her own attitudes, by writing herself into the professional values. She has created an image of herself that may make others talk of her and regard her as “good with the weak children,” “good at physical activity,” “vulnerable but very loyal,” etc. In other words, she has acquired a specific kind of identity. With the new practice, she has to venture into unknown territory (ibid., p. 178). Here her identity must be renegotiated. The individual employee can no longer define herself as she has done previously. If an employee finds it difficult to put herself in play and draw on previously legitimate identity negotiations, her personal basis for participation may be shaken. Sensitivity toward Lone’s lived experience—qua movement analyzes—also gives the impression that she is affected emotionally. Her body is stiff and motionless. Her caring gesture expresses that she is defending herself against the humiliation it would be if the others see that she does not know what to do. By

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ruffling Viktor’s hair she communicates “I am also doing something legitimate.” As such, Lone tries to cover up the fact that she is at a loss about what to do. She also knows that she is not living up to what could be called adequate behavior in the new practice, and therefore clings to already established and recognized forms of participation. Inspired by sociologist Erving Goffman and his ethnometodological studies about emotions in human interaction, we are able to understand that there are feelings involved in such situations. In “Embarrassment and Social Organization” (Goffman, 2005, pp. 97–112) he explains how the feeling of shame and embarrassment is latent in all social systems across cultures. He argues that all interhuman encounters can be studied as interactions in which embarrassment arises or as interactions in which participants use a number of methods to avoid embarrassment. The feeling of embarrassment is caused by unfulfilled expectations: “Given their social identities and the setting, the participants will sense what sort of conduct ought to be maintained as the appropriate thing, however much they may despair of its actually occurring” (ibid., p. 105). Because embarrassment is interpreted as a sign of “weakness, inferiority, low status, moral guilt, defeat and other unenviable characteristics” (ibid., p. 102), the participants will try to conceal the embarrassing situation through facial expressions, gestures and large movements. Lone’s caring actions are thus an expression of perplexity about how she should tackle the situation. Care becomes “screens to hide behind” (ibid.) while she tries to bring her feelings up to speed and herself back into play. The fact that the feeling of inadequacy is connected with the action itself means that the feeling is not a characteristic of the person, but something that comes into existence in the social system (ibid., p. 108).

Conclusion The study underscores essential findings in relation to both (1) Embodiment and analysis and (2) learning processes in practice.

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Regarding (1) The findings underline how the use of different methods was beneficial for understanding the implications that arise when employees are involved in participating in an educational program and then attempt to develop a new shared repertoire in the kindergarten. What could not be explained on the basis of the interviews emerged in the observations. At a microanalytical level, the movements, in their shape, intensity, and timing, gave insight into how the tensions and dilemmas were experienced. The analysis expressed how a socially induced shame or embarrassment was embedded in the body, which made it difficult to behave and move in an adequate way. In this way the theoretical notion of embodiment enriched the analysis. The theoretical frame of reference, including both a sociological and a psychological perspective, meant that the interpretation of the phenomenon that emerged in interviews and observations was viewed through a shifting focus on the organization and the individual, respectively. Bringing both perspectives into consideration was meant to reduce the tendency to individualize the problems, and it also helped render visible the emerging tensions. (2) The study demonstrates that the kindergartens’ decision to train the employees to be able, to a greater extent than previously, to prioritize physical activity by way of playing and by adult-organized activities, along with the subsequent implementation of this decision, is a complex process. On the one hand, it is successful according to the criterion of success that the project has defined: more activities and more moving children. On the other hand it is also a process filled with tensions and dilemmas, at an institutional or organizational level as well as at a subjective level. The participants’ negotiation of the tensions and dilemmas—as this negotiation emerges in actions and communication—gave rise to both positive and negative learning experiences. Professional competence will of course influence the nature of the experiences, but political and media-made discourses about bodies and movement seem to interfere as well.

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The employees’ enthusiastic stories, their almost wordless descriptions of the difficulties in making the project survive, and their bodily, ambivalent negotiations could all be interpreted as expressions of an understanding of how both tradition and policies “stick to” the body. In this process new standards for the good and less good educator develop, which has consequences for selfperception and identity. Viewed in this light, the present study contributes to a critical view of the significance for identity and self-perception, that may arise when physical education, body and movements are immersed to an increasing degree in discourses about health and body. References: Bourdieu, P. (1990). The logic of practice. Cambridge: Polity Press. Csordas, T. J. (1994). Embodiment and experience: The existential ground of culture and self. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Damasio, A. R. (2000) The feeling of what happens. London: Vintage Books. Elkjaer, B., & Huysman, S.(2008). Social worlds theory and the power of tension. In: The Sage handbook of new approaches in management and organization. Ed. D. Barry & H. Hansen. London: SAGE, 170–177. Easterby-Smith, M., Crossan, M., & Nicolini, D. (2002). Organizational learning: Debates past, present, and future. Journal of Management Studies 37(6), pp. 783–795. Evans, J., Rich, E., & Davies, B. (2004). The emperor’s new clothes: Fat, thin, and overweight. The social fabrication of risk and ill health. Journal of Physical Education 23, 372–391 Evans, J., Davies, B., & Rich, E. (2008). Bernstein, body pedagogies and the corporeal device. Paper presented at the 5th Basil Bernstein Symposium, Cardiff School of Social Sciences. Evans, J., Davies, B., & Wright, J., eds. (2004). Body knowledge and control: Studies in the sociology of physical education and health. London: Routledge.

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Gard, M. (2004). An elephant in the room and a bridge too far, or physical education and the “obesity epidemic.” In Body knowledge and control: Studies in the sociology of physical education and health. Ed. J. Evans, B. Davies, & J. Wright. London: Routledge, pp. 68–82. Gebauer, G., & Wulf C. (2001). Kroppens sprog: Spil, ritualer, gestik. Copenhagen: Gyldendalske Boghandel, Nordisk Forlag; trans. of Mimetisches Handeln in der sozialen Welt (Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch, 1998). Goffman, E. (2005). Interaction on ritual: Essays in face-to- face behavior. New Brunswick: Transaction Publisher. Hammersley, M., & Atkinson, P. (2007). Ethnography: Principles in practice. London: Routledge. Herskind, M. (2007). Evaluering af børn i bevægelse [Project evaluation: Moving children]. Copenhagen: Danish University of Education. Herskind, M. (2008). Movement analysis and identification of learning processes. In Learning bodies. Ed. T. Schmilhat, M. Juelskjaer, & T. Moser. Copenhagen: Danish School of Education Press, p. 269–284. Herskind, M., & Ronholt, H. (2007). Idræt, krop og bevægelse mellem sundhed og dannelse [Physical education, body, and movement between health and “Bildung.”] Utbildning & Demokrati 16(2), 57–74. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of Perception [1945]. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Moustakas, C.(1994). Phenomenological research methods. London: Sage. Quennerstedt, M. (2008). Exploring the relation between physical activity and health—a salutogenic approach to physical education. Sport, Education, and Society 13(3), 267–283. Ronholt, H. (2002). “It’s only the sissies.” Analysis of teaching and learning processes in physical education: A contribution to the hidden curriculum. Sport, Education, and Society 7(1), pp. 25–36. Schatzki, T., Cetina, K. K., & von Savigny, E. (2001). The practice turn in contemporary theory. London: Routledge. Schilhab, T., Juelskjaer, M., & Moser, T., eds. (2008) .Learning bodies. Copenhagen: Danish School of Education Press. Stern, D. (1998). The interpersonal world of the infant: A view from psychoanalysis and developmental psychology. London: Karnac. Stern, D. (2004). The present moment in psychotherapy and everyday life. New York: W. W. Norton.

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Strati, A. (2003). Knowing in practice: Aestethic understanding and tacit knowledge. In Knowing in organizations: A practice- based approach. Ed. D. Nicolini, S. Gherardi, & and D. Yanow. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, pp. 53–75. Strati, A. (2007). Sensible knowledge and practice-based learning. In Management Learning 38(1), pp. 61–77. van Manen, M. (1990). Researching lived experience: Human science for an action sensitive pedagogy. Albany: State University of New York Press. Wedderkopp, N., Froberg, K., Hansen, H. S., & Andersen, L. B. (2004). Secular trends in physical fitness and obesity in Danish 9-year-old girls and boys: Odense School Child Study and Danish substudy of the European Youth Heart Study, Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports 14, 150–155. Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Weiss, G., & Haber, H. F.(1999). Perspectives on embodiment: The intersection of nature and culture. New York: Routledge. Wood, E. (2004). A new paradigm war? The impact of national curriculum policies on early childhood teachers’ thinking and classroom practice, Teacher and Teaching Education, 20, 361–374. The Government Health Program “Sund Hele Livet” [Lifelong health]. (Available online at www.folkesundhed.dk/media/sundhelelivet. pdf, accessed 2002).

Narrative Research on Adult Informal Learning Giancarlo Gola Abstract: The objective of the research is to examine social workers’ pro­ fessional practice, and in particular, to explore their informed learning at work. Organizing the meaning of actions and reflec­ tion on the experience through the narration is an area of social research that has attracted researchers as different as Dewey (1938), Schön (1983), and Mezirow (1990). The rationale of the present investigation is that narrative inquiry can further the knowledge of the action and the subjective reconstruction of experience (see Riessman 1993; Clandinin & Connelly 2000). The narrative interview was our preferred method for data col­ lection. This study offers some useful suggestions about the me­ thodological contributions to narrative data collection and analysis offered by the creation of a network of all the elements analyzed in each interview, using ATLAS.ti, in order to define the characteristics of social workers’ informal learning and the contents of informal learning in the workplace.

Introduction The purpose of this research study is to inquire about social workers’ informal learning and to elucidate, through the narration of personal professional experiences, how social workers learn, and whether they learn through informal processes. The narrative approach is employed as a research device to explore professionals’ social action and the forms of practical and tacit knowledge that belong to adults’ experience. It starts from the assumption that through the recovery of biographical narra-

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tions, the subjects can deepen their reflection about how they have acquired their knowledge, what kind of knowledge and skills they have learned in their job; and what kind of knowledge has been modified through the elaboration of experiences and events. This philosophy of educational research, in terms of learning produced by experience, draws on Dewey’s work (1938), according to which knowledge comes from experience and takes shape through reflective reasoning and reflective thinking. In order to gain knowledge from experience, it is important that the subject reflects about what is happening, manifesting a specific interest about the actions s/he is performing. This approach was later used by Schön (1983), according to whom our way of learning is normally tacit, implicit in our models of action and in our sensibility toward the things we are involved in. Thus reflection favors the recovery of knowledge. In this respect, to investigate informal learning means to deepen, to recover, and to raise the subject’s awareness about his/her experiences. This happens through reflecting on one’s own actions—actions that become the objects of a specific analysis, through putting oneself at a critical distance, both with regard to the finished activities, to the difficulties and the conflicts that the latter have engendered, and with regard to the decisions that have been taken to overcome them. The empirical research is developed according to a naturalistic paradigm, (Lincoln & Guba, 1985), in which the theoretical frameworks about adult learning are not only assumed to be a paradigmatic theory that can explain the object of inquiry, but are also considered as evolutionary theories. In fact, the intent of this research study is not simply to understand formal and informal ways of learning, but to investigate the subjective and contextual meaning of learning, to assess the importance that the subjects of our study accord to them. Through the empirical research, we will try to explore the narrations of the participating subjects, the information and the meanings that the subjects consider as informal and non-inten-

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tional learning (and where such learning has been acquired). We are aware that a method of investigation that privileges a narrative approach can be vulnerable to methodological criticisms in terms of reliability and validity, like all other qualitative research. The object of analysis—informal learning—can lend itself to criticisms, since any explanations will prove difficult and controversial insofar as these depend on subjective concepts such as experience, actions, memories and knowledge. The specific objectives of this research study refer to two orders of knowledge: the possibility of recognizing informal learning through a reflection on experiences and actions, and the methodological choices that are at the roots of empirical research, according to two specific epistemologies, grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), and narrative inquiry (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000; Riessman, 1993).

Theoretical framework: Informal learning in the workplace Research on informal learning is a branch of educational research and, with particular reference to adults’ learning, it is part of a still controversial research area that presents different aspects, in terms of the objects of investigation and the subjects investigated, rather than in terms of the paradigms of scientific research employed. The focus of these research studies varies as they range from education and informal learning in the workplace to sources of informal learning, from the effectiveness of informal learning to what influences informal learning, from learning in non-work environments to accidental and deliberate learning. The interest in adult informal learning started with Knowles’s work (1950): he considered every individual practice as an activity capable of producing continuous learning. This perspective influenced a great deal of empirical research on self-directed lear­ning and adult learning (Tough, 1971), as well as several studies and different epistemic positions, sometimes centered on the adult as

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a subject, sometimes on the formalities of learning or on the lear­ ning context. Within the scientific literature on informal lear­ning, different origins and contaminations can be identified concerning the meanings of informal learning, experiential learning, informal and incidental learning, self-directed learning, reflective learning, tacit knowledge etc. In this respect, the present inquiry is specifically directed toward informal learning in the workplace, drawing on the work of Eraut (2004), Straka (2004), and Colardyn and Bjornavold (2004). Several authors agree that the a distinction can be made between formal and informal learning, others suggest that the nature of learning is the same in both cases, yet the context of learning changes: while formal learning takes place inside structured teaching and training contexts, informal learning happens within destructured contexts. In attempting to explain the meanings of informal learning, Eraut (2004) proposes a definition of it, not just in terms of a distinction between formal and informal learning, but as the acquisition of knowledge without the awareness of it, and without any explicit knowledge about what has been already acquired—non-intentional and unstructured learning that needs no teachers. Eraut (2004) suggests a theoretical classification of informal learning based on three levels of intentionality: deliberative learning (aware learning, projected); reactive learning (spontaneous, in which the level of intentionality varies according to situations and contexts); and implicit learning (in which there is no intention to learn or awareness). The three distinctions formulated by Eraut, which recall Dewey’s—and later Schön’s—concepts of reflexivity, identify the possible temporal relationships between an episode of learning and the experiences that have allowed a subject to acquire new knowledge. Eraut believes that the context in which learning happens is always the present, while the object of learning can be in the past, present, or future. When we report “an experience,” we are probably thinking about a single episode, accident, or

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particular event, but when we speak about the way we have learned, we might refer to all the learning that has been acquired through a series of episodes and events, which happened over a long period of time and of which we are not always aware. In his study of informal learning, Garrick (1998) states that informal learning is deliberate, while accidental learning is not. Although Eraut specifies that the most important difference between informal and formal learning is the intention to learn, Marsick and Watkins (1990) focus their research on informal learning in the workplace, where informal learning can happen both in institutional (i.e., a class, a professional organization) and non-institutional contexts. This way of learning is at an individual level and is individually managed. The two authors stress the difference between deliberate learning and accidental learning, such that deliberate learning is the result of “formal” and self-directed learning, while non-eliberate learning implies that the subject is not aware, and his/her learning is either the result of activities, contexts, and cultures that can influence or facilitate the acquisition of new knowledge, or has been produced through experiments and errors. Informal learning can intentionally be encouraged by an organization, or it may not be produced despite the subject operating in an environment that is considered conducive to learning. Conversely, incidental learning happens in every occasion, even if people are not always aware of it. Marsick and Volpe (1999, p. 5) define informal learning as follows:, “It is integrated with daily routines. It is triggered by an internal or external jolt. It is not highly conscious. It is haphazard and influenced by chance. It is an inductive process of reflection and action, It is linked to the learning of others.” They believe that informal and accidental learning is at the heart of adult education, because this type of learning is based on the study and the analysis of life experiences and what one can learn by experience. Rusaw (1995), drawing on the study by Marsick and Watkins (1990), suggests that informal learning is a process of learning

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that happens during the experience of everyday life, often at subconscious levels. Beckett and Hager (2002) also distinguish formal from informal learning, claiming that formal learning should not be considered superior to other forms of learning, and they propose a new emergent paradigm of learning, defining it as informal learning during professional practice. This would be an organic and holistic, contextual type of learning, based on experience. It occurs in situations where the main aim is not learning; it is activated by students or adults as individuals rather than by teachers; and it is a type of learning that is often produced in collaborative ways. In order to explain the meanings of the term “informal learning,” Schugurensky (2000) proposes a taxonomy of learning starting from two main categories: the intention to learn and the consciousness of learning. Through these two categories, he proposes the subdivision of informal learning into three forms: selfdirected learning, accidental learning, and socialization learning. Self-directed learning refers to an individual project of learning without the specific assistance of a teacher, educator, or instructor, but it can include the presence of other subjects that are not teachers. It is a deliberate learning process, because the individual’s aim is to learn before the learning process begins, and it is conscious learning because the individual is fully aware that s/he is learning. On the other hand, incidental learning refers to learning produced by experience when the subject does not have any specific intentions to learn; after having been through that particular experience, the individual becomes aware that s/he has been learning, that s/he has acquired new knowledge. Thus this represents non-intentional, unconscious learning. Learning through socialization (also described as tacit learning) describes the interiorization of values, attitudes, behaviors, and skills that can refer to everyday life. Colardyn and Bjornavold (2004) have recently tried to offer a new definition of the concepts of formal, non-formal, and

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informal learning, on the basis of two assumptions: that the individual has the intention to learn, and (central to the learning process) that s/he is in the right structural context to learn. The interesting points for our empirical research, however, are not the terms and the distinctions offered by these authors, and the different definitions of informal learning, but their recognition that more or less intentional types of learning—more or less conscious acquisition of knowledge and learning—can happen in the workplace as an integral part of professional practice. In terms of our study, it seems to us that those researchers who are closer to the analysis of informal learning in the workplace tend to refer to the concepts elaborated by Marsick and Watkins (1990), and Eraut, (2000, 2004), because they share both the qualitative methods of investigation and the object of investigation: “informal learning referred to professional practice.” The attention to personal understanding of learning, especially when taking into account that people consider what they learn in their job and in their life as more remarkable and meaningful than equivalent knowledge learned in traditional educational contexts, requires formal acquisition of information in a natural context. With regard to this, Brookfield (1995) proposes an elective method to give credibility to reports about “subjective” learning, using an approach to research about learning that is based on collecting accounts told by the subjects, using their languages, their constructions, their interpretations of events and emotions. To ensure that a research study can help to clarify some characteristics of formal and informal learning, it is important to apply different tools of investigation, such as deep investigations within a narrative research approach. Based on the above theoretical references, our study will address the following two research questions: (1) Is it possible to find in narrative texts of adult professionals the elements that constitute their form of informal learning? (2) Is there a form of experiential

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knowledge that constitutes informal learning and that the narration can help to identify? In this respect, it is interesting to explore the generativity of learning in order to recover the meaning of adult learning, as a way of becoming aware of the action and what is around the action, whether theoretical knowledge or practical knowledge, experience or reflection.

Methods of inquiry In employing the narrative approach as a method of inquiry, for both data collection and analysis, this study draws on Riessman (1993) as well as on the work of Clandinin and Connelly (2000), according to which experience is what we study—and narratively so, because narrative thought is the key form of experience and is thus key to writing and thinking about it. In the context of adult education, the narrative approach has also undergone an important development within biographical research. Narration is considered both an occasion for and a tool of self-knowledge, reflection, and transformation—an occasion toward which we can orientate our motivations, our educational development, and a micro-model for educational research itself. Narrative knowledge follows Bruner’s logic of cognitive formality that allows each one of us to make order in the symbolic reality that surrounds us, in the social net in which we are involved and move (Bruner, 1987, 1991). The narrative form reflects the effort to reestablish a sense of order and meaning in human experience: the stories are ways to organize the experience, to interpret the events, and to create meaning, while maintaining a sense of continuity. The literature on the narrative approach that has been developed in the last few years has focused on the theme of narrations as research objects and tools (Josselson & Lieblich, 1995). The constructivist literature helps to give more weight to the idea

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that the subject ascribes sense and meaning to personal experience, and in this generative action, s/he builds his/her own reality and a phenomenology of him/herself, other people, and the world. A necessary condition for promoting and provoking learning experiences lies in the possibility of becoming aware of the subjective and sociocultural conditions and constraints within which we practice our freedom of thought and interpretation. Learning, especially as an adult, happens when experience—considered not only as sensory experience, but also as experience of thought—becomes an object of knowledge and critical reflection. The narrative approach assumes that a unique reality does not exist as a univocal interpretation of social reality: pluralism, relativism, and subjectivity represent the constitutive principles of such an approach. But this doesn’t exonerate the researcher from the responsibility of providing some logical, coherent, and comprehensible bases as far as choices and methods are concerned in order to explain the process through which the results have been reached. Research is therefore a deeply hermeneutical task in which the researcher’s interpretation is always personal, partial, and dynamic, and is carried out through a constant dialogical process, through using recovered texts and investigated contexts. The narration offers its own heuristic device, not only through specific research methods (Atkinson, 1998; Riessman, 1993; Denzin, 1989), but also through a narrative approach that privileges the actual meaning that facts produce for the actors— a meaning that emerges through their narration—over their mere analysis. The narrative approach is associated with a type of research that finds its base in the idiographic paradigm, whose specific methodological characteristics are founded on research procedures sometimes called “defective,” in which the research strategies cannot be connected to objective and always observable variables, but are dependent on interpretation and a well-pondered hermeneutical process directed toward a specific phenomenon. Narrative research allows us to explore and to understand

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the inside world of individuals because the individuals already know themselves and they reveal themselves to others through their own stories. Narrative research allows us to explore individual and collective experiences, actions, problematic situations of difficult interpretation; it helps the subjects to understand themselves and to reconstruct the cultural and social meaning of their experiences. Through narration we can understand not only the intentions and the motivations of the investigated and narrated actions, but also the structures of knowledge the subjects refer to while planning, realizing, and evaluating their actions. Narrative devices such as biographies, narrative interviews, life stories, or critical accidents are therefore given particular importance, both when we intend to examine processes of reconstruction of actions—understood here as the individual and social way of acting, rather than its observation and explanation—and when we intend to clarify the actor’s epistemic position in a given situation that shows his/her perception of the way s/he acts, based on his/her knowledge, history, and experiences. Finally, narrations have a fundamental role when we face a process of reconstruction of beliefs, preconceived or implicit theories that influence and constrain a subject’s way of acting in specific sociocultural contexts—such as professionals’ actions, in all their complexity and cognitive pregnancy. These devices offer the possibility of giving meaning to specific finished actions, to events and experiences, to all performed activities. Narration is an extremely functional way of understanding the different forms of human actions (educational action represents just one form), as well as the different forms of knowledge that can emerge from them. The narration of personal experiences allows one to work on one’s own educational biography; it allows one to become aware of those contexts and relationships that have influenced one’s process of education, and therefore, starting with the experience, to find out the critical junctures that should be monitored in an educational process (Mezirow, 1990).

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In this respect, the narration has an epistemic function: that of starting a process of elaboration, interpretation, understanding, and recalling of experiences, happenings, and situations, shaping them so as to make it possible to describe them to others, to try to explain them according to the protagonist’s intentions, expectations, and circumstances, to confer sense and meaning within socioculturally recognized repertoires. The researcher reconstructs the collected elements collected and elaborates them in order to give them meaning, trying to connect them and build a history that can offer a possible response to the research questions (in this study, informal learning). In the action of telling it is necessary to distance oneself from the story told, in order to reflect on oneself in the past, which often means a rediscovery in the present of neglected aspects of one’s way of being and of relating to daily life. Such reflective action implies a continuous retrospective change of meanings and events (i.e., a personal reconstruction of new plots in search of new meanings and consequently the production of a new system of knowledge). Every story will therefore never be a real copy of what really happened, but rather a reconstruction and redefinition. The story takes the ingredients of life and experience, but it elaborates them again, assigning them structure and new meaning. Thus the narrative action consists in introducing synthesis and order among separated or otherwise uncorrelated elements; it is always creative, new, producing a reality that didn’t exist before. The focus of informal learning research is precisely on the actors’ epistemic position and on the reconstruction of one’s cognitive (implicit, but also explicit) theories. The cases, the biographies, the life stories contribute to the recovery of the actors’ vision, as, through reflection and reconstruction, it can influence the learning processes and the structures of knowledge involved in the action. The knowledge of something is only satisfactory when the experience and the discovery become reflection, story, and comment. Only the story

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can evoke the dynamics and the process, the contextual and historical dimensions, of what it represents. The knowledge lives, manifests itself, and is legitimated at the moment of its representation, through the actors’ narration to others and themselves, as they recognize themselves through this narrated knowledge.

Participants The research that leads to a naturalistic epistemology can be explained as an indicative non-analytical map, an open run in order to allow flexibility and changes as soon as some data emerge (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Exactly because of this epistemology, the organization of the sample in the present study (subgroup of a population of reference) is of a non-probabilistic type: the selection of interviewees is different from standard research (it does not have the character of statistically representative, it does not have to reproduce within the sample numerical references to the universe of the subjects investigated). In the present research we have tried to find a sort of social representativeness, since, according to Bichi (2002, p. 78), “The criterion of representativeness is also important in the biographical approach, yet with characteristics that underline not exactly the reproduction of the numerical dimensions but those thematic and categorical dimensions linked to specific problems and defined social groups.” This approach responds to two issues: the objectives of the research (the researcher’s theories and categories) and the sample (investigated group). The sampling operation has accordingly taken the characteristics (Crabtree & Miller, 1992) of flexibility and change within this research study: interviewees were chosen in a serial way, the samples were organized and modified according to their dimensions, andthe subjects were selected until saturation. This choice responds to operational criteria of differentiation, whose aim is not only to try to document the differences

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between the subjects’ skills, butalso to identify different characteristics, conditions, and attitudes that favor learning. The sample selection criteria have thus been rather different, with the aim ofgathering as much information as possible in order to deepen, compare, and differentiate the phenomenon under study. The social workers that were chosen for this research were reached with the help of an insider within the professional organization. A social worker himself, he took part in the research as well as acting as a mediator to organize and plan the interviews. The interviewees were approached during working hours and in an appropriate venue, in order to put them at ease (usually an office that they normally do not use for work activities, like a conference room and other private offices). The subjects could take part in the project voluntarily, though they had not always been previously informed about the type of research and the matters that they would have to discuss. During the introduction and before recording, the researcher informed the interviewees about the specific research study; the person that would conduct the interview and the time of the interview itself; and the fact that the meeting would be recorded, but the interviewee would remain anonymous. Data collection was carried out in 2006, with ten social workers belonging to different public organizations and working in elderly care, with mentally disabled adults, with minors, and with adults addicted to legal and illegal substances (alcohol, smoking, drugs).

Data collection The instrument chosen for collecting empirical data was the narrative interview, elaborated on the basis of an open protocol close to the model of investigation defined as Life Story (Bichi, 2002), starting from a scheme of reference in line with the research interests. In order to ease the narrative data reconstruction process and the recovery of the learning stories, the inter-

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viewer and the interviewee followed an index-outline during the meeting, one that had been prepared both to ensure rigor in data collection and to allow a narrative analysis of qualitative data. The data gathered with the narrative interviews are unstructured material, which leaves full liberty of expression (with few moments of direct speech due to the researcher’s interferences, like the initial introduction and sometimes the necessary spurs to ensure that the interview keeps in line with the investigation’s objective). The use of the outline was not binding, however, as the narrative approach privileges inquiries from within the field of observation. Through the use of the narrative interview, based on a open story format, the subject was asked to discuss his/ her real learning process. The focus was specifically on awareness of the social environment in which the actors have learned; knowledge of their professional activities and of the learning that is contingent to these activities; the nature of learning from professional experience, the process of knowledge construction; and the theories implicit in the actions and in life experiences. The narrative interview is founded upon an initial generative stimulus—more specifically, the initial introduction starts with the request to interviewees to discuss their job and how and what they have learned, leaving free narrative space to the interviewees: “I would like you to tell me about your job, about those experiences that have particularly influenced you, how did you learn how to do your job?” The time allotted for each interview was approximately one hour, even if, given the type of research approach, an interview with an open time frame was preferred. Interviews were held on a single occasion, without dividing them or organizing more than one meeting with the same subject.

Data analysis Data collection was carried out according to the protocol described above. The “narrative interviews” were tape-recorded,

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and subsequently transcribed as text files, for subsequent computer-assisted data analysis. The research focus on the exploration of remarkable meanings led to choosing the text (narrations and stories of narrative interviews) as the source of information, and as unit of analysis, the data of the interviews assume the value of histories, narrations, events through which the interviewees describe their world (Gubrium & Holstein, 1995). In this way reality is not true to itself, but is a narrated reality, contextualized and locally produced, in line with naturalistic epistemology. In order to overcome the problem of matching the researcher’s categories (or those offered by the literature) with those of the interviewees,’ we opted for a method that restores, at least partly, the actors’ social knowledge, as well as the chronological reconstruction of their narration. This is possible through a process of priorities based on the analysis of each story’s narrative contents; the anlaysis of each story’s narrative structure; and finally, on the integrated analysis of the narrative structures within each story’s contents. This approach follows Rosenthal (1993), who hypothesized that we can analyze life stories’ narrations both with regard to the structure and with regard to the contents, and that the data retrieved can be integrated. The analysis of narrative constructions of the interviews allows us to identify the elements that constitute the subjects’ reconstruction of their learning, and these can define the “narrative themes” concerning the object of investigation: informal learning. Through the use of the most updated version of the software (ATLAS.ti) for qualitative analysis of the structural aspects of each narration, we tried to determine the salient nucleus of the narration—i.e., those elements around which the actor builds the actual narration.

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 arrative analysis of the contents N and structures of the Life Stories The procedure used for the narrative analysis of the text has a double purpose: the description of the meaningful contents that emerged through categories of analysis defined by different levels of coding and acquired through different procedures, and the interpretation and understanding of such contents through the examination of the relationships among the categories of analysis they belong to. The analysis of narrative contents focused on narrative themes that had a connection with the concepts of learning and experience, and was carried out through segmentation of the texts into simpler units with meaningful contents in order to examine their mutual interrelations. The procedure was applied to several operations: content and single word analysis, identification of the key elements that form the text, classification of the elements into nominal variables (codes), and assignment of codes according to grounded theory. During the analysis, the ATLAS.ti software facilitated the exploration of complex meanings hidden within the information gathered, and in particular, it allowed and facilitated the following phases of textual analysis: segmentation of the interviews’ oral transcripts into meaningful quotations relative to the object of our investigation; coding of quotations through assigning codes that summarize the content of the quotation; grouping of the primary documents and the codes in families; and creation of networks that illustrate the relationships between codes, between families, or between other meaningful data. The narrative abstracts have been coded according to the logic of open coding (Strauss & Corbin, 1990), selecting the parts of the narrative text in quotations and linking the data to general concepts, using the same verbal labels employed by the participants during their narration, or simply condensing them into one word that sums up their content and meaning. These

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categories have been elaborated in order to conceptualize the learning process, rather than to describe, identify, or summarize it. In a second phase, starting from the codes obtained from all the narrative abstracts, we produced an axial coding (Strauss & Corbin, 1990), which entails a conceptual improvement of the classification. All the codes were selected and then grouped in families (the families are real theoretical dimensions that include the information of the empirical indicators, already summarized by the codes), which correspond to the typologies of informal learning already identified by Eraut (2004) and the literature. To these families we have added another aggregation relating to themes that are considered to be relevant for the study, yet do not directly refer to one theoretical model, which we called way of learning and which does not distinguish between formal and informal learning. Deliberative learning is a family of codes that includes all those activities, actions, or intentions to learn, as well as the processes of self-directed learning, whereby the subject is conscious and aware of his/her learning objectives, whether yet to be reached or already achieved (Eraut, 2004; see also Schugurensky, 2000). Reactive learning is a family of codes that refers to all the knowledge acquired during actions like ideas, opinions, impressions, questions about the action, and reflection during the action itself. Initially the subject is not aware that s/he is learning. Learning is produced by reflection (Eraut, 2004; see also Schön, 1983; Schugurensky, 2000). Informal learning is a family of codes that refers to tacit knowledge, which includes episodes, implicit knowledge, situations, and actions whereby the subject is not at all aware that he/she is learning. There is no intention, just an incidental way of learning, but there are also subconscious expectations (Eraut, 2004; Reber, 1993; see also Schugurensky, 2000; Marsick & Watkins, 1990). Way of learning is a family of codes that includes the codes of processes, occasions and moments when the subjects think they

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have acquired both individual and external knowledge, both formally and informally, as well as incidentally. This family includes codes that are already contained in the other three families described above. In a third phase of analysis, the data were interpreted according to Riessman (1993) and Bell’s (1988) models of narrative analysis, which draw on the structural approach of Labov and Waletzky (1967). These models allow us to code the narrative structures, to identify in the narrative discourse of each interview a nucleus and the relationships that connect all the episodes. Riessman (1993) also asserts that the purpose of the analysis is to see how the interviewees put order in the flow of experiences so as to make sense of the events and the actions in their lives. A further reassertion of Labov’s model comes from Mishler (1995); when he theorizes about structure, he explains that the contribution of structural analysis aims to preserve the history that contains the sequence of socially meaningful actions without which there would be no history at all; therefore the analysis is the basis for a direct interpretation of a complex unit of social interactions. The specific aim of this phase is to offer a better understanding of the narrative productions and of the meaning of the learning experience, rather than an empirical verification meant to classify informal learning based on a theoretical field. All the narrative abstracts were selected in this phase and grouped in five categories of codes (skipping the sixth element of the model, the evaluation): abstract, orientation, complicating action, resolution, coda. Abstract is a coding that introduces the matter, summarizing the main points; it can also include the interviewer’s questions. Orientation is a coding that includes the details of the narrated event’s contextual variables: time, place, participants, situation. Complicating action is a coding that includes and describes the problematic elements around which the interviewee builds the actual narration: it is, for this reason, the nucleus of the narration.

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Resolution is a coding that includes the phase of resolution of the event. From the structural point of view, this phase can follow both the evaluation and the description of the problematic element. Coda is a coding that closes the narration leading the actors to the present situation.

Results The concepts classified through the analysis of narrative data allow us to observe and explain (within the limits of reliability and truthfulness of every research study, and specifically of the present one) possible interpretations of social workers’ informal learning. The first coding step has allowed us to trace the social workers’ learning path, in terms of both formal and informal competences, by using some labels produced by the same participants (the categorization based on the data was organized according to forty codes). The codes were grouped in the family way of learning and then organized in typologies we termed deliberative learning, reactive learning, and implicit learning. In order to understand more in depth what kind of specific informal learning had been acquired, we integrated the narrative analysis of the contents and the structural analysis of the interviews, particularly with regard to quotations encoded as the nucleus of the story, the complicating action. Some important elements emerged through the thematic and integrated data analysis.

Way of learning The first group, way of learning, includes a series of codes used by the participants in the research, which represent how the social workers have learned. On this first level, following the grounded theory criteria, we tried to verify the degree of frequency of such codes in the narrative texts (with the software ATLAS.ti). The most frequent codes within the narrative text

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are: learning from colleagues, which recurs in five different interviews and in some other interviews (nos. 2, 3, 8); learning from practice, in three interviews; and learning from errors, in four different interviews. Without rigid representation about how to learn in the workplace, some codes are to be found also in Eraut’s work (2004, p. 20). He distinguishes different ways of learning at work, such as participating in working groups, comparing one’s own work with that of other colleagues, and learning from particular difficult situations or new activities. Figure 1 shows examples of the different ways social workers learn (and the number of correlated quotations). Through the structural analysis of each narrative interview, we could identify the objects of the stories encoded in the Abstract (13 quotations); the subjects’ attitude were encoded in the Orientation (23 quotations), which covers what happened and what were the critical episodes. We highlighted the parts of the text related to the code Complicating action (36 quotations), which also defines the nucleus of each interview. Yet more has emerged from each narrative interview has emerged more than a nucleus: finally, the resolution of the problem and the closing of the discourse were codified as Resolution (21 quotations) and Coda (11 quotations).

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Figure 1. Examples of ways of learning

Deliberative learning In this typology of learning, the subjects are completely aware of the learning objectives they want to reach, during institutional training, academic learning, and learning from documentation produced at work to understand and resolve a specific professional problem. In Figure 2, the codes illustrate deliberative learning and the number of quotations related to each code. The codes “self-directed learning” and “self-determination” (in the examples in Figure 2) are present in three different quotations, since they recur in three different narrative interviews. We can say that self-directed learning has happened in autonomy and without the intervention of teachers, whose purpose is in part the same as the subject’s and consequently is connected to the family “deliberative learning.”

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Figure 2. Examples of deliberative learning

In the story of interview no. 8, the social worker, after a long period of absence from work, felt the need to acquire the knowledge and the skills required to lodge a petition for a client. She began collecting information, documents, and laws related to this activity to fill her own gaps; the biggest challenge for a social worker is to feel unprepared to face new problems at work, and in her case, this has partially been resolved through a conscious process of self-directed learning. Interview_8 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes [self-directed learning] [self-determination] “[…] I must say there has been continuous training, every day I became aware that I had learned something. For instance, the Assistant Administrator is an institutional figure; when I started I didn’t even know about its existence. I began to read about the law, to understand what it meant and now I am able to appeal to a court, therefore this process has led me to understand how to do it and now I know what an Assistant Administrator is. I have learned by myself: I spent a long time at home on maternity leave and therefore I had

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been rather distant from all these matters. So when I came back I went to conferences, where I learned about the existence of this institutional figure. However, I never asked about it, I started to pick up information, documents, to talk to colleagues. I started to collect information instead of waiting to be informed, and this attitude has helped me.”

Reactive learning The codes in Figure 3 refer to reactive learning, which the subjects have acquired during action; this represents learning that is conscious without having been planned, like learning from mistakes, learning from theoretical thinking about one’s own previous knowledge, and reflection on the action as knowledge of reality.

Figure 3. Examples of reactive learning

In the story of interview no. 2, the social worker described a way of learning based on mistakes, encoded as “learning from errors” (procedural errors and relational errors, as the interviewee likes to call them), from which the social worker has learned new lessons in order to manage relationships with clients and colleagues. The problem for this social worker was colleagues’

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negative judgment, since she had made so many mistakes at work, and how this judgment has impacted on her. Interview_2 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes [learning from errors] “[...] I must say that there are plenty of things one learns by making mistakes, other colleagues get worried when you are doing something wrong, they tell you that this is a way of learning, you do not only learn from the procedural errors, that is just part of it ... but also from relational errors. For example we organize a support group for children, it is a difficult job, there are often conflicts also among social workers. Then you learn in the field, the first few times you are shocked, but then you learn little by little to manage the relationship with parents and children.” In the story of interview no. 3, the social worker highlighted her learning experience through mistakes in a challenging situation, in which she was alone and without the opportunity of discussing her problems with other colleagues. Interview_3 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes [learning from errors] “[...] how I have learned ... I don’t know really … through attempts and mistakes .... I mean … [...] Through attempts and mistakes, finding myself in a difficult situation. [I think I have learned], in fact my first professional experience was in Public Social Services, [...] where I had been confined for some time. I had nobody to speak to about problems, I didn’t even know what I was supposed to do there since I had done my apprenticeship in other kinds of services, different from public service. Therefore the social worker’s job, well, I didn’t know what it was, I ... ehh, I began to work in this small public service structure ... bombarded by everything, by clients’ applications, by an administration that was against social workers, who were only expected to answer to them … There was a law by

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which the Municipality had to hire a social workerg, but the Secretary of the Municipality thought that social workers should keep at a distance, as far as possible, and the Mayors of these little municipalities had an odd way of thinking and they interfered a lot. Besides I was not in an office in the Municipality, I had my office in a branch office without telephone and without typewriter, and I had to do everything, from interviews through to the final deliberation, this was my first experience, and from there on I have understood a few things, learning along the way …” In the story of interview no. 9, the social worker stressed how she learned to ponder about the mistakes she had made, such as acting impulsively without a plan and without the necessary knowledge. Interview_9 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes [learning from errors] “[...] Really, we learn from mistakes, also after the training course about relationship and help, I started questioning myself, perhaps my way to act impulsively, with anxiety. I’d immediately start, without even thinking, without making hypotheses, defining a plan, without the necessary ... [knowledge].”

Implicit learning The codes in Figure 4 refer to implicit learning, tacit knowledge, which includes unconscious episodes and unintentional episodes of learning, such as learning from mistakes, motivation, empathy, professional ethics, difficulties in the workplace, professional identity, emotional involvement, andreflection about experience. These are also the most difficult learning processes to explain to other parties: because they are unknown to the actor, they only become conscious through rational reflection on past experiences.

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Figure 4. Examples of implicit learning

The coding “reflecting on on the experience” is present in two quotations belonging to two different narrative interviews (see Figure 4). This evidence has been associated with implicit and incidental learning. In the story of interview no. 8, the social worker said how in one case, while she was assisting two people affected by mental disabilities, she had to apply the knowledge she had already acquired as a professional (starting an assistance program, planning interventions, and so on). However, she had to alter her own attitude toward mental illness, at least in part, as she acquired knowledge in the field, including medical competence, in order to manage similar situations. This level of learning can be associated the category of implicit learning, as the social worker was not initially aware of her learning process during her work with the two mentally disabled patients; she had not previously planned any learning objectives, since her aim was to solve the two people’s problem. Yet she kept a strong memory of this episode, which today she still interprets as lear­ ned knowledge, a way of learning that can affect social workers’ professional behavior over time.

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Interview_8 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes: Reflecting on the experience] “[...] Today I follow a particular case of a ‘psychotic’ lady [mental disorders], with one daughter, also ‘psychotic,’ therefore two people with various mental issues. [...] In this case, [from this experience] I have learned collaboration above all, integration with other social services, an important integration. I learned that relational skills and attitudes are fundamental to establish a communication line with the lady and her daughter, both with mental disorders. Therefore it is very important to have relational skills but also medical skills, before starting a relationship with new clients. We should know when someone is schizophrenic, [I have learned in the field how to relate to mentally ill people]; this experience has taught me how to change my attitude [when interacting with mentally ill people; after this experience I have a different attitude]. [I have also learned] about specific procedures like the ability to elaborate a project before acting and to evaluate the situation, prior to intervention [...].” In the story of interview no. 2, the social worker focused on professional and emotional involvement, specifically when taking children away from their family of origin and into care. He reflected on how dealing with these cases required a different attitude and level of awareness compared with dealing with adults with mental illness. He found that the problems he experienced as a social worker when taking a child away from his/her family through a reflective process, equipped him with important skills for dealing with people with mental disabilities. Interview_2 Codes: [COMPLICATING ACTION] and codes: reflecting on the experience] “ [...] I must say that taking children away [from their family] is always a tragic event for us, an extreme solution, with extreme consequences, symptomatic that something has gone wrong in our work. Through training I’ve actually understood that in many cases,

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taking away a child from his/her family is as tragic for the social assistant as it can be positive for the family, who perceives it as a sort of liberation […]. This experience was one of the last things I had to deal with before leaving that social service structure. I was sad to leave, I would have happily worked a few more years, perhaps not all my life, because it is difficult to work with children your whole life. But I would recommend this experience to everybody, and with the experience I have now, I would recommend it to all my colleagues. When we have to deal with people with mental illnesses that have got children to care for, even if the attention is focused on the adult, in reality that adult has been a child that has suffered from difficult family dynamics, and the risk is that the same dynamics can be replicated.”

Discussion and conclusion As Eraut (2004) has already observed in previous work, the most important problem in carrying out research about informal learning (and the same problem has arisen in this investigation as well) is that informal learning is often implicit learning, unconscious learning; the participants have no awareness of the nature of their learning—their knowledge is either implied or part of a person’s general skills, rather than something they have learned during their professional life. Therefore it is very difficult to trace a personal learning process, apart from the distinction between theoretical knowledge acquired at university and professional practice. In their descriptions the participants are dominated by past coding systems of significance, and therefore it is rather difficult for them to describe complex aspects of their work and the nature of their experience as a learning process. We still need to clarify the relationship between what the participants say and those learning experiences that have been classified as implicit since the distinction itself is not always possible or intelligible. The participants do not know exactly what their im-

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plicit learning implies, nor are they aware of the actions and the activities related to implicit mechanisms (and perhaps these are not easily inferable from an investigation based exclusively on open biographical interviews). We refer to implicit learning as ineffable knowledge (Polanyi, 1966), knowledge that the subjects are not able to express with words; this should be seen as a level of tacit knowledge, also because totally explicit knowledge is not even conceivable. In contrast, reflective moments are those that help explanations of meanings, the analysis of personal feelings and behaviors, changes of meaning, inner training, self-conversation: these are meaningful pathways for the recovery of the implicit and tacit dimension of learning, which is possible through different levels of self-awareness (see Figure 5).

Figure 5. Relationship between self- awareness and implicit learning

Limits of this study Employing narrative interviews as a data collection method allows a representation of reality and of the object of study in a specific moment and context, but it does not help to generalize, to understand whether the experience, life events, and activities

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of other social workersn—those that have not taken part in this study—happen in a similar way, whether the same elements of knowledge and learning can be identified, or even whether the actual participants might give different information and data at another point in their life. The analysis of the data has been carried out as single interviews, and groups of interviews have been grouped together according to two different approaches: grounded theory and narrative inquiry. However, the coding of the second level was arranged through a system of aggregation, disaggregation, and verification of the codes assigned to single families, according to theoretical cognitive schemes (deliberative learning, reactive learning, implicit learning), without sharing the categories’ assignment and significance with the participants in the research. This represents a limit to the effectiveness of the interpretation of the research data (Maxwell, 1992).

Implication for research on informal learning The results are summarized in a document that can be used to elaborate a sort of working situational and contextual theory about the nature and the characteristics of informal learning in the workplace. The study does not expect to reconstruct what happened in reality—there was no intention of verifying the truthfulness of the interviewees’ statements. Instead, the objective of the study was to examine how people become aware of their personal way of learning in their job and of their informal learning process. This research has observed, as has other experts’ work before (see Eraut, 2004; Schugurensky, 2000; Marsick & Watkins, 1990), that informal learning can have different levels of intentionality. There are still many areas to explore, such as emotional, and affective factors, or moral judgments that may condition and favor informal learning. Assuming a reflective grounded logical balance, we can infer that there are experiences and actions, not

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Crabtree, B. F., & Miller, W. L. (1992). Doing qualitative research: Lon­don: Sage. Denzin, N. K. (1989). Interpretive Biography. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Denzin, N. K., & Lincoln, Y. S. (2005). Handbook of qualitative research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Dewey, J. (1933). How we think: A restatement of the relation of reflective thinking to the educative process. Boston: Heath. Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York: Macmillan. Eraut, M. (1999). Non-formal learning in the workplace. The hidden dimension of lifelong learning: A framework for analysis and the problems it poses for the researcher. Paper presented at the 1st international Conference on Researching Work and Learning, Leeds University. Eraut, M. (2000). Non-formal learning, implicit learning, and tacit knowledge. In The necessary of informal learning. Ed. F. Coffield. Bristol: Policy Press, 12–31. Eraut, M. (2004). Informal learning in the workplace. Studies in Continuing Education 26, 247– 273. Eraut, M., Steadman, S., Furner, J., Maillardet, F., Miller, C., &Blackman A. (2004). Learning in the professional workplace: Relationships between learning factors and contextual factors. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Con­fe­rence, San Diego, CA. Fielding ,N., & Lee R. (1991). Using computers in qualitative research. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Garrick, J. (1998). Informal learning in the workplace: Unmasking human resource development. London: Routledge. Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. The discovery of grounded theory: Strategies for qualitative research. New York: Alsine. Gubrium, J., & Holstein, J. A. (1995). Biographical work and new ethnography. In Interpreting experience: The narrative study of lives. Ed. R. Josselson & A. Lieblich. Vol. 3. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 1–26. Gubrium. J., & Holstein, J.A., eds. (2001). Handbook of interviewing. London, Sage. Josselson, R., & Lieblich, A. (1995). Interpreting experience: The narrative study of lives. 3 Vols. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Knowles, M. (1950). Informal adult education. New York: Association Press.

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Labov, W. (1997). Some further steps in narrative analysis. In Journal of Narrative and Life History 7(1-4), 395–415, http://ww­w.ling. upenn.edu/~labov/sfs.html. Labov, W., & Waletzky, J. (1967). Narrative analysis: Oral versions of personal experience. In Essays on the verbal and visual arts. Ed. J. Helm. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 12–44, http:// ww­w.clarku.edu/~mbamberg/LaboveWaletzky.htm. Lincoln, Y. S., & Guba, E.G. (1985). Naturalistic inquiry. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Marsick, V. J., & Volpe, M. (1999). The nature of and need for informal learning. Advances in Developing Human Resources 1(3), 1–9. Marsick, V. J., & Watkins, K. (1990). Informal and incidental learning in the workplace. London: Routledge. Maxwell, J. A. (1992). Understanding and validity in qualitative research. Harvard Educational Review 62(3), 279–300. Merriam, S. B., & Associates. (2002). Qualitative research in practice: Examples for discussion and analysis. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Merriam, S., Caffarella, R., & Baumgartner, L. (2007). Learning in adulthood: A comprehensive guide. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Mezirow, J. (1990). Fostering critical reflection in adulthood. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. Miles, M. B., & Huberman, A. M. (1994). Qualitative data analysis: an expanded sourcebook. London: Sage. Mishler, E. G. (1995). Models of narrative analysis. Journal of Narrative and Life History 5(2), 87–123. Polanyi, M. (1966). The tacit dimension. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Reber, A. S. (1993). Implicit learning and tacit knowledge: An essay on the cognitive unconscious. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Riessman, C. K. (1993). Narrative analysis. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Riessman, C. K., & Quinney, L. (2005). Narrative in social work: A critical review. Qualitative Social Work 4, 391–412. Rosenthal, G. (1993). Reconstruction of life stories: Principles of selection in generating stories for narrative biographical interviews. The narrative study of lives. Ed. R. Josselson & A. Lieblich. Vol. 1. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 59–91.

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Rusaw, A. C. (1995). Learning by association: Professional associations as learning agents. Human Resource Development Quarterly 6(2), 215–226. Schön, D. A. (1983). The reflective practitioner. New York: Basic Books. Schugurensky, D. (2000). The forms of informal learning: Towards a conceptualization of the field. NALL Working Paper No.19, Center for the Study of Education and Work, Department of Sociology and Equity Studies in Education, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. Seale, C. (2000). Using a computer to analyze qualitative data. Doing qualitative research: A practical guide. Ed. D. Silverman. London: Sage, 188–208. Shaw, I., & Gould, N.. eds. (2001). Qualitative research in social work: Con­text and method, London: Sage. Straka, G. A. (2004). Informal learning: Genealogy, concepts, antagonisms, and question. Online at www.itb.uni-bremen.de/dowloads/ Publikationen/Forschungsberichte/fb_15_04.pdf. Strauss, J., & Corbin, A. (1990). Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Taylor, C., & White, S. (2004). Case formulation in social work: formal knowledge, moral judgment, and the tacit dimension. Trans. (into Italian) P. Boccagni. In Il servizio sociale postmoderno: Modelli emergenti. Ed. F. Folgheraita. Trento: Erikson, 181–204. Tough, A. (1971). The adult’s learning projects: A fresh approach to theory and practice in adult learning. Toronto: Ontario Institute for Studies in Education Press.

Development of Professional Knowledge in Action: Experiences from an Action Science Design Focusing on “Acknowledging Communication” in Mental Health1 Solfrid Vatne Abstract: This chapter reports a multi-professional development project whose purpose was to develop “acknowledging communication’ in a psychiatric department for young people. The professional part of the project has its foundation in Schibbye’s treatment theory of inter-subjective understanding of relationships. The article presents the specific design and methods used: the re­sear­ cher’s process notes and field notes from participating in the pro­ ject, and qualitative interviews of eight informants participating in reflection groups. The article presents and discusses the staffs’ experiences of (1) participating in the development process and (2) outcomes of acknowledging communication in the unit. The study showed that in order to facilitate change in the role of staff members, it is important to combine several reflection arenas where theoretical principles can be converted into prac­ tical action. Even drawing data from only one study site the study should be of interest for professionals working with cli­ nical change processes.

Introduction Acknowledgment is considered to be so basic to the development of the individual that the absence of acknowledgment may contribute The study was supported by a grant from the Nordmøre and Romsdal Health Trust, Norway. A slightly different verstion of this chapter appeared in 2008 in Encyclopaideia: Journal of Phenomenology and Education 12(24), 9–29, and appears here with the permission of the editor. 1

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toward the development of mental illness (Stern, 1985). Being acknowledged may therefore be important in helping those who suffer from mental illness. This chapter presents design and findings from a process of professional development of “acknowledging communication” among the staff at a psychiatric unit for young people.

The project-context Young people who have experienced trauma, abuse, psychotic symptoms, and deep depression often experience feelings of alienation, both among other people and by themselves (Sunde, 2004). When dealing with such patients, staff at this unit has perceived that many of these patients have felt lonely and misunderstood over long periods of time. In an attempt to alleviate their mental pain, the patients may behave in a manner that is hard for the world around to comprehend. Even though the staff was genuinely interested in helping, they found that it was easy to “take over” the responsibility for the young people and talk about them as though they were incompetent. This gave the staff emotional distance from the patient’s pain, and thereby a feeling of mastery and control. Psychiatry is criticized for taking on the role of educator in the treatment of mentally ill patients (Goffman, 1961; Foucault, 1971; Vatne & Fagermoen, 2007). International research characterizes staff members’ communication as expert monologues (Lendemeijer & Shortridge-Bagget, 1997; Salias & Fenton; Høyer, Kjellin, Engeberg, Kaltialo-Heini, Nilstun & Sigurjònsdottir et al. 2002; Holmes, Kenndy & Perron, 2004). In a study by Vatne and Fagermoen (2007) from the same hospital where the current study was done, two simultaneous and conflicting perspectives in nurses’ approaches to patients were found: a dominating perspective of correcting, and a weaker one of acknowledging. Subsequently, acknowledging approaches have been developed further in Reflection Groups of nurses. Schibbye’s (2002) theory of intersubjectivity in therapeutic relationships constituted the theoretical foundation.

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Theoretical framework Acknowledging communication According to Schibbye (2002), disciplinary power interactions can occur during clinical activities; these power interactions are characterized by the therapists defining the patient’s behavior, experiences, and solutions. Often such definition can contribute to “deadlock” in a treatment relationship. Based on Hegel’s philosophy of mutual acknowledgment Schibbye presents intersubjectivity as the sharing of common experiences— for example, being open to the subjective opinions of someone else. Acknowledgment is close to the concept of “self-respect,” e.g., a feeling of intrinsic value of self-esteem. When patients experience that their feelings are being regarded as important and valid, they may also become subjects, rather than objects, in their own life. It has been shown that mutual openness is particularly effective in interactions with people who have suffered from psychotic breakdowns or whose lives have otherwise been disrupted by mental problems. By being acknowledged as thinking and feeling, individuals can regain their ability to engage in “self-reflection” and “self-delimitation” (Schibbye, 2002). Self-delimitation, self-reflection, and emotional presence The concept of self-delimitation refers to the ability to sort out and distinguish between one’s own opinions, feelings, values, and assessments and those of others. It is also about constantly trying to regain boundaries when engaging in dialogue with others (Schibbye, 2002, p. 78). Self-reflection is described as a specific human quality whereby one is able to relate to oneself, being one’s own object, by observing oneself from an outside position. This entails separating oneself from others and

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practicing self-delimitation. Self-reflection is our ability to have thoughts about our thoughts and to be aware of our feelings (ibid., p. 77). At the same time, self-delimitation gives the other person an opportunity to separate him/herself. This process calls for the professionals to take the patient’s perspective, e.g., being emotionally present to what the patient is experiencing. Engaging in reflective processes includes a therapeutic wondering together. The therapist tunes in to the patient’s affective state, responds to what s/he thinks the patient is feeling, and thereby invites the patient to share his/her experiences. The rationale for this project was to offer the patients a better process of self-development by building the staff’s ability to behave in more acknowledging ways, e.g., affective tuning in to patients’ emotions, together with self-observation by self-reflection, which in turn is the foundation for self-delimitation for both patient and therapist.

Professional development by reflecting on actions In milieu therapy, people are socialized into cultures characterized by institutionalized rules regarding what is considered as normal and as disruptive behavior (Schön, 1983; Argyris, Putnam & Smith, 1985; Vatne, 2003). The rules that determine working methods are often implicit tacit knowledge in practice, which can live a life of their own alongside, and in contradiction to, the professionals’ expressed theories and values. Tacit knowledge may therefore serve as a hindrance to organizational change. However, “reflection on action,”—for example, on the reasons for acting—may result in an awareness of knowledge about the action (Schön, 1983). Schön proposes that engaging in reflection occurs when one sees something new in a situation, or when one becomes aware of one’s own uncertainty or dilemmas. The study by Vatne and Fagermoen (2007) indicated that staff members’ strong focus on educating patients was governed by their own feelings, e.g., shame and fear.

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The theory of action science developed by Argyris et al. (1985) emphasizes the process of practitioners’ tacit knowledge in practice, named “theories-in-use,” described in terms of a Model I: strategies of control, self-protection, and covering up embarrassment. Model I–strategies can be in conflict with “espoused theories” expressed as ideals for practice. Through Model II–strategies or double loop learning, by introducing new, valid theories and values, organizational practice can be improved. Action science is therefore described as a way of closing the gap between an organization’s “espoused theories” and tacit “theories-in-use.” In this project we thought that systematic reflection on our own practice, based on an action science design, would make it possible to understand more about the tacit rules that governed our practice. Application of theoretical principles inherent in acknowledging communication might be helpful to discover something new in our interactions with the patients. Schibbye’s theory of “Intersubjectivity” and Schön’s theory of “Reflecting on actions” were used as a basis for the professional development project. Both theories deal with self-reflection as a method and are based on professionals’ vs. patients’ feelings as important reasons for reflecting on actions. Design and methods The project was initiated by the unit’s professional leader, and all staff members (about fifty) participated. In order to ensure the project’s relevance to all staff members, representatives from different professional groups participated in a project group responsible for developing the project. Prior to the start of the project, approval was given from REK (the Norwegian Regional Committee for Medical Research Ethics) and approved by the Norwegian Data Inspectorate.

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Setting The project took place at a treatment and rehabilitation unit in a medium-sized mental health hospital in western Norway. The unit has approximately fifty staff members and is divided into two wards. The unit provides treatment for seventeen young people between the ages of sixteen and thirty, who suffer from various mental and emotional disorders, often related to trauma and abuse, and patients with symptoms consistent with a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

Goals of the project The project had two specific goals: 1. To develop acknowledging communication as a practice in the unit 2. To study possible changes in clinical work in the unit

Action research within a reflective lifeworld approach Since the project contained a development process based on reflection involving all of the staff members, we opted for action science as its design, which is one of several theories of action research (Argyris et al., 1985; Malterud, 2003; Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). Action science is defined by Argyris et al. (1985, p. 4), as an inquiry into how human beings design and implement action in relation to one another. Hence it is a science of prac­tice of administrators, educators, and psychotherapists … intimately related to social interventions. Clients are participants in a process of public reflections that attempts both to comprehend the con­ crete details of particular cases and to discover and test pro­ positions of a concrete theory.

In action research, action and research are regarded as two aspects of the same process (Argyris et al., 1985; Malterud, 2003). Action research is cyclic in nature, e.g., its reflection is

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cycles of documenting practice, teaching, and discussion, and this new knowledge is included in the action, then is in its turn reflected over again (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). In this project the action part involved the three following cycles (Vatne, Bjørnerem, & Hoem, 2009): 1. Reflection on specific practice situations in various groups 2. Teaching and reflection program 3. Reflection on the whole development process The various reflection arenas and the teaching and reflection program in this project are presented in Figure 1, to which the following more detailed description may be added.

Figure 1. A  renas for Teaching and Reflection in the Acknowledging Communication Project

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Arenas of reflection and teaching In practice, the generation of theory depends on a well-functioning feedback process between researcher and practitioners. This presupposes structured arenas of reflection (Kim, 1993; Coghlan & Brannick, 2005), ensuring that clinicians are engaged in critical reflection in their own practice (Argyris et al., 1985). This perspective is related to the phenomenological view that all knowledge is basically related to the phenomenon as it is experienced in its manifold and complexity in people’s lifeworld (Zahavi, 2003), and represent a reflective lifeworld approach (Carlsson, Dahlberg, & Nystrom, 2004). As shown in Figure 1, the reflection process in this study took place in three different arenas: eight Reflection Groups, a Leader Support Group and teaching and reflection arenas; i.e., Project Seminars and a Voluntary Education Program.

Reflection Groups All the staff was divided into a total of eight interdisciplinary Reflection Groups. The leaders of the wards established the groups systematically on the basis of the staff’s working shifts and to ensure that different professions were represented in each group. Fixed meeting times were arranged every second week over the course of one year. Each Reflection Group had two group leaders, selected on the basis of their suitability and on the principle of equality. The group leaders were responsible for running the processes within the Reflection Group, which was organized to reflect on specific practical situations presented by the participants.

Leader Support Group The group leaders of all the Reflection groups, sixteen in total, participated in a Leader Support Group led by an external

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experienced professional. The group leaders each contributed specific practical situations discussed in the Reflection Groups for further reflection in the Leader Support Group. Fundamental matters that were discussed in the Leader Support Group could then be referred back to the Reflection Groups in a cyclic process by the group leaders (see Figure 1), leading to inter-group dialogue (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). By transferring reflections on situations between these arenas, it was possible to develop common practical knowledge about acknowledging com­munication. This knowledge could also be reallocated to specific interaction with patients in the unit. The meetings of both the Reflection Groups and the Leader Support Group lasted one and one-half hours. The following guide (Figure 2) containing questions designed to help the group leaders was developed on the basis of research previously carried out by Vatne (2003) and based on the theories of Schibbye (2002) and Schön (1983). 1. Actual understending and action • How do I understand the patient? • What did I feel during the situation< • Comfort / discomfort? • How did I act? • Positive-negative aspects / consequenses? 2. Alternative understanding and actions? • Connection between purpose and consequenses • Alternative approches and possible consequenses through acknowledgment? – Tuning in emtionally? – Self-reflection? – Self-delimitation? Figure 2. Questions for use in the Reflection Groups in the Acknowledging Communication Project

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Project Seminars In order to have a common theoretical basis for reflection in and between the groups (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005), Project Seminars (eight in total) were organized. The purpose of the seminars was to present and discuss the theory of acknowledging communication. The speakers at the seminars were hired guest lecturers, external consultants and the unit’s own staff. Relevant articles were distributed to the staff members, and textbooks were purchased and made available to the whole unit. Voluntary Education Program All the staff was offered a Voluntary Education Program that carried the equivalent of fifteen credits. It was organized by Molde University College, Norway, and set up in order to provide the staff the opportunity to boost their formal competence. This education program was also cyclic, based on participation in the Project Seminars and the tasks undertaken by the Reflection Groups. It was supplemented by seminars, literature, and support on assignments. The study included two written texts of reflection on one’s own practice and one presentation of a specific interactive situation taken from the practical work in the Reflection Groups, involving written stories, role play and video taping. The study culminated with a written paper. Twenty mem­bers of the staff were taken on as students by the college.

Data collection methods Data collection methods in action research in a phenomenological view can vary, but follow the action taking place in the actor’s lifeworld. Figure 3 shows an overview of the data collection methods related to the different arenas of reflection presented.

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Figure 3. D  ata-collection Method related to Arenas of Teaching and Reflection in the Acknowledging Communication Project

The figure illustrates that data were collected in form of documents and the researcher’s (first author’s) process notes (reflections and narratives), written during participation in the Leader Support Group and Project Seminars. Because of the transferring of data by the leaders between the Reflection Groups and the Leader Support Group, this became a main data source. In the Leader Support Group, data were collected during an eighteen month period in 2004–2005. Through qualitative interviews (lasting two hours each), data of the participants experiences from participating in various arenas and the whole project was collected (taperecorded and transcribed verbatim). A strategic sample, comprising eight members of the Reflection Groups, was recruited to take part in the interviews. To meet the demand of broadness and variation in the data, the informants were selected one from each Reflection Group, with different educational professional backgrounds and length of experiences. The informants received

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written information, in which they were informed that participation in the study was voluntary and confidential, and that they could withdraw at any time. The interviews were carried out after the conclusion of the project (January–February 2006) by a researcher who had not taken part in the group reflections, but was familiar with the project’s theoretical foundation. The interviews were based on a semi-structured interview guide that dealt with the staff’s experiences of the action process and the practical results of the process in the unit. The interviews were analyzed on the basis of Kvale’s (1996) theory of qualitative thematic analysis. Each case was analyzed and interpreted based on a hermeneutical perspective focusing on the informants’ meaningful understanding and acting. The method involved systematic structuring; analyzing in detail; and coding of the text data from all interviews into meaning condensation by creating categories of themes and subthemes that reflected the essential meaning in the text, as well as the distinctions and contradictions inherent in the data. In a final analysis, data from all informants were analyzed together, and together with the researcher’s process notes and narratives from the Leader Support Group. Major themes emerged about the participants’ experiences of (1) participating in the process and (2) outcomes of acknowledging communication in the unit.

Rigor Rigor in action research is related to use of learning cycles and to the fact that focus is placed on some significant factors useful for the organization (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). This study’s specific strength is the assembling and analyzing of data from different reflection and teaching arenas over a relatively long period (one and one-half years). The interviews of participants from the Reflection Groups, together with process notes from the Leader Support Group, ensured representation of experiences and knowl-

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edge developed in all those arenas. The reliability of the study was ensured by tape recordings of the interviews and the research journal of systematic notes taken during the process in the Leader Support Group. However, by drawing data from only one study site, the study has limited transferability.

 e staff’s experiences of participating Th in reflection on action Wondering reflection: a general principle The condition set for participating in critical self-reflection is that the reflection takes place in a safe, collaborative democratic partnership of non-forced discussion (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005; Forneris & Peden-McAlpine, 2007). On the basis of the theory of self-reflection, wondering reflection was applied as a reflection form in the groups. During reflection, the participants placed emphasis on whatever worked well, i.e., approaches that opened up the interaction with the patient. Experiences of various reflection methods The groups made use of oral and written narratives about selfexperienced situations, role plays and/or video presentations of role plays. An example is role playing and videotaping of a simple story about a dilemma experienced by a night-duty worker at the end of the evening on the ward. A young person is sitting alone in the lounge watching TV. According to the ward rules the TV is supposed to be turned off by 11 p.m., but what do you do when a patient is in the middle of watching a program he wants to see? This video film was made in one of the Reflection Groups, with three different solutions to the situation. It was subsequently reflected upon by the Leader Support Group and also at a Project

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Seminar, and is an example of how working methods and reflections were made available to all the staff in the unit. By reflecting on oral/written situations, it may be possible to get the heart of why we act as we do (cf. Schön, 1983). When the participants replayed the roles involved in a specific situation, as in the story referred to above, they experienced a resurfacing of the feelings that the participants had in the actual situations; this provided a platform for reflecting on how they had impact on their practice. Playing the role of the patient brought forward the patient’s possible feelings in the situation, something that many of the informants in the interview felt was an important starting point for being emotionally present. The feeling of being offended by the staffs’ opinions and rules of behavior illuminated the need of working with self-delimitation. One powerful way of opening a “deadlocked” interaction was to use “reflecting teams” (Andersen, 2005), by giving a small group of participants special responsibility for observing the interactions that took place during the role play. Afterward, this group expressed their thoughts about what had occurred and the consequences of the interaction. They also provided input about alternative approaches. In this way, the participants in the situation were able to see new things in the situation, and also received new ideas about interaction. The proposals that the participants found usable were then tried out in another role play. One of the informants described her experience of these methods as follows: Role play that involves the use of a video was very positive be­ cause we suddenly saw ourselves, saw the situations, in a totally different way. It was extremely clear what we were doing. Some of us then got an “aha” experience.

The staff experienced that such processes could provide them with access to different reasons for the way in which they interacted with patients. Particularly evident became the unit’s infor-

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mal rules guiding the staffs’ actions. The most important were to behave “similarly” toward the patients and “loyal” to the rules.

Translating theory to actual practice In their interviews, several informants expressed that “selfdelimitation and self-reflection were new concepts.” The theoretical presentation of “intersubjective sharing” in articles and textbooks were “not very understandable. It was ‘heavy’ reading.” Therefore reflection on these concepts in the group process started rather hesitantly. According to Schön (1983), theoretical principles cannot easily be applied in practice. In order for the staff to be able to apply the theory, it was necessary to convert the theory into everyday language. The Leader Support Group— where concrete practice was related to theoretical definitions and descriptions, then transformed to the Reflection groups—was evaluated as being particularly important. However, the training process was also experienced as being unfamiliar and somewhat threatening, especially at the start of the process: You were given time to reflect about what you actually were doing in the unit, and not least what you yourself wanted to do. Just being allowed to dare to expose yourself a bit, and receive new ideas and input about different ways of working! In one way it was an unfamiliar situation, in which I was now supposed to look at how I act, how I express myself, how I deal with patients. At first it was threatening, but very instructive. It was also a strain. It was quite demanding when you have to look at yourself. These quotations show a process involving a questioning of practice, which was experienced as risky, and also painful and stressful. Focusing on positive approaches and seeing the humorous side of a situation, together with enough time to develop the group processes over a period, were important conditions for maintaining security.

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 ormalized education program speeded F up the clinical process The staff participating in the education program experienced that the requirements for course participation, working on theories and producing videoed role plays of clinical situations, served to speed up the process of professional development. The process led to acknowledging communication being discussed specifically in reports and in relation to clinical work in the unit. Obtaining fifteen study credits also gave greater weight to the project, serving as a motivating factor and giving greater value to those with no previous college education. One of the informants reported: I have learned quite a bit, but it is something else to be able to say that I have fifteen credits. It helps to secure the level. It is particularly important for those who have no previous study points. Experience shows that the acquisition of new theoretical knowledge and the development of such knowledge in a community of practice should go hand in hand if the patients are to benefit from the knowledge. One informant said, “It is the totality of all parts of this project that have been important for creating the changes in practice.”

Experiences of the whole process The informants described how through the various aspects of the process, theory, and different arenas for reflection, they acquired a practical content in their approach that was meaningful for them, both personally and for their work with patients. The entire process of acknowledging communication helped to create a change in attitudes. It is something that remains in your blood—and then you use it in your everyday life—not just at work, but also in your private life. It is both professional and personal.

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The fact that everyone became equal participants in a process in which they had to “present their uncertainty and discover things together, resulted in a feeling of equality.” That highly educated professionals also described difficult situations involving self-revelation, was significant in opening up the process for everyone (cf. Topping, 2005, on peer training). We were all working on changing ourselves - there were no dif­ ferences between us, the approach was new for everyone.

Moving from a culture where one’s everyday life is characterized by formalized rules for patient treatment to a culture with a more open and reflective attitude in dealing with patients can also be experienced as a major transition. The staff expressed that it was a “painful process” to gain insight about the fact that they had perhaps previously behaved in ways that were offensive to the patients. “It is the price we have to pay for making a positive change.” Questioning your own practice can also evoke negative feelings such as blame and guilt, and defensive strategies against the project (Ruth-Sahed, 2003; Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). Two of the staff members were so opposed to the project that they elected to leave the process. Their opposition appeared to be related to their perception of the whole project as a criticism of the manner in which they worked, and also to the discomfort they experienced regarding self-revelation. Some of the staff felt the way in which they had worked previously was not good enough. Some of the difficulties were caused by the fact that information about the project did not reach all employees. Some employees were worried that process memos sent by the groups could be traced back to individual employees.

Theories about change processes (Argyris et al., 1985; Holter, 2001) highlight the fact that change takes time, and that different resistance techniques may develop as changes occur. In particular, staff can feel insecure if they lose previously held positions.

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On the whole, however, this project and the new forms of communication were regarded as being important and positive.

 e participants’ experiences of outcomes of acknowledging Th communication in the unit Acknowledging communication: Known—but still unknown Theoretically, the informants were familiar with the basic ideology of acknowledgment. Mental health nurse specialists especially described acknowledgment as a basic attitude in their professional education, e.g., “to acknowledge the patient as a valuable person.” However, it was not an ideology, “consciously settled in the unit’s everyday practice.” How to practice acknowledgment was an unknown area of competence. All informants expressed that they found the theory difficult to put into practice in their actual encounters with patients. One said: “It feels like my tongue gets tied” (Vatne & Hoem, 2008). Mutuality: A core in acknowledging the patients The informants presented mutuality as the essence in acknowledging communication; they described it as an “intersubjective sharing of good and bad feelings and beliefs in a respectful way.” Through mutuality, both patients and professionals were “allowed to appear as distinct persons.” In various fashions they stated intersubjectivity to be an important aspect of a therapeutic relationship. The patients are experts on their own lives and their experienced problems in relationships with other people. Trying to understand the stories patients tell us, and their subjective reality, is necessary to attain a therapeutic change.

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In a collaborating relationship I have to respect the patient’s point of view. It is about sharing good and bad experiences. This manner of mutual sharing could make a change in both parties of the relationship.

Rolechanging processes  rom “knowing best” to acknowledging F patients as competent The informants explained that one consequence of respecting the patients’ subjective point of view was that “the therapists have to take the patients’ expressions seriously” and to “accept and dare to show diversity in behavior and opinions among patients and colleagues.” For the informants this change involved a shift away from what they called a “traditional” role of a professional expert, i.e., the role in which the professional “always knows what is best for the patients.” The expert role was described as involving behavior like “stubborn talk and assertive manners”—for example, “defining the patients by ascribing negative attributes to them,” and performing a role of disciplining the patients, as previously described. If staff relates deviation only to the person’s poor qualities, it is a diagnostic approach (Løchen, 1971; Vatne & Holmes 2006), which can prevent the staff from understanding the situation and the professionals’ own contribution to it—for example, the way they interact with patients (Breeze & Repper, 1998; Vatne & Fagermoen, 2007). According to Schibbye (2002), disciplinary interactions can easily occur during clinical activities, characterized by the therapists defining the patients’ behavior, problems, experiences, and solutions. Often such attitudes can contribute to “deadlock” in

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the treatment relationship. When staff members find themselves in challenging encounters, it is recommended that they try to view the situation from the patients’ perspectives (Wright, 1999) and examine the professionals’ own behaviors and responses (Harris & Morison, 1995). The informants in this study described such a change in their perspective and actions during the project. But the new approaches were yet not totally integrated, either in themselves or in the practice of the unit: “Such dramatic changes in communicating with the patients’ takes time.” According to the informants, respecting the patient’s view implied they have to “undress” from a distanced professional role, and “stand out as independent persons having their own opinions about patients and treatment.” It also involved “reflecting about the language used in communication with patients.” It is about “speaking to them in a way that opens up, giving the patients a possibility to reflect upon themselves, and in relationships with others.” By sharing feelings with the patients in a self-reflective and self-delimitating manner, the professionals described their behavior as professional, with a closer relationship to the patient and sometimes also becoming a friend. MacGillivary and Nelson (1998) found that mutual trust and respect, sustained by self-disclosure, friendships, and relationships, emerged strongly as a core value of partnership, which seems to be a more professional concept than friendship.

From a culture of conformity - to appreciating diversity “To show diversity” was perceived by the informants as a big step from the unit’s former ideology, i.e., “to act identically and conform, in accordance with the unit’s informal rules.” When the therapists behaved as distanced experts, they said they did not find it “necessary to explore the patient’s own opinions and feelings.” In contrast, by practicing self-disclosure, the professionals were “allowed to develop a closer relationship to the

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patient, being a professional acting self-delimited through selfreflection, and more like a ‘friend.’” The informant’s statement about being both a professional and a friend is worth examining. For example, in a study by Hem & Heggen (2003), nurses described being “professional” and being “human” as contradictory demands that produced difficult role conflicts.

Self-delimitation and self-reflection in practice The participants in this project talked about self-delimitation and self-reflection as concepts that had to be translated into concrete actions in clinical encounters. They described selfdelimitation as “consciousness about their own thoughts and feelings”; they regarded their previous lack of consciousness as a possible background for serious conflicts in situations with patients. In order to behave distinctly, the informants felt it was important to distinguish verbally between the therapist’s and/or patient’s experiences in the situation. To behave in a self-delimited way assumed that they practiced self-reflection, explained in terms like “reflecting about our own feelings in the concrete situation” and/or “what we think might be the individual patient’s feelings.” Practicing self-reflection in Reflection Groups through discussion and role playing clinical situations became the arena for developing ways of verbalizing self-reflection and self-delimitation. When practicing self-reflection, one informant expressed, that he “came to see himself from another perspective.” Others related that they found it “important to investigate experiences together with the patients.” When we reflected about my narrative in the group and roleplayed the interaction, I suddenly saw myself in a new light. It was my own shame I placed upon the patient. It is important to look into yourself—and shed light on yourself in the situation; we are not used to acting like that. It is important to investigate our experiences and beliefs with the patients; ask them about their feelings and thoughts. Our

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interpretations of what is happening inside the patients from an outside position can be wrong.

Researchers have similarly demonstrated that critical reflection through dialogues, combined with narratives, helped to transform nursing practice by bridging the gap between theoretical ideals and the realities of daily caregiving practice (Kim, 1999; Forneris & Peden-McAlpine, 2007).

From authoritarian talk to wondering questions The informants explained their changes in communication with the patients as a “shift from authoritarian messages to using wondering reflective questions, based on emotional listening to patients’ expressions.” It also involved a change in approach from “walking ahead of the patient, trying to drag him from behind, to pushing together in collaboration.” In contrast, they pointed out their previous focus to be on “reality of facts,” practicing realityorientation and motivating patients to change opinions and behavior in accordance with the professionals’ own opinions and behavior. Often such advice from staff could end in “closing up the talk.” When shifting to acknowledging approaches, the informants described their work as more meaningful, but also more difficult and uncertain. “It is tough to put focus on ourself ” and “strenuous to be conscious of yourself all the time.” Participants in the Leader Support Group “felt there was a way to go before the new approaches were fully integrated.”

Discussion and conclusion Research on reflection in action is to study processes whereby practitioners learn to reflect in action (Kim, 1993, 1999). On the basis of acquired experiences from this project, I will draw attention to the fact that the combination of reflection on theory,

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formal educational requirements, and participation in clinical reflection is important for professional development. This combination appears to be particularly relevant for staff members with considerable experience, but little formal professional education. This corresponds to international research that shows that when many strategies are used together in a cyclic way, they elicit reflection and help students to make connections between theory and practice (Forneris & Peden-McAlpine, 2007). Reflection Groups gave an opportunity for the investigators to conduct a group dialogue with the clinicians about their traditional strategies of acting. The narratives of their practice experiences were shared through storytelling, after which they were guided in reflective dialogue, following reflective guidelines and incorporating the attributes of critical thinking. This is defined as a process of reflective thinking that goes beyond logical reasoning to evaluating the rationality and justification for action within a context (Argyris et al., 1985; Ruth-Sahed, 2003). Putting aside an all-knowing role in favor of engaging in an open inquiring of one’s own interaction with patients is something that requires both courage and willingness to participate in sharing feelings and thoughts. In the beginning, the discussion was mostly about what was right and wrong behavior, which also became an exposure of the unit’s treatment culture. Recognizing forces that influence the way one thinks and acts involves questioning one’s underlying assumptions, and may lead to a transformation of perspective (Kim, 1993; Coghlan & Brannick, 2005, Forneris & Peden-McAlpine, 2007). After a while, we recognized that the main theme became “what could be a constructive way of opening the situation” and “to behave in a self-delimited way.” Both are examples of Model II—thinking or double loop learning. Model II—thinking occurs when the change requires thinking and questioning, altering the core assumptions that underlie a situation (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005). It is a complex process in which cognition and feelings

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are closely linked. I will especially highlight the importance of role playing which evoked the staff’s own feelings in the situation—feelings previously hidden for them. The cyclic nature of the project involving “inter-group reflection” (Coghlan & Brannick, 2005) made it possible to create a common ground of theoretical knowledge in Project Seminars and in the Education Program, and transform the knowledge into concrete practice in reflection upon clinical narratives in the reflection arenas. This finding corresponds with Kim’s (1993) description of putting theory into practice, which involves a process embedded in specific situations of practical work, transforming symbolic knowledge into action to make the theory accessible to the practitioner. However, both interviews and research notes gave support to the complexity of running such a project, where defensive barriers affected some of the staff’s willingness to expose themselves to the judgment of others (Forneris & Peden-McAlpin, 2007). The informants talked strongly about getting through a consciousness-raising process of how to relate to the patients in such a way that the patients can experience the relationship as acknowledging. In their descriptions, the informants used Schibbye’s theoretical concepts, and put them in concrete terms: emotional presence, self-delimitation, and self-reflection. During the project, they developed a common theory base for practice, translated into concrete actions that they experienced as meaningful in practice. The essence in acknowledging approaches they described in terms of “we have to go through ourselves,” i.e., self-reflection, to be emotionally present in a patient’s lifeworld. The concrete approaches in acknowledging communication seems fruitful in milieu therapy—both for nursing and in a multi-professional approach. Future research could focus on more in-depth development of acknowledging communication in practice, and should include patients’ experiences of such approaches. Related to earlier research (Ruth-Sahed, 2003; Forneris & Peden-McAlpen, 2007), the significance of this study is that

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reflection, combined with narratives and dialogues, helped to transform clinical practice by bridging the gap between the theoretical ideals and the reality of daily caregiving. The fact that all the staff on the unit was included in professional development resulted in increased individual mastery through new, common socialization processes while the staff was engaging in practical work with patients. Being recognized as a competent clinician by professional leaders involved mastery on the fraternal plane. This type of professional development also entailed better mastery on the part of individual clinicians on the level of understanding and skills. One experienced that new methods of communication with the patients were effective in creating better patient-helper relationships and for attaining new, important treatment. References Andersen, T. (2005). Reflective processes: talks and talks about those who talk. Trans. H Thomsen. Copenhagen: Danish Psychology Press. Argyris, C., Putnam, R., Smith, D. M. (1985). Action science. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Coghlan, D., & Brannick, T. (2005). Doing action research in your own organization. London: Sage. Breeze, J., & Repper, J. (1998). Struggling for control: The care experiences of “difficult” patients in mental health services. Journal of Advanced Nursing 28(6), 301–311. Carlsson, G., Dahlberg, K., & Lützen, K. (2004). Violent encounters in psychiatric care: A phenomenological study of embodied caring knowledge. Issues in Mental Health Nursing 25(2), 191–217. Forneris, S. G., & Peden-McAlpine, C. (2007). Evaluation of a reflective learning intervention to improve critical thinking in novice nurses. Journal of Advanced Nursing 57(4), 410–421. Foucault, M. (1971). Madness and Civilisation. Trans. R. Howard. London: Tavistock. Goffman, E. (1961). Asylums: Essays on the social situation of mental patients and other inmates. New York: Doubleday.

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Harris, D. & Morison, F. (1995). Managing violence without coercion. Archives of Psychiatric Nursing 9(4), 203–210. Hem, M. H., & Heggen, K. (2003). Rejection—a neglected phenomenon in psychiatric nursing. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing 11, 55–63. Holmes, D., Kennedy, S. L., & Perron, A. (2004). The mentally ill and social exclusion: A critical examination of the use of seclusion from the patient’s perspective. Issues in Mental Health Nursing 25, 559–578. Holter, H. (2001). Female repression, male repression, and dominance techniques: Norwegian beliefs and ideas. In Norsk tro og tanke. Ed. J. E. Hansen. Oslo: Tano Aschehoug, 623–629. Høyer, G., Kjellin, L., Engeberg, M., Kaltialo-Heino, R., Nilstun, T., Sigurjónsdóttir, M., & Syse, A. (2002). Paternalism and autonomy: A presentation of a Nordic study on the use of coercion in the mental health care system. International Journal of Law and Psychiatry 25, 93–108. Kim, H. S. (1993). Putting theory into practice: Problems and prospects. Journal of Advanced Nursing 18, 1632–1639. Kim, H. S. (1999). Critical reflective inquiry for knowledge development in nursing practice. Journal of Advanced Nursing 29(5), 1205–1212. Kvale, S. (1996). Interviews: An introduction to qualitative research interviewing. London: SAGE. Lendemeijer, B., & Shortridge-Bagget, L. (1997). The use of seclusion in psychiatry: A literature review. Scholarly Inquiry for Nursing: An International Journal 11(4), 299–315. Løchen, Y. (1971). Idealer og realiteter i et psykiatrisk sykehus: En sosiologisk fortolkning. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. MacGillivary, M. A., & Nelson, G. (1998). Partnership in mental health: what is it and how to do it. Canadian Journal of Rehabilitation 12(2), 71–83. Malterud, K. (2003). Qualitative methods in medical research. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Ruth-Sahed, L. A. (2003). Reflective practice: A critical analysis of data-based studies and implications for nursing education. Journal of Nursing Education 42(11), 488–497. Salias, E., & Fenton, M. (2000). Seclusion and restraint for people with serious mental illness. (Cochrane Review). In The Cochrane Library, Issue 3. Oxford: Update-Software.

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Schibbye, A. L. (2002). A dialectic understanding of relations in psychotherapy with individuals, couples and families. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Schön, D. (1983). The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books. Stern, D. (1985). The interpersonal world of the infant. New York: Basic Books. Sunde, S. (2004). Trauma—perspective on the treatment of schizophrenia. Journal of the Norwegian Psychological Association 41, 725– 728. Topping, K. J. (2005). Trends in peer learning. Educational Psychology 25(6), 631–645. Vatne, S. (2003). To correct and to acknowledge: Nurses’ rationale for setting limits in an acute psychiatric ward [English language summary]. In Korrigere og anerkjenne: Sykepleieres resjonalitet for grenesetting på en akuttpsykiatrisk behandlingspost. Doctoral dissertation, Institute of Nursing Sciences, University of Oslo. Vatne, S., & Holmes, C. (2006). Limit setting in mental health: Historical factors and suggestions as to its rationale. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing 13, 588–597. Vatne, S., & Fagermoen, M. S. (2007). To correct and to acknowledge: Two simultaneous and conflicting perspectives in mental health nursing. Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing 14, 41–48. Vatne, S., & Hoem, E. (2008). Acknowledging communication: A milieu-therapeutic approach in mental health care. Journal of Advanced Nursing 61(6), 690–698. Vatne, S., Bjørnerem, H., & Hoem, E. (2009). Development of professional knowledge in action: An action science design focusing on “acknowledging communication” Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences 23, 84–92. Wright, S. (1999). Physical restraints in the management of violence and aggression in in-patient settings: A review of issues. Journal of Mental Health 8(5), 459–472. Zahavi, D. (2003). Husserl’s phenomenology: Cultural memory in the present. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

Analyzing descriptions of lived experience A phenomenological approach Luigina Mortari, Chiara Sità Abstract: Phenomenological perspective can be useful for qualitative researchers trying to make rigorous, deep descriptions of lived experiences. This chapter aims at developing a methodological reflection on the potential and limits of phenomenological content analysis, moving from an investigation based on inter­ views of teachers’ and parents’ experiences of family-school par­ tnership. We chose to use the eidetic phenomenological approach for data analysis, reflecting on its implications for our knowledge and trying to answer the question of how a phenomenological perspective can shape our knowledge of lived experiences. The chapter presents the structure of the investigation and discusses the methodological problems emerging from the research process.

Research structure Phenomenological research is oriented toward answering questions of meaning. More specifically, a phenomenological approach can be useful when the research aims at understanding an experience as it is lived and thought by the participants (Cohen et al., 2000, p. 3). Phenomenological research focuses on the lived mea­ ning of the experiences of the research participants. “The locus of phenomenological research is human experience, and it approaches topics of interest through their presence in conscious awareness” (Polkinghorne, 1989, p. 45). Phenomenologically based inquiry asks how meaning presents itself to experience by way of interrogating accounts of participants’ experiences. This is the case of the empirical research object of this study. The research aims to explore the experience of family-school

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partnership in all school grades. Especially in the last few years, this relation raises significant problems for the Italian school system. We made an exploratory qualitative study on this topic using descriptive interviews with teachers and parents of different school levels. The main goal is to understand the essential aspects of this relation as it is lived, from the viewpoint of those who are concretely involved in it. According to the phenomenological assumption that requires investigating a lived experience, not a vicarious experience or a general reflection on it (Cohen et al., 2000, p. 3), we involved as research participants both teachers and parents who have direct experience of the problems permeating school-family collaboration and asked them about their experience. The complexity of the meaning people attribute to their lived experience cannot “be grasped through analytic manoeuvres or explanatory theories” (Dahlberg, et al., 2002, p. 22); it instead requires a method approaching it in a rigorous and delicate way, and description fulfills this request. The interview is focused on teachers’ everyday experience of relations with the pupils’ parents or parents’ everyday experience of relations with their own child’s teachers. It aims at obtaining a detailed description of lived experience, starting from the question: “Can you describe your relation with your son/daughter’s teachers?” for the parents and “can you describe your relation with the parents of your pupils?” for the teachers. It is evident that this kind of question implicitly asks the participants to turn their attention to what they live; indeed, we think that phenomenological research should not put general questions or questions focused on abstract ideas or theories, but focus on what a precise person lives regarding a precise phenomenon. The interviews are our “source of evidence” concerning the participants’ experience. The corpus of the interviews includes seven primary school teachers and twenty eight parents.

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The Phenomenological perspective The object of phenomenological comprehension is the meaning of lived experience as the individuals involved live and perceive it. They are usually asked to describe an experience they have lived—not to make abstract considerations on a general topic (Giorgi, 1985). Phenomenological research is interested in descriptions coming from inside ordinary being-in-the-world. The object of phenomenological inquiry, from an eidetic perspective, consists in the participants’ descriptions. The goal is to analyze these descriptive texts in order to grasp a precise description of the phenomenon “as it appears.” (van Kaam, 1966, p. 15). A phenomenological approach to social research can be better understood by examining three authors who propose different visions of phenomenolgical knowledge and methodology: Clark Moustakas, Max van Manen and Amedeo Giorgi. Clark Moustakas combines phenomenology with his heuristic approach in order to grasp a deep understanding of human experiences by “creating a story that portrays the qualities, meanings and essences of universally unique experiences” (Moustakas, 1990, p. 13), as his research on the experience of loneliness exemplifies (Moustakas, 1975). Moustakas strongly focuses his attention on the unique meanings of personal experience, and he is criticized for having left out of account the essence and the structural dimension of phenomenological knowledge (Applebaum, 2007). Max van Manen explicitly connects phenomenological and hermeneutical approaches in human science research. He defines phenomenological human science as “the study of lived or existential meanings […] as we live them in our everyday existence, in our lifeworld” (van Manen, 1990, p. 11). His notion of phenomenological knowledge takes into account both Heidegger’s interpretation of phenomenology as hermeneutics (Heidegger, 1976) and Gadamer’s reflection on hermeneutics (Gadamer, 1986). In van Manen’s perspective, phenomenological knowledge is both descriptive and interpretive, since it mediates between interpreted

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meanings and the thing toward which interpretations point (van Manen, 1990, p. 26). The use of interpretive acts is justified by the fact that in lived experiences, the meanings are often veiled or hidden. Amedeo Giorgi proposes a phenomenological research method that strongly refers to Husserl’s thought, on the idea of phenomenology as a descriptive science, based on intentionality. He seeks for the meaning from the subjects’ viewpoint, but is interested in the underlying psychological structures, searching for knowledge that could be significant to a wider community. In our research the analysis of the interviews uses Giorgi’s approach. This method, starting from an epistemological perspective, considers description as a key term. Describing is a cognitive act required for both the participants and the researcher. During the interviews, the participants are involved in an analytic process of describing lived experiences, and the researchers produce descriptions starting from the data collected. Writing descriptions is something different from writing narratives and explanations: the language and the style used for describing help to identify the essential qualities of an experience. The participants’ comprehensive descriptions of the phenomenon are the basis for an analysis that can “draw the essence of the experience” (Moustakas, 1994, p. 13). In Giorgi’s perspective, the very act of describing can facilitate the perception of the person of what s/he has lived. However, while according to Giorgi the main goal of phenomenological research is to enlarge the comprehension of psychological processes, we would rather talk about comprehension of human experience of the world— which goes beyond psychological structures.

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The steps of a phenomenological inquiry Epochē and the researcher’s own experience of the topic The aim of the phenomenological method is to gain a faithful knowledge of the phenomenon. According to this main object, the mind is required to become receptive to the appearing of the phenomenon, in order to let it show itself in its original givenness. But it is very difficult to allow this disclosure of the phenomenon since a researcher, entering a research field brings along his/her own world and experience. The researcher’s ordinary, personal beliefs and assumptions can become a preconceived set of theories, which risks limiting the openness of the inquiry process. What phenomenology requires of the researcher is to perform the epochē. The epochē consists in two main acts: suspending our everyday perspective, our reactive attitude toward the things in the world (De Monticelli, 1995); and facing things without presupposing habitual knowledge. According to Ashworth (1999), the cognitive act of performing the epochē is impossible because, as Heidegger and Gadamer teach us, our grounding in a set of presuppositions is inescapable. Even if we acknowledge that the principle of presuppositionlessness is not practicable, however, we think that working on one’s mind in order to make it as empty as possible with regard to the preconceived assumptions constitutes a necessary task in order to search for a faithful description that respects the original profile of the lived experience of the participants and lets it emerge in clarity.The epochē allows us to acquire a different view of experience. As researchers, we are part of the same world we are investigating. This is why we have to question the taken-for-granted assumptions we have toward the world in our “natural,” nonreflective attitude. In our case, predominant frames and languages are those related to the field of education and to personal experiences about school. The researcher’s experience (in this

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case we are talking about our own experience as a parent, a teacher, a pupil, a researcher) cannot be considered as a part of the data, but it is useful to be aware of it in order to be prepared to cope with possible distorted interpretations. The first challenging question was how to perform the epochē. In order to cope with this question we decided to make explicit our own experience about the topic by writing it down, using writing to increase our awareness. The awareness of one’s pre-conceived notions facilitates the epochē process by activating a critical perspective on personal knowledge and implicit theories about the phenomenon that can influence the analysis. Indeed, when a subject casts light on his/her presuppositions, then the tacit power they exert on the cognitive life can be identified and consequently reduced. Moustakas proposes using the descriptions of personal experiences as a means for the analysis by thinking about it during the process of analysis, seeking all possible meanings and divergent perspectives, varying the frames of reference about the phenomenon and constructing a description of how it was experienced. In our case, the researchers’ personal experiences of the phenomenon help to clarify his/her symbolic world and promote self-awareness, which can be considered as the condition for the epochē. As long as our personal experiences are exposed to the glance of consciousness, their power to influence the process of analysis is reduced (Mortari, 2007).

Phases of the analysis We analyzed the descriptions using the following steps, coming from Giorgi’s phenomenological approach: reading the texts in order to get the sense of the whole; finding significant statements about the experience, focused on how the individuals experience the topic; working out a label corresponding to each significant statement; and grouping them into meaning units.

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The following example from a teacher’s interview demonstrates part of this process: Int

A8 (I-1)

pos

8

Statements

Labels

We call all parents for a meeting where we explain … we propose our program.

Organize collective meetings with parents

For example, we explain to parents what are the projects we will develop during the school year.

During the meeting we also listen to parents’ proposals.

Explain to parents school activities and projects

Meaning

Building spaces for information and discussion

Give parents the possibility to discuss the program

The meanings concerning the way teachers describe their relation with parents can then be referred to the meaning unit we have called “institutional practices” in school-family relations. Other meaning-units concern, for example, the way they put these practices in action (attitudes, methods, flexibility, etc.); the way teachers interpret communication with parents; the representations of parents; the way teachers talk about themselves and their personal experiences as parents; and the expectations and desires they express toward parents at school. As regards parents, the meaning-units concern, for example, how they perceive teachers’ communication, visions of the school and their child; strategies they use in their relation with

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teachers; feelings; and the way they describe themselves in the relation with school. Starting from the units identified, we wrote a descriptive portrait about each account given by the participants in order to highlight singular meanings, and drew a map for each individual description. The maps include a core of common meaning-units as well as meanings that are specific to the subject concerned. An example of a map of a parent’s description is presented below. Strategies 1 Attempts to create a dialogue with the teacher concerned

About the child The child’s well-being is the most important thing Her son has a difficult relation with a teacher in particular Apart from school, her son has “10 millions good qualities” I know my son, I don’t recognize him in all those negative evaluations

Teachers’ communication Unilateral Labelling Centred on school outcomes Bureaucratic

Feelings She feels like – being evaluated as a parent – not being trusted

About the teachers They haven’t got time for parents They are less interested in the child than in learning They don’t really know the child They are competent on education: they could give parents some suggestions

G1—Mother of primary school boy

Strategies 2 When the dialogue with the teacher is not satisfying, she looks for another interlocutor (the headmaster)

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This process aims at acquiring an analytic vision of the data in order to grasp the meaning the participants give to their experience. Afterward, the researcher begins a self-reflective operation during which s/he reflects on these meanings as they take shape in his/her mind. In this process, the researcher produces a world of meanings that is connected to the meanings built and expressed by the participants: this is a complex phase, requiring critical reflection and a continuous effort at clarification (Mortari, 2007). The meaning-units, expressed in the participants’ language, are further examined and systematically interrogated in order to grasp the sense they reveal, and then, translated into the researcher’s language. The last phase of the process consists in synthesizing and integrating the meanings identified in order to build a general description consisting in a written text that should give an accurate, clear, and articulated description of the experience. Through this text, the reader should obtain a better understanding of the experience under examination (Polkinghorne, 1989, p. 46).

Emerging questions Since the aim of phenomenological research is to find the essence of the phenomenon investigated, then after clarifying the essence of participants’ individual descriptions, the further step of the inquiry is to focalize the essence of the experiences of the group under examination. From a postmodern perspective, this does not mean aiming at universal essences; rather, it requires grasping a situational essence. This process raises some methodological problems: (1) What do we mean by the “essence” of a phenomenon? (2) How can we identify the “essential” structures of the experience?

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What do we mean by the “essence” of a phenomenon? According to phenomenology, the essence is the quality that necessarily characterizes a phenomenon and without which it could not be (Stein, 2001, p. 38). The essence of something says what a thing is in general (ibid., p. 39), that is, what properties necessarily and universally belong to it. This philosophical definition of essence raises critical questions for empirical research, because in our postpositivist era, we maintain that the result of an inquiry process is always situated, and it can never acquire a universal value. As a matter of fact, Husserl’s interpretation of essences is not focused on universality: his understanding of the lifeworld as infinite leads him to define essences as always open, never completely explored and described; they are also supposed to change as the lifeworld is continuously changing (Bertolini, 1988). As researchers in the human sciences, we recognize the situated character of our knowledge (Mortari, 2007). Consequently, in order for the concept of “essence” to be valid in phenomenological research, it has to be interpreted so as to be useful for empirical purposes (Dahlberg, 2006, p. 11). Phenomenological philosophy aims toward eidetic vision. Eidetic vision is the invariable way in which everything is given to experience, that is, its structure. According to Husserl, the essence is not something that is hidden within or behind objects: essences are aspects or qualities of objects, grasped through intentionality. In empirical research we can define the essence as the way a phenomenon is, always related to its context and its particular meanings. This does not mean that phenomenological research is interested solely in individuals’ idiosyncrasies. Moustakas and van Manen, in different ways, give priority to individuals’ meanings and their radically singular character. On the contrary, Giorgi tries to use an individual’s account to clarify a phenomenon that is significant for a wider community. In his

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perspective, the aim of the research is not to focus on mere individuals’ meanings. On the contrary, the aim is to understand psychological structures and meanings that connect an individual to a community of “others” (Applebaum, 2007). In some way, phenomenological research deals with the problem—is well known to qualitative researchers—of the transferability of knowledge. Essential structures are not universally valid because all knowledge is embodied in a precise context: we wouldn’t have had the same results if we had done our research in a different cultural, historical, or geographical context. But phenomenological analysis can help us to understand and clarify some phenomena taking place in other contexts and involving other people. In this perspective, the results need to take into account both individuals’ experiences and the common structure of human experiences. This epistemological problem challenges us to define what the essence could be in empirical research. We call the essence that which expresses fundamental and shared properties of the experience, recurring aspects that help to clarify the phenomenon we study (Mortari, 2007). How can we identify the essential structure of the experience? Phenomenological analysis takes into account the participants’ original descriptions aiming to understand their “underlying structures.” This analysis should allow to find a general description by taking specific descriptions as a point of departure. This conception has been accused of positivism because it presupposes an objective, universally valid truth. From a social science researcher’s perspective, essential structures can be considered as constructions built byfollowing as much as possible the principle of fidelity to the phenomenon. This sounds like a paradox, but we can say that the validity of phenomenological

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research in the human sciences is strongly related to this paradox. Essences are neither produced nor interpreted, because they are “already there”; they already belong to the lifeworld. But they cannot be considered as something that just lies in the object itself, ready to be described: “the meaning is disclosed in the researching act that takes place between the researcher and the phenomenon” (Dahlberg, 2006, p. 12). This theoretical position finds its foundation in Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy, specifically in its concept of “chiasm,” which suggests that the act of knowing implies a continuous exchange between the object of investigation, which appeals to me by making itself evident to my consciousness, and I myself, casting my attentive light to the object. Starting from this phenomenological assumption, another question has to be raised: how can we find common, shared properties of the experience? In qualitative research, numbers have very little relevance, but we can remark that in our sample there are some meaning-units that occur in all cases (Mortari, 2007); these meaning-units have been found both in teachers’ and parents’ accounts. Essences, considered as qualities structurally belonging to the phenomenon, should be present in all the different forms the phenomenon takes and in its empirical variations (De Monticelli, 1995). In teachers’ descriptions, for example, their relation with parents takes place within predefined spaces and it is essentially based on giving information (“We have established meetings twice a year,” “We clearly explain to the parents what are our plans for the school year”). Moving from this common frame, many different configurations of meaning emerge from the interviews: teachers try to facilitate parents’ encounter with school through various flexible strategies. As for parents, we identified the strong centrality of their child as a common property of the relation with teachers as they live it in every encounter with the school (“All I’m interested in is my son’s well-being,” “When I meet teachers I want to talk about my son, I expect to be asked about how he is at home”).

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Main results The previous paragraph has presented a concise description of the essence of the phenomenon we have studied. But the research also has to describe the different aspects of a composite phenomenon and the ways in which it appears in the participants’ experience. The phenomenological method is not a simplifying approach: on the contrary, it leads to different levels of comprehension, corresponding to a “core meaning” (Mortari, 2007), which includes the essential aspects, and the constituents of the phenomenon (Dahlberg, 2006). The partial meanings or constituents contribute to further elucidating both the meaning of the phenomenon and the tension among the different, sometimes contradictory, aspects that characterize it. On the basis of the core meaning and the partial meanings or constituents, it is possible to build a description as intense and general as possible of the phenomenon and its specificity. The final result is a complex description including essence and constituents, which has been called a “lamination of meaning” (Gergen & Gergen, 1995, p. 88). This expression defines the outcome of an adequate description as a meaning composed by different levels that express the various aspects through which a phenomenon reveals itself in a holistic, non-fragmented vision taking into account the entirety of the phenomenon (Mortari, 2007, p. 196). From the teachers’ viewpoint, our research evidences that the relation with parents belongs first of all among the assets of an institution, and it is one of the duties defining a teacher’s role. The main goal of this relation is to inform parents about school activities and explain the sense of what school does. Within this framework, the teachers use different strategies in order to facilitate parents’ encounter with the school context (“We often meet parents outside school and have informal conversations,” “We ask parents to choose the time and the modes they prefer for our meetings”). As for the constituents of the experience, we can say that the relation with parents is described as a complex

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experience that needs to be founded on parents’ trust toward the school and the teachers. This experience includes many different aspects: the idea that family background influences children’s behavior and achievement at school, the sensation that there is more competition than cooperation between parents and teachers in educating children, and the attempts to find more effective ways of involving parents. In their accounts, the parents recognize the value of institutional aspects; being informed and being asked for suggestions are considered to be a form of “respect.” However, when they talk about their relation with the teachers, they seem to appreciate an individual relation, reciprocity in communication, and shared attention to the child as a whole, not only to his/her learning outcomes (“When I see the teachers, I would like them to talk me about my daughter as a person, not as an “outcome –producer”). In their descriptions, they talk about many difficulties, especially in communicating with teachers. They interpret these problems in different ways (carelessness of teachers, their own difficulties in approaching school, etc.) and tell how they try to find solutions by following strategies such as applying to the headmaster, strategies that often have negative effects on teachers’ trust toward them.

Does phenomenological research have practical relevance? The aim of phenomenological research is to clarify the essence of a phenomenon beginning from a faithful description of its singular appearances. We can call the description of the essence a “descriptive theory” about the phenomenon (Mortari, 2007). One last question arising from our research is about the contribution of phenomenological knowledge to improve and orient practice. We assume that an investigation is relevant when its results are somehow significant for the participants, and more generally

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for those who are involved in the phenomenon investigated. On this basis it could seem that a “simple” descriptive theory is not meaningful. But the opposite is the case: it is precisely this kind of theory, which searches for a faithful knowledge of a phenomenon, that can be extremely significant because it goes into the core of the phenomenon itself. Indeed, a descriptive theory can throw light on the lived experience by giving research participants a key that allows them to grasp a better understanding of their experience. For example, identifying the deep difference between the meanings that parents and teachers attribute to their relation (essentially institutional meaning for teachers, child-centered meaning for parents) helped us to elaborate hypothesis about how these meanings contribute to make encounters between teachers and parents more difficult. Previous research has already demonstrated that the difficulty in the relation between teachers and parents is mainly due to cultural barriers, reciprocal visions and representations of the other, and beliefs about own and the other’s role and responsibility toward children (Gunn Morris, & Izumi-Taylor, 1998; Graue & Brown, 2003). In the present investigation, a phenomenological approach has helped to go more deeply into these implicit frames of reference and to grasp a complex vision of the phenomenon. The cultural aspects of the difficulty in relations between family and school cannot merely be identified with generic prejudices toward each other; they include a core meaning that influences many of the efforts that teachers and parents make in order to facilitate their cooperation. Teachers’ vision of this relation, considered as an institutional duty of transparency and correct information about what they are doing at school seems to be in conflict with parents’ expectations of a dialogue in which they are asked about their point of view on their child. Teachers’ interpretations and the way they live this relation need to take into account parents’ point of view, not simply to respond to their requests, but in order to find a common ground of educational questions and to rethink times, spaces, contents,

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and logics of family-school encoun­ters. In this way, the insights identified in a descriptive theory can serve action-oriented, actionsensitive knowledge (van Manen, 1991). References Applebaum, M. (2007). Considerazioni critiche sui metodi fenomenologici di Moustakas e di van Manen. Encyclopaideia: Journal of Phenomenology and Education 11(21), 65–76. Ashworth, P. (1999). “Bracketing” in phenomenology: renouncing assumptions in hearing about student cheating. Qualitative Studies in Education 12(6), 707–721. Bertolini, P. (1988). L’esistere pedagogico: Ragioni e limiti di una pedagogia come scienza fenomenologicamente fondata. Firenze: La Nuova Italia. Cohen, M. Z., Kahan, D. L. and &, R. H. (2000). Hermeneutic phenomenological research. Thousand Oaks,CA: Sage. Dahlberg, K. (2006). The essence of essences—the search for meaning structures in phenomenological analysis of lifeworld phenomena. International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and Well-Being 1, 11–19. Dahlberg, K., Drew, N., & Nyström, M. (2002). Reflective lifeworld research. Lund: Studentlitteraitur. De Monticelli, R. (1995). La conoscenza personale: Introduzione alla fenomenologia. Milano: Guerini. Gadamer, H.-G. (1986). Verità e metodo. Trans. R. Dottori. Milano: Bompiani. Gergen, K..J., & Gergen, M. M. (1995). From theory to reflexivity in research practice. In Research and reflexivity. Ed. F. Steier. 76–95. Giorgi, A. (1985). Phenomenology and psychological research. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. Graue, E., & Brown, C. P. (2003). Preservice teachers’ notions of families and schooling. Teaching and Teacher Education 19, 719–735. Gunn Morris, V., & Izumi Taylor S. (1998). Alleviating barriers to family involvement in education: The role of teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education 14(2), 219–231. Heidegger, M. (1976). Essere e tempo. Trans. P. Chiodi. 3rd ed. Milano: Longanesi.

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Mortari, L. (2007). Cultura della ricerca e pedagogia: Prospettive epistemologiche. Roma: Carocci. Moustakas, C. (1975). The touch of loneliness. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Moustakas, C. (1990). Heuristic research: Design, methodology, and applications. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Moustakas, C. (1994). Phenomenological research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Polkinghorne, D. E. (1989). Phenomenological research methods. In Existential-phenomenological perspectives in psychology: Exploring the breadth of human experience. Ed. R.S. Valle and S. Halling. New York: Plenum Press, 41–60. Steier, F., ed. (1995). Research and reflexivity. London: Sage. Stein, E. (2001). Introduzione alla filosofia [1930]. Trans. A. M. Pezzella. Roma: Città Nuova. van Kaam, A. (1966). Existential Foundations of Psychology. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. van Manen, M. (1990). Researching lived experience: Human science for an action sensitive pedagogy. London, Ontario, Canada: Althouse Press.

Phenomenological Practice: Methodological Reflections

Methodological Considerations for Human Science Research in the Wake of Postmodernism: Remembering our Ground while Envisioning our Future Scott D. Churchill Abstract: In this chapter I will begin by discussing the bio­ graphical roots of researchers’ ontological and epistemological commitments. I will also raise some concerns about the current state of human science research, with regard to the nature of what gets presented as findings. I will then use Heidegger’s care-structure as a framework for differentiating natural science, human science, and postmodern approaches to psychological theory. Next I will place human science research into dialogue with postmodern challenges, by considering the nature of psychological data and knowledge, and asking if there is a “rea­ lity base” for research beyond the chain of signifiers that make up both our data and our analyzes: What is the ontological status of the situations that serve as ground and purpose for psychological research? This will bring us to a contrast between the phenomenological assertion of a primacy of experience and the postmodern assertion of a primacy of stories. I will close by posing three basic methodological questions for us to ponder.

 ived hermeneutics: The personal foundation L of our intellectual life The first half of the 20th century saw the rise of humanism in academic and professional psychology as well as in the field of psychiatry. Concurrently, in the field of philosophy, Husserl’s transcendental aims were being subverted by Heidegger, Sartre, Merleau-Ponty, and Levinas (among others) into more human-centered and historically-situated concerns. Value-laden understandings of

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the human “self” gave rise simultaneously to the American humanistic psychologists’ preoccupation with “self-actualization,” to European philosophers’ notions regarding “authenticity” and “authentic being-one’s-self,” and even to contemporary Eastern psychology’s emphasis on self-forgetfulness. Then postmodernism came along and began exposing the political underpinnings as well as the epistemological tenuousness of the many divergent assertions about reality that have emerged (Derrida, 1973, 1976; Foucault, 1976, 1980). So where do we stand now? Terms like “truth” and “self ” no longer seem viable in the wake of postmodernism, as such language appears to lay claim to impossible essences and unities. In their place we find only contingencies and disunities. What is left to do, for the oldschool phenomenologists and human science psychologists who once offered us a light at the end of the philosophical tunnel, who found ways of acknowledging “multiple realities” (Schutz) and not simply a “universe” of ideas, while still standing on the firm ground of their convictions regarding ontologically revealed “depth dimensions” of human reality? When, in 1949, Heidegger wrote his essay entitled “The Way Back into the Ground of Metaphysics,” he seemed to be offering up something solid upon which to stand, indeed, a perspective that could “under-stand” everything else. The image he offered was that of a tree, sinking its (metaphysical) roots into solid (ontological) ground, extending its (disciplinary) branches into the sky. What happens when this whole scheme is turned upside down, and seemingly vanishes into thin air after a wave of the Derridian wand? Many psychologists today find themselves situated somewhere in between the assuring “certitudes” of their formative years, and the not so assuring challenges coming from the forward edge of our collective intellectual history. At such times, one pauses, reflects, and takes stock. This paper is the result of one such “taking stock,” in which a “human science” psychologist enters into a self-critical examination of his own values, and

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asks, with a searching eye, “What among the rich ideas of my formative years can still hold true for me today? How do I think, teach, and continue to grow in light of the healthy skepticism introduced to me via postmodern thought?” Upon reflection, what I have found are not grand narratives deprived of their grandness, but rather enduring convictions that have emerged from many years of mentoring qualitative research projects from within a “human science” framework. In reflecting upon these issues, I realize that part of being human is having a history, and that this history cannot be undone or simply taken out of play via deconstruction. I further realize that rather than apologize for my preconceptions and guiding principles, I prefer to celebrate the “lived hermeneutic” by which the notions communicated to me by my college and graduate school professors have become my own. My first exposure to existential philosophy was in 1969, when I had just been called for the draft into the Vietnam War (from which I was spared). In the same year I was introduced to many new experiences and was blown away by the new ideas I was learning. I can recall admiring my college professors, wanting to be like them, yearning to understand the deeper meaning of philosophers like Kierkegaard and Jaspers and Heidegger and Sartre. Everything that characterized who I was at that point in my life, at that very point in history—all of this was the backdrop against which I assimilated the ideas that would become my destiny to profess and to continue reflecting on. Indeed, it would be an interesting exercise (in terms of our own professed principles of hermeneutics) to juxtapose the texts that we read as undergraduate and graduate students with the events that were taking place in our lives at the time we were reading them. And I would argue that it is the spirit of my times, and not, for example, those of Kierkegaard or Heidegger, that lie at the basis of the values and existential concepts that I hold dear. I cannot pretend that I really know the political context within which Heidegger wrote Being and Time, or within which

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Sartre wrote Being and Nothingness—even if I might inform myself about their meaning and motivational contexts. The fact remains that my own understanding of these thinkers belongs to my biography, not theirs. (When I, as a teacher, present Freud or Sartre or whomever in class, it is not Freud, it is not Sartre, rather, it is my personal understanding of whomever I am presenting that, of course, gets communicated to my students.) In retrospect I can say that I was ready for a personal absorption of existential philosophy at this time in my life. Heidegger believed that “a readiness must be there” before one steps into the path of phenomenology. (2005, p. 1). I may have been only eighteen years old when I first read Heidegger, but I can still remember the awe I experienced when my first Heidegger teacher would refer in class to “Being with a capital B.” This was my first introduction to the “ontological difference.” Both in college and in graduate school, Heidegger’s existentialia were discussed not only in class, but in hallways, in all night “bull sessions,” even in crowded bars. We were incorporating our reading of Heidegger into our understanding—our understanding—of what it meant to be human, of what it meant to be studying existential phenomenology in America in the early 1970s. And when in my current life I teach Heidegger, it is certainly not an interest in National Socializm that animates my teaching, but rather the wonderful revelations of my college days, the spirit of my times, that I find myself communicating. This is likewise true when I teach phenomenology and qualitative research: here I am drawing not only upon the writings of my teachers, but even more so upon the very personal way that I internalized their teachings, along with the teachings of my clinical mentors. I tell my students that I am teaching them what my teachers taught me. I instruct them to cite the writings of my teachers as their sources. My own “natural attitude” here is my belief that what I know (and teach) is precisely what my teachers taught me, as though I were a blank slate or sieve

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through which their teachings were simply passed on to my students. Of course, what I present to my students is—indeed, has to be—my own unique synthesis of what my teachers taught me, of what I’ve read in books, and of how I integrate all this within my own personal experience. I realize now that if I were to “deconstruct” what I teach to my students, this would probably be less a matter of revealing hidden power assumptions imported from the authors I’ve read, and more a matter of revealing my own psychological interests, dreams, and blind spots. And maybe one reason I have tended to keep postmodernism at an arm’s length is that I am still enjoying the process of passionately living out my own “personal myth” of what it means to be a teacher. What I wish to communicate here is the very personal nature of what we call “knowledge”—in this regard, I tend to agree more with Kierkegaard than with postmodernists regarding the source and origins of our thoughts and values. Yes, we have incorporated ideas and values from out of the social world, but they bear our own indelible stamps. We have taken them up, and made them our own—just as our patients and research participants have made certain “social constructs” about their psychological lives “their own.” Thus as a phenomenologically trained researcher, if I am to understand the meanings of the words, thoughts, and values of my research participants, it is not going to be to the social history texts that I turn, but rather to research interviews with the participants themselves, to find out precisely what their narratives mean to them.

Hearkening to a shared “depth dimension” This brings me to one of the concerns I have for contemporary qualitative research: that is, the tendency of novice researchers to think that their results end with the recording and tallying of the participants’ statements. I want to say: there has to be more! There has to be more than the sharing of the data in the

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results. And yet, sometimes it appears as though simply by using the words of the participants—projecting them onto a PowerPoint screen and pointing to them –we are uncovering the personal meanings of experience. I believe there are deeper levels of personal meaning that can only be thematized by a more sensitive attunement to the meanings expressed or implied by qualitative data. Furthermore, I believe that these “deeper levels” are accessible to us when “staying within” rather than “going beyond” the evidence (Giorgi, 1992; see also Giorgi, 2000 regarding the boundaries of description and interpretation). In other words, I am not proposing that we try to fill in gaps in the data via hypotheses or conjecture; rather, I am saying that descriptive findings are not reducible to the data themselves—the data are not themselves the “results,” but rather provide the evidence used in determining results. In staying within the evidence, the human science researcher can be found to exhibit principles derived from both phenomenology and hermeneutics (although it is not necessary to follow principles from both fields) in order to arrive at meaning. The phenomenological principle of description (versus explanation) points the researcher in the direction of the textural aspects of experience—the richly nuanced, idiographic description of an event as it is lived. The phenomenological principle of searching for essences—whether or not we decide to “deconstruct” what is meant by “essence”—points the researcher in the direction of the structural aspects of experience—those characteristics of a more formal nature that remain the same throughout a series of variations. Both the “accidental” and the “necessary,” the textural and structural, are illuminated through descriptive thematizations (see Keen, 2003, for illuminating discussion of texture and structure). However, here (with phenomenology) we are limited to thematizing what meets the eye—or ear. Hermeneutical principles help us to go beyond what first appears to ever deeper layers of meaning, accessible when “listening with the third ear” (Reik).

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This is not, of course, a requirement for human science researchers, but it can be a source of great insight into lived experience. The move from phenomenological to hermeneutical-phenomenological reflection is generally understood as a thematic move from description to interpretation (see Giorgi 1992, 2000). Structural and textural constituents are still sought and described; however, there is greater attention to contextual meanings—interpreting a text in terms of the ever widening existential contexts of the author. Without digressing too far into a discussion of hermeneutics, we might simply refer to Heidegger’s own “hermeneutical-existential” method, by means of which a moment of experience is found to be situated within an overarching, existentially individuated “care-structure,” the thematization of which becomes an interpretive act on the part of the researcher—that is, seeing a moment of experience in terms of the “projects” that animate it and the “facticities” that situate it. When anything as sophisticated as Heidegger’s care-structure— or depth psychology’s developmental schema—is brought to bear on qualitative data, we are properly speaking of engaging in interpretive rather than purely descriptive acts. In such acts, we are seeing our way through the data to an “underlying” or conceptually “pregiven” depth dimension. If Brentano spoke of psychognosis as as “knowing the psyche” (derived from the Greek gnosis which means “to have seen”), then we might speak here of a “psycho-dia-gnostic” presence where we see through the surface events (whether behaviors or descriptions) to their psychological depths (see Churchill, 2000). What, in essence, concerns me the most about the postmodern influence within psychology is the resulting loss of what we might call the “depth dimensions” of the psychological subject. We are no longer “selves” with “souls,” but rather “agents” (or pawns) who merely activate a “sense of self.” The “whence” and “whither” of human being do not stand in existential relation to each other when that “being” now refers to one’s (displaced?)

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place in an endless chain of signifiers. Isn’t this one of the “ambiguities” that Heidegger (1962) guarded against with his notion of the “care-structure”—the idea that our ownmost projects, our authentic possibilities, and even our average everydayness are all existentially rooted in the historical (and biographical) situation within which we “find ourselves”? For Heidegger, this “facticity”—this relation to a situation into which we are “thrown”—is not a hapless relation to grand narratives and social constructions, but rather a very personal way in which we embody our “foundedness” (Fundierung), and in which we initiate our own way of “bodying-forth” (leiben) and thereby “saying” (if only in silence) something special and personal about the meaning of our being. And this is why the existentially trained psychologist is engaged in what Heidegger called “hearkening” 1 (and not just “processing data” or “reframing narratives”). Hearkening (Horchen) is a deeper kind of listening, one in which we can even listen in silence. Heidegger tells us that in the hearkening that comes from dwelling-with the Other, we are able to experience something of who the other person is, through our mode of attunement to him/her. In both psychotherapy and psychological research, as well as in everyday life, this hearkening itself requires a sensitivity to one’s own attunement (in this case, an attunement to the Other) as well as a sensitivity to the attunement of Others. When listening to a patient, or reading qualitative data, this sensitivity requires a bracketing of our own In Being and Time Heidegger makes some remarkable pronouncements regarding the very nature of listening, of hearing, of “being-open” to oneself and to others, and eventually, of “hearkening.” He writes: “Listening to . . . is Dasein’s existential way of Being-open as Being-with for Others. Indeed, hearing constitutes the primary and authentic way in which Dasein is open for its ownmost potentiality-for-Being—as in hearing the voice of the friend whom every Dasein carries with it. … Being-with develops in listening to one another, which can be done in several possible ways: following, going along with, and the privative modes of not-hearing, resisting, defying, and turning away. It is on the basis of this potentiality for hearing, which is existentially primary, that anything like hearkening [Horchen] becomes possible. (1962, pp 206–7) 1

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“first-person” feelings in similar situations so that we can leave our capacity for “feeling” available to ourselves as our mode of attunement to the mode of Being-in revealed in the data. Our own subjective processes thus become “instruments” of our perception of others. Hence we can only truly understand the Other when we have been able to feel or suffer with the Other. We are not reminded of our own suffering; this can come later. But for now, we “suffer-with” as we bear witness to the Other. We might even become attuned to a suffering that lies just below the surface of the Other’s expression, somewhere just out of his/her reach. But we feel it, we sense its presence, we know that it is there. To borrow Heidegger’s phrasing, it is not revealed in “what is said [explicitly] in the talk,” but rather in what we understand that the talk is “about.” Such understanding requires moments of “shared attunement” that occur quite spontaneously, and that can only be “cultivated”—but never “made to happen” in the researcher’s experience. In Being-with-one-another understandingly we do not revert to our own inner world; we remain curious and attentive to the Others’ “inner” world, which is now a “shared” world. This shared world is made accessible by what I described at a 2005 Bournemouth conference as a “second-person” perspective (later published in Churchill 2006, 2007). I would really like to know how, if at all, a poststructuralist would talk about this experiential realm that comes into being when we pass from firstperson to second-person awareness: does it belong to the Imaginary? to the Symbolic? to the Real? It seems to me that these categories, if applied to second-person phenomena such as Heidegger’s “hearkening,” would be either reductive or inadequate to the experience, because hearkening, like Heidegger’s concept of Verstehen, does not have to be expressed in language for it to exist, and hence it probably stops short of the Symbolic order. Yet it transcends first-person singular experience, and hence must also transcend the order of the Imaginary. And if the Lacanian would proclaim it to belong to the Real, I am not sure

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what is gained by that. So once again, I find myself remaining grounded in my phenomenology. (Can somebody on the postmodern side please throw me a lifeline?)

The lived and the spoken With respect to Heidegger’s care-structure, in which the temporal ecstases of past (facticity, thrownness, attunement), present (fallenness, circumspective concern, discourse), and future (existence, projection, understanding) are ontologically interdependent and equiprimordial, we find in both traditional psychology and postmodern psychology variations in which one “moment” within this existential gestalt is given undue priority. With traditional psychology, there is a totalization of thrownness so that all one can see is determinism. This is both expressed and symbolized by the equation y = f(x), which states that behavior (y) is simply a function of antecedent variables (x). With that equal sign (in which the present is reduced to the past), no room is left for choice (future projection). With postmodernism, there seems to be another extreme: a totalization of fallenness where discourse (the present ecstasis) is no longer grounded in one’s personal attunement (the past ecstasis) or in one’s authentic understanding (the future ecstasis). Postmodernists emphasize the role of the social order in constituting the self, or at least our sense of “self ”—and thus, in Heideggerian terms, they would affirm our having fallen under the spell of “the they,” without leaving room for such “falling” to represent a genuine relationship either to one’s own past or to one’s “authentic future.” If the sociobiologist sees the human being as just a disposable container for DNA, then the poststructuralist has a tendency to see the human being as just a disposable carrier of the grand narrative. Either way, there is a primacy of the code over the code carrier. And let’s not leave out the shortcomings of American psychology’s “human potential movement”: one might say that

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the “shadow” of the humanistic movement was its own totalization of Heidegger’s third temporal horizon, possibility—over and against the obligations of the past and present. With Heidegger, we are understood as “thrown projects” or “situated freedoms”: there is a dialectic between the existential past and the existential future, between determinism and indeterminacy, between necessity and possibility, between facticity and existence. In light of all this, human science psychologists must be careful, and maybe even worry, when attempting to integrate postmodern principles into their practice. It is one thing to learn to be sensitive to shifting contexts of social meaning, to personal lacunae posing as personality traits, or to language games that once were taken as “grand narratives” of “the way it is.” This much we can (and in fact already do) take from the postmodernist literature. On the other hand, we must be careful not to invoke theoretical systems that we do not fully understand, and to which our practice therefore bears only a facile relationship, and then to use these systems as the basis for a new and enlightened practice of human science research. One such example would be what some contemporary psychologists have referred to as “narrative therapy in the postmodern world,” the aim of which is “to provide [patients] with the opportunity to revise their stories in such a way that these will be more in line with what they want” (Parry & Doan, 1994, p. 45). What these therapists may be forgetting, however, is that what their patients want is a happier life, not just a happier story; they want their day-to-day experience to be free from anxiety, gloom, fear, whatever—and simply changing the way one talks about one’s experience doesn’t necessarily change the experience that exists in the first place. The problem is that the therapists here, grounded by what I think is a misappropriation of poststructuralist insight, seem to believe that what exists in the first place, so to speak, is the story. This is a far cry from the client-centered therapy where we learned to dwell in the client’s words, and other nonverbal modes

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of self-expression, in order to gain insight into something more fundamental, more primordial—namely, the client’s experience. The words of the client open up the client’s world to us. They don’t constitute that world in the first place; they are a second-order expression of that world. The Rogerian reverence for the client’s words is replaced in some cases of contemporary therapy with a skepticism toward the client’s own words—and, more alarming, with respect to their lived experience. Equally distinctive of this approach is the fact that the client is viewed less as an agent, as the author of his/her own story, and more as the passive victim of language games. If existential therapists try to teach their clients “I am what I choose to be,” narrative therapists attempt to persuade their clients “I am the way I’ve been influenced to think I am” (Parry & Doan, p. 53). The postmodern therapist thus places stories, rather than experiences, at the center of therapy. (Gergen & Gergen, 1998, offer a nicely developed dialogical model of postmodern thinking regarding the relationship of self to narrative—one with a more sophisticated philosophical foundation than one finds in some of the psycho­therapeutic applications of postmodernism.) The dividing line between the human science psychologies and the postmodern psychologies (those seeking to apply the insights of poststructuralism) seems to have something to do with whether one abides by a primacy of experience or a primacy of language.1 Merleau-Ponty (1962) succinctly designates the 1 In fact, the relationship of phenomenology to postmodern thought is much more complicated—indeed, to the point where it can be asserted that one can “locate the beginning of philosophical postmodernism in Husserl” (Madison, 1988, p. xiii). “The history of the phenomenological movement,” continues Madison, “is the history of the progressive attempt to eradicate the traces within it of … the metaphysical ghosts that continue to haunt our discourse, the house of being, as Heidegger called it.” The underlying and more serious point of poststructuralism is to raise the question of what is the ultimate referent in discourse. As people like Lacan and Derrida have pointed out, there is only the myth of a “transcendental signified”; for postmodern thinkers, there are “in fact” only signifiers functioning in the structural role of the signified (Terry Pulver, personal communication).

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problem faced by psychologists when he says that experience is for the most part lived, rather than known. Postmodern psychologists prefer, it seems, to beg this distinction and focus instead on what is spoken. My concern is that once the chain of signifiers becomes dislocated from its foundation in experience, we end up with no objective reference point of which we can speak, or even allude to—and therefore no longer a concern on the part of the psychologist with whether the reality described by one story or another hits the mark, because the “mark” is now whatever story “sounds” best. This has been characterized by Jerome Bruner (1983, 1990) as a shift from a correspondence criterion for truth to a coherence criterion. There has also been talk of an alternative “pragmatic” criterion for truth, and I believe it is this kind of utilitarian notion that “truth is whatever works for you” that has led us to the current crisis in philosophical psychology (see Spence, 1982, pp. 275ff., for a thoroughgoing critique of this position).

Confronting diversity in the search for essences So where does this leave us? Concretely, I am talking about each participate in an International Human Science Research Conference (or similar setting), insofar as we represent not only genders and nationalities, cultural traditions, and possibly social classes and races, but also our individual embeddedness in different theoretical traditions. We represent theories and practices that nevertheless have, or can be shown to have, their roots in the vast history of what is known as “humanism”—from its origins in ancient and medieval thought to its blossoming in the Renaissance; its transmutation into clearly and not so clearly defined intellectual strains within the Geisteswissenschaften in modern times (including America’s humanistic, transpersonal, and constructivist psychologies, as well as Europe’s existential, phenomenological, and dialectical movements, even extending to Asia’s spiritually based disciplines); and finally, its further transmogrification

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in what is in the current vernacular referred to as a “postmodern” period in intellectual history, where we remind ourselves every day of the dangers of the normative practice of thinking in exclusive terms. We find ourselves situated in an academic and professional environment whose pluralism leads us to recognize that we are not “one” but “many”: hence I speak today of “human science psychologies.” Our understanding of “meanings” as well as “unities” or “wholes” has been transformed in this past century, first by phenomenological psychology and more recently by postmodern thought. Phenomenological psychologists have turned our attention away from meaning as a content of consciousness, toward an appreciation of meaning as an activity of consciousness. Experience taken as a “whole” is not thought of as something static, but as something that unfolds in a process of becoming. Furthermore, the “whole” is not to be circumscribed by the boundaries of one’s own body, but rather is understood to include those transpersonal realms that are invoked within one’s own experience. Postmodern thinkers have helped to make us aware that meanings consist of “texts” through which we inscribe ourselves in the world, and that the act of inscription, like the act of reading, is not simply the recording of an already existing meaning, but rather is itself a kind of birth of meaning. As Merleau-Ponty (1962) observed, language does not express thought; rather, it accomplishes thought. With regard to “wholes” (including gestalts) postmodern thinkers are wary and prefer to allow for disunities; the search for essences, structures, and identities is seen as serving political interests in establishing norms that are ultimately intolerant of individual and cultural differences. The concept of “wholeness” must therefore be tempered to embrace rather than to exclude the accidental, the variable, or the “abnormal.” Postmodern thinkers (Derrida, Lacan) seem to have moved away from phenomenology as a method because they have been put off by the Husserlian search for essences or unities and instead

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prefer to speak of differences or “disunities.” It was nonetheless the phenomenologist Jean-Paul Sartre who indicated that we need not be deterred by such difficulties as indefinable or inhomogeneous objects of investigation: This is because there can be descriptions which do not aim at the essence but at the existent itself in its particularity. To be sure, I could not describe a freedom which would be common to both the Other and myself; I could not therefore contemplate an essence of freedom … actually the question is of my freedom. Similarly when I described consciousness, I could not discuss a nature common to certain individuals but only my particular consciousness, which like my freedom is beyond essence … (Sartre, 1956, p. 438)

If postmodern thinkers have a tendency to want to abandon method (or at least epistemology) altogether in view of a multiverse of narratives irreducible to any knowable essence, phenomenologists like Sartre still offer hope by suggesting and demonstrating that a diversity or heterogeneity of individual experience is no deterrent to developing a methodology for a psychological science. Human science psychologists informed by postmodernism can indeed engage in a study of human variance, rather than trying to control or otherwise eliminate variance. In such studies, there would be less concern with making claims for “external validity” and thus a change in attitude toward the conventional ideal of randomness in sampling procedures. There might be a shift away from nomothetic studies toward the idiographic (see, for example, Hoskins, 2001). And even if meaning is to be found in the particularities of individual experience rather than in the universalities or typicalities sought by modern scientists, a phenomenological method nonetheless turns out to be well suited to our purpose. Thus we can find room in human science research for both the nomothetic and the idiographic, even if some proponents of the latter are not supportive of the effort to engage in the former.

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An emerging research practice So how do human science researchers move forward after facing the postmodern challenge? There are three basic questions that must be addressed by any methodology. First, what kinds of questions shall we pose? Second, what kinds of data shall we collect and interrogate? Third, what kinds of knowledge (or formulations of “truth”) will result?

Questions in a context of diversity and change In the questions that we pose we will be addressing ourselves to the idiosyncrasies of ever changing human realities. Having transcended the modern preoccupation with universals and essences, we can follow our interests into the realm of the individual and the accidental where intentionalities and contingencies intertwine to co-constitute human existence. We will think of individual “essences” as what remains the same in our perception of someone or something through a series of adumbrations— rather than as what remains the same in the individual. One contribution of postmodern thought is its reminder that whatever we strive to know, we can know without being able to claim any universality or permanence to what amounts to our creation. A “new” question for psychological inquiry thus becomes: to what extent can any individual’s expressions be taken as reflective of “humanity itself ”? This leads to a second question: what kinds of “realities” (actual or virtual) are created by humanity? These are reflective questions of a foundational nature that are posed in the wake of inquiries already undertaken. It will be important to maintain a distinction between questions of an overarching nature that provide a context as well as an inspiration for further research, and questions of a more circumscribed nature that can be addressed more directly using qualitative or quantitative methods.

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Researchers typically address general questions by “operationalizing” the questions into observable events and finding adequate means of sampling the target population. With “humanity” itself as the population of interest, there is an immediate problem with respect to the external validity of any research investigation. The challenge will be for methodologists to design studies that reflect “humanity” without being either reductionistic or totalizing, and this will require some new thinking with regard to what constitutes “data” and how one arrives at “results.”

Data as a narrative construct It was R. D. Laing who suggested that we refer to the subject matter of psychology as capta rather than data because “the ‘data’ (given) of research are not so much given as taken out of a constantly elusive matrix of happenings” (1967, p. 62). What he is acknowledging here is the peculiar nature of both the process and content of psychology: as a logos, psychology selectively illuminates its subject matter, and in effect its findings are captured by a creative mind rather then merely recorded on a blank slate. Moreover, the “constantly elusive matrix” that forms the subject matter of psychology is an ever changing nexus or totality (Dilthey, 1977, called it a Zusammenhang) that includes the presence of the psychologist. For postmodern psychologists, this matrix is understood to be a system of discourse that is elusive only to the extent that it is essentially idiosyncratic: each moment of psychological insight represents a “happening” that takes place between an instance of human conduct and the narrative context that is the researcher’s presence. The implication is that we no longer search for “objective” truths or feel obliged to make claims that our knowledge is based on “fact.” In a revitalized human science research paradigm we will acknowledge that our starting point is not an accumulation of “bare facts” but rather an act of positing by which we co-

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constitute our very sense of what it is we are studying. As Polkinghorne (1991) observes, each language system has its own particular way of distorting, filtering, and constructing experience. … Each language system is to be recognized and honored as one among the many systems by which order can be constructed in experience. … Rather than reproductions of clear pictures of the real as it is in itself, human experience consists of meaningful interpretations of the real.

It may be even more appropriate to say that human experience consists of meaningful interpretations that make up the real. If psychological reality is our subject matter, then it is already a narrative reality. What is true for us in everyday life is every bit as true for us as researchers: we respond not to “objective” qualities of our subject matter, but to qualities that are a function of our perspective upon our subject matter.

 nalysis of data and formulation of results: A Toward an epistemology for human science research Almost a century ago, Wilhelm Dilthey (1977) remarked that in understanding, we draw upon all of the powers of the psyche: sensing, judging, remembering, imagining, intuiting, feeling, and thinking. How ironic, then, that when empirical psychologists go to the encounter with their subject matter, they bring with them a truncated understanding whose claim to fame is its reliance upon sense data and calculative thinking, to the exclusion of other modes of understanding such as feeling, intuiting, and imagining. In aspiring to be scientific, psychologists have adamantly based their theories upon observation, and yet they have restricted themselves to essentially one mode of observation: sensation. Unfortunately, we have forsaken the very modes of perception that might conceivably offer us the most direct and faithful access to our subject.

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If a methodology for human science research would raise questions about the meanings of consciousness, conduct, and culture in a context of diversity and change, then the methods employed would be predicated upon a sensitivity to meanings requiring some form of direct existential contact between the researcher and the phenomenon. Such contact could be achieved by establishing an empathic relationship with the “data.” Human science researchers can take as data, and thereby submit to their powers of understanding, just about any form of human expression: verbal testimony, written protocols, observed behavior, gestures and drawings, art works, cultural artifacts, and media presentations. To be sure, these data must be perceived by the senses in some way or another in order for them to be understood. But understanding exceeds the powers of sensation in the same way that psychological meaning transcends the purely material events occurring in the brain while experience takes place. Material events of behavior and the sensations that register them in the brain of the researcher are both merely superficial occurrences. Meaning is an event that reflects what we might call the “depths” of the psyche. It is what inspired Freud to invent his depth psychology, which sought the meaning or “intent” of the symptom over and above its material cause (see especially Freud, 1963, pp. 59–61). What is important to bear in mind is that the relationship between a behavior and its meaning or intent is not a simple “correspondence” such as might be understood to exist between a material object and its weight. This is what has led philosophers of science to contrast “narrative truth” with “historical truth” and to speak of “interpretation as an artistic and pragmatic creation that is always oriented toward the future” (Spence, 1982, p. 287). If our understanding of behavior, like behavior itself, is always oriented toward the future, then we must not look back; perhaps it is the case that we cannot look back (that is, to justify or ground our assertions in their relationship to

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historical “fact”). This, of course, raises a problem with respect to the validation of our findings. Simply to ask for a good story leaves one open to too many inadequacies: using narrative fit alone as a criterion for adequacy, we discover that there are numerous plausible accounts that might never be proven. Psychoanalytic therapy, however, does not require that the analyst’s reconstruction of a childhood event be objectively confirmed for it to have “subjective truth value”—that is, pragmatic value for the present and future of the patient. Feyerabend (1975) takes this position to the extreme, suggesting “once it has been realized that close empirical fit is no virtue and that it must be relaxed in times of change, then style, elegance of expression, simplicity of presentation, tension of plot and narrative, and seductiveness of content become important features of our knowledge.” In practice, I believe that aesthetic criteria for validity will not suffice: we need to strive for both coherence and correspondence, even if of a limited nature, and perhaps we should consider a third term that embraces both of these criteria. At the Fourth Human Science Research Conference in Alberta in 1985, I suggested that the term connectedness might serve to indicate the need for description to be adequately grounded in evidence (albeit not a simple “self-evidence”) while expressed in a way that preserves the Zusammenhang or Gestalt of human experience (Churchill, 1985). Furthermore, it suggests the need for understanding to be connected to our future, in the Heideggerian sense of a “pro-ject.” That is, our formulations of truth should facilitate our journey through life. This brings us to a final consideration, which is the task of communicating one’s research journey and one’s research findings to an audience. Many (if not most) research reports are written in the “third person” as a way of implicitly suggesting that not only the results of the study but the study itself is an “objective” event that somehow “took place” apart from our personal involvement in making it happen. Literature reviews are assem-

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bled as summaries of previous studies—as snippets of information not held together by any inherent connection other than the one assigned by the author in the moment of assemblage. But like the individual lives of which we write, research investigations (and their traditions) have their own “stories.” We can do much to communicate our research to audiences if we can situate that research within the broader “history” of our own research traditions (see Churchill, 2008). Just as each individual life finds its own narrative place within a wider social context, each individual research project has not only its own story to tell, but the story of its predecessors. Thus as a parting nod to the postmodernists who would deobjectify such “things” as research traditions by calling attention to their contingent status, I will close by suggesting that these traditions—as forming the backdrop of our own studies—need to be integrated into the stories we tell of our own work. Indeed, we are the narrators, the meaning-makers, and thus in formulating our literature reviews, our data analyzes, and our findings, we are truly engaged in the task of storying, of weaving a narrative of the series of events that have preceded us, inspired us, and grounded our own work. Telling the story of a research tradition, then, is a way of remembering our own ground. In the end, the value of our research investigations—and of our research traditions—will depend on their ability to help us to gain insight into the vicissitudes of human experience. Beyond what we and our participants gain from our research together, there is the further gain on the part of our readers who are able to enter into and appreciate not only the experiences of our participants, but the very experience of doing research. References Berger, P. L., & Luckmann, T. (1966). The social construction of reality: A treatise on the sociology of knowledge. New York: Doubleday.

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Bruner, J. S. (1983). Conceptual and narrative modes of thought. Paper presented at the 92nd Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, Toronto. Bruner, J. S. (1990). Acts of meaning. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Churchill, S. D. (1985). The question of verification in phenomenological research: Descriptive criteria for validity and reliability. Paper presented at the 4th Annual Human Science Research Conference, University of Alberta. Churchill, S. D. (2000). “Seeing through” self-deception in narrative reports: Finding methodological virtue in problematic data. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 31, 44–62. Churchill, S. D. (2002). Stories of experience and the experience of stories: Narrative psychology, phenomenology, and the postmodern challenge. Constructivism and the Human Sciences 7, 81–93. Churchill, S. D. (2006). Encountering the animal other: Reflections on moments of empathic seeing. The Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology 6, 1–13. Churchill, S. D. (2007). Experiencing the other within the we: Phenomenology with a bonobo. In Phenomenology 2005. Selected Essays from North America. Ed. L. Embree and T. Nenon. Bucharest: Zeta Books, 139–162. Churchill, S. D. (2008). “Be true to your school”: An open letter to students and practitioners of human science research. The Humanistic Psychologist 36, 1–8. Derrida, J. (1973). Speech and phenomena [1967]. Trans. D. Allison. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. Derrida, J. (1976). Of grammatology [1967]. Trans. G. C. Spivak. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Dilthey, W. (1977). Ideas concerning a descriptive and analytical psychology [1894]. Trans. R. M. Zaner. In W. Dilthey, Descriptive psychology and historical understanding. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 23–120. Feyerabend, P. (1975). Against method. San Francisco: New Left Books. Foucault, M. (1976). The archaeology of knowledge [1969]. Trans. A. M. Sheridan. New York: Harper Colophon. Foucault, M. (1980). Power and knowledge. Trans. C. Gordon, L. Marshall, J. Mepham, and K. Soper. New York: Pantheon.

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Freud, S. (1963). Dora: A fragment of an analysis [1905]. Ed. P. Rieff. New York: Collier. Gergen, K. J. (1991). The saturated self: Dilemmas of identity in contemporary life. New York: Basic Books. Gergen, K. J. & Gergen, M. M. (1998). Narrative and the self as relationship. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology 21, 17–56. Giorgi, A. (1970). Psychology as a human science; A phenomenologically based approach. New York: Harper & Row. Giorgi, A. (1992). Description versus interpretation: Competing alternative strategies for qualitative research. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology 23(2), 119–135. Giorgi, A. (2000). The similarities and differences between descriptive and interpretative methods in scientific phenomenological psychology. The empirical and the transcendental: A fusion of horizons. Ed. B. Gupta. New York: Rowan & Littlefield 61–75. Heidegger, M. (1956). The way back into the ground of metaphysics [1949]. Trans. R. F. C. Hull & A. Crick. In Existentialism from Dostoekvsy to Sartre. Ed. W. Kaufmann. New York: Random House, 206–221. Heidegger, M. (1962). Being and time [1927]. Trans. J. MacQuarrie & E. Robinson. New York: Harper & Row. Heidegger, M. (1999). Ontology: The hermeneutics of facticity [1923]. Trans. J. van Buren. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Heidegger, M. (2005) Introduction to phenomenological research [1923–1924]. Trans. D. O. Dahlstrom. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Hoskins, M. L. (2001). True grit and the new frontier: Cultivating new ground for psychological research. Qualitative Inquiry 7, 659–675. Hoskins, M.L. (2002). Towards new methodologies for constructivist research: Synthesizing knowledges for relational inquiries. In Studies in meaning: Exploring constructivist psychology. Ed. J. D. Raskin & S. K. Bridges. New York: Pace University Press. Husserl, E. (1973). Experience and judgment [1939–1948]. Trans. J. S. Chur­chill and K. Ameriks. Evanston: Northwestern Universi­ty Press. Keen, E. (2003). Doing psychology phenomenologically: Methodological considerations. The Humanistic Psychologist 31(4), 5–33. Laing, R. D. (1967). The politics of experience. New York: Ballantine Books.

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Madison , G. B. (1988). The hermeneutics of postmodernity: Figures and themes. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception [1945]. Trans. C. Smith. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Parry, A. & Doan, R. E. (1994). Story re-visions: Narrative therapy in the postmodern world. New York: Guilford Press. Polkinghorne, D. (1988). Narrative knowing and the human sciences. Albany: State University of New York Press. Polkinghorne, D. (1991). Postmodern epistemology of practice. Unpublished manuscript, University of Southern California. Sartre, J.-P. (1956). Being and nothingness: A phenomenological essay on ontology [1943]. Trans. H. Barnes. New York: Philosophical Library. Spence, D. P. (1982). Narrative truth and historical truth: Meaning and interpretation in psychoanalysis. New York: W. W. Norton.

Rethinking Postmodernism: On Some Epistemic and Ethical Consequences of the Researcher’s Commitment to Postmodern Constructivism Letizia Caronia By paying attention to the real talk, we learned that meaning is situated, not abstract; enacted, not embodied; negotiated, not decoded; consequential, not prior, to use; and not exclusively referential. (Moerman, 1988, p. 97)

Abstract: This chapter focuses on some of the epistemological and ethical consequences of the researcher’s commitment to a contemporary postmodern theory of “language, reality, and truth.” It will take a particular starting point: the meta-analysis of a typical post­ modern analysis of narratives from the field. When these com­ municative events occur, and different theories of “language,” different notions of “reality,” different conceptions of “truth” are at stake: every time researchers speak with their informants and every time they analyze discursive data, they reopen the endless question of the relationships existing between language, reality, and truth. The meta-analysis of this kind of discursive data sheds light upon how many different theories of language are at stake during the research process and what the epistemic and ethical implications of this silent game actually are.

Introduction Despite some inner differences, contemporary approaches in social sciences referring to postmodernism have a “family-resemblance” (Wittgenstein, 1958, p. 32, §67). If someone asked what these approaches have in common, I would say: “an anti-positivist

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and anti-realist stance toward social phenomena.” This chapter is not intended to illustrate the well-known theoretical assumptions of the anti-positivist approach in social sciences nor will it argue in favor of its epistemological accurateness. Since the “interpretive turn” in human sciences (Rabinow & Sullivan, 1979, 1987), a great amount of theoretical investigation and empirical research has already demonstrated the theoretical consistency, the methodological advantages, and the heuristic strength of the anti-positivist paradigm in social sciences (Agar & Hobbs, 1982; Atkinson, 1990; Atkinson & Drew, 1979; Bogen & Lynch, 1993; Briggs, 1986; Bruner, 1990; Moerman, 1988; Borutti, 1991; Caronia, 1997; Mortari, 2007). We can therefore assume that these issues are well known and largely shared, at least inside the scientific community of qualitative researchers in human sciences. I’d rather move one step further that is where angels fear to go: what is, if any, the dark side of the postmodern, anti-realist approach in social sciences? This investigation is consistent with postmodernism. As postmodern researchers, we are supposed to reflect critically upon the epistemological assumptions we think by (Mortari, 2007, p. 20). This normative statement makes us submit even our own postmodern, anti-positivist theoretical framework to some epistemological processing. This chapter focuses on some of the epistemic and ethical consequences of the researcher’s commitment to a contemporary postmodern theory of “language, reality, and truth.” To illustrate this point, I will take a particular perspective: the metaanalysis of verbal interactions in the field. More specifically, I will focus on storytelling. This discursive activity lends itself well to shedding light upon how many different theories of language are at stake during the research process and what the epistemic and ethical implications of this silent game actually are. The chapter’s first point is a critical reflection on the multiple identities and multiple epistemologies of the one we usually

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refer to as “the researcher.” I will then present some discursive data coming from my own field research and give some examples of the constructivist-oriented analysis I made of them. After this metaanalysis, the chapter will demonstrate what kind of knowledge can (and cannot) be derived from this kind of data if the researcher is committed to a constructivist epistemological frame of reference. In the conclusion I will shed light upon the epistemological assumptions underlying (my own) radically postmodern-oriented research practices and single out the epistemic and ethical consequences of such a commitment to postmodernism.

 erbal interactions in the field: When and for whom V is it true that truth is an interactive achievement? Verbal interactions with informants have always been one of the main tools of field research. Although most researchers avoid using them as the sole source of information, to varying degrees structured interviews, focused dialogues, and naturally occurring conversations with people are still considered a relevant part of the methodological toolkit of any qualitative research (Duranti, 1992, 1997; Saville-Troike, 1989). Researchers do speak with their informants, and every time they do so, they reopen the endless question of the relationships existing between language, reality, and truth. When these communicative events (Hymes, 1974) occur, different theories of “language,” different notions of “reality,” different conceptions of “truth” are at stake: to varying degrees, conscious or stated, shared or not by participants, folk or scientific, they are contemporaneously at work, embodied in and enacted by the different personae inhabiting the research scenario. “Researcher” and “informant” are in fact no more that umbrella terms concealing different actors playing different roles. For the purposes of this chapter, I will focus on the researcher’s multiple identities.

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The notions of “researcher” covers different actors: s/he is a layperson, a social scientist, a partner of social interactions in the field, an analyst, a writer, a member of his/her scientific community. Each of these different personae has its own “epistemology of the word”; the “researcher” therefore is endowed with a toolkit of different theories about language, reality, and truth. These theories or cultural beliefs do not necessarily remain the same throughout the research process from the field to the analysis, nor are they necessarily always shared by the participants involved. As a social scientist, the researcher has at least two different epistemological paradigms available,offering him/her two different conceptualizations of the relationships between language and reality: the so-called (neo-)positivist paradigm, and the socalled anti-positivist one. Despite running the risk of an oversimplification, they can be summed up as follows. The positivist approach assumes the following: 1. There is a reality out there. 2. It can be described by our words. 3. There is one and only one true description of the world, which is the one that corresponds to it. 4. Truth is such a correspondence. The anti-positivist paradigm assumes the following: 1. There is not a world “out there,” just ways of world-making (Goodman, 1978). 2. Reality is a version of the world constructed by people through their discursive practices. 3. Truth is a joint accomplishment, a consensual agreement about the adequacy of one of those versions. When s/he is in the analyst’s shoes, the contemporary researcher committed to the postmodern approach refers to the anti-positivist way of conceiving the relationship between language, reality, and truth.

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But to what other kind of theory is s/he committed when assuming the role of “participant” in field verbal interactions? Involved in talking with people, in asking questions and listening to answers, doesn’t s/he act as a layperson endowed with other (folk) theories, namely, a realist, referential approach to language, reality, and truth? When the researchers have to make sense of field discursive data, they face another main problem: they have to interpret it according to one of these theories. In so doing, they make some decisions: they establish whether and to what extent their informant’s words have any “truth-value”; at the same time, they establish what the truth-value of their own words in the field is. The way researchers cope with this dilemma depends on their theoretical assumptions and on their epistemological stance vis-àvis the unending debate about the scientific understanding of the everyday understanding of reality (Maturana, 1991; Lynch, 1993). When the researchers worked (or still work) within the positivist paradigm, the dilemma (if it was ever seen as such) was relatively easy to resolve. Indeed, according to the positivist approaches, there is one and only one true description of reality, of its sense and meanings: the one that corresponds to it. Scientific knowledge is such a description, and the social scientist’s competence relies on his/ her skills and methods to produce it. Informant talk is seen as nothing more than first-level data, raw material waiting for the right interpretation or explanation. This will be provided by the scientific description and analysis, once this is rooted in an unbiased method (Rabinow & Sullivan, 1987; Briggs, 1986). If the researchers’ theoretical assumptions are closer to the anti-positivist perspective in social sciences, things become rather more complex. On the basis of a relativistic theory of “truth,” claiming that reality is a linguistic co-construct, the so-called “interpretive turn in human sciences” argues against what is viewed as an ar-

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rogant attitude and proposes taking the informants’ reconstruction of their own reality seriously into account. Postmodern researchers know well that they can no longer consider their in­for­mant as an idiot culturel. Contemporary postmodern researchers do now appear more respectful of the informant’s talk, the informant’s versions of reality, the informant’s ways of world-making. But the question is: are they really?

Storytelling in the field: Multiple actors at play What follows (extract from Caronia, 1997, p. 224) is an example of the discursive data the researcher has to cope with, both as a participant in the field and as an analyst. We will see how his/her epistemological paradigm changes when the researcher moves from “being a participant” in the field to “being an analyst” at his/her desk.

“ He saw them as an insult”: the story of a cultural misunderstanding Event: an audio-recorded focused interview Participants: a pre-primary teacher, two researchers Key: informal talk, largely semi-structured, conversation-like interview style [...] 332. R1: and what about the relationships with the families → 333. T: well... we had some problems not with children, with some parents.. you know... the child he was ok but with the father we had some hard moments becau::se (.) a ma:le (.) for instance I had like a confrontation with him because a woman who says a woman who says to his son, a male e::hm ?what did I say to him. (DESC) I don’t remember exactly now. you know this sort of things like pet names or caressing, (ASC) he saw them as an insult

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→ 334. R2 :ah ah → 335. T: I: I: I made |a mistake → 336. R1: |an insult to his male child 337. T: to his son and to him as it was a male I understood what was happened looking at his reaction but I waited 24 hours before trying to have a talk with him because in that moment if he could he would have→ 338. R2: oh, really? 339. T: how did I dare , me that is a woman how did I: but I have to recognize tha:t (.) the day after I changed my attitude toward him I → explained him that for me:: etcetera-etcetera, and I have to recognize that after that he was very kind to me, very at hand with me 340. R1: but there was |there was been= 341. T: |but there was 342. R1: =your paying attention to → 343. T: a mistake, I made a mistake 344. R1: no but also your paying attention to his reaction 345. T: yes of course 346. R1: because one could not, if one doesn’t look at the reaction he may pass over 347. T: it was difficult to me to accept all that because it was my fault, but 348. R1: so a good suggestion to give to other teachers may be to always pay attention to parents’ reactions 349. T: paying attention-yes […]

This is a typical example of storytelling in interview. The whole semi-structured interview is officially focused on a general topic: the presence of ethnic minority children inside the pre-primary school where the teacher works. The micro-story is embedded in a larger sequence whose topic is the relationships between the school and the families of ethnic minority children attending this school. In turn 332 the interviewer introduces the topic (“what about the relationships with the families”). The

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teacher replies, formulating the family-school relationships in terms of “problems” (333). This reply constitutes the preface indicating the “about what” of the imminent story (Sacks, 1974). So the following narrative about a father who interpreted as an insult what for the teacher was an affective gesture is narrated as an example of the kind of problems the teachers encounter. These problems derive from cultural misunderstanding. All the participants involved in this storytelling (the teacher and the researchers) behave as if they consider the story as being about something that really happened in a real world, something that happened in that way and for the reasons unfolded. Moreover, through this storytelling, the participants come to share a knowledge about something that happened in a world out there. We can summarize this shared knowledge as follows: In pre-primary school there are some instances of conflict rela­ tionships among ethnic minority parents and schoolteachers. When these conflicts occur, they are generated by cultural differences.

Unfortunately, the distinction coming from therapeutic discourse studies between “narrative truth” vs. “historical truth” (Spence, 1982) is not useful in this case. In analyzing narratives from the field, we have to accept that to construct a narrative truth is to commit oneself to the historical truth. Narratives from the field tend toward referentiality. For this specific discursive genre “a commitment to truth goes along with the transforming action of fiction” (Ricoeur, 1986, p. 249) and the stories have a “being-like-that” quality. From the teller’s point of view, most of the reasons why she tells the story she tells are rooted in her belief that “things occurred in the way she is telling they did.” The ontological strength of tales from the field is at core of their modeling function: forging a link between the particular and the general, the

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stories transform individual cases into examples of a class of events, into documents of a more general pattern. As in any naturally occurring conversation, the stories told during a field conversation are told because they are supposed to be true, because they are considered as empirical evidence for some more general statements or theories about the state of affairs (Schiffrin, 1990; Fasulo & Pontecorvo, 1997). In this particular case the story is narrated because it is supposed to depict and demonstrate that cultural differences are at the origin of conflicts and problems in the school. Otherwise, why would the teller have narrated this story in this context? The story can work as evidence of the state of affairs in the school because it is (supposed to be) true. And it is supposed to be true in the name of a specific (folk?) theory of the relationship between language, reality, and truth. If the informant’s epistemology of language is a referential one, what is the researcher’s? I think that it is more or less the same, at least when s/he acts as a participant in the field. The researchers listen to the story, they record it, they invite the teller to go on in her storytelling, they ask for more details, they ask for information, they make and propose inferences from what has been already said by the teller (“so a good suggestion to give to other teachers may be to always pay attention to parents’ reactions,” 348). All these linguistic actions are ways to frame what has being said as a good or reliable description of what really happened in a real world. Moreover, these linguistic actions are also ways to frame the teller as a reliable witness of the events her words refer to. Of course we do not know if the researcher believes all that. What we know from the analysis of his/her verbal interactions is that s/he acts as if s/he believed. In that context, storytelling participants have tacitly established a contract: the narrative truth corresponds to the historical truth. All epistemological or narratological suspicions about

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the role of the teller’s point of view in constructing the characters’ point of view, all sociological doubts about the social and discursive construction of reality, all postmodern assumptions about the constructed nature of whatever account, vanish with this interpersonal agreement. Simply put, the teller and the researcher are both committed to the same epistemology of language: the referential and positivist one. What are the assumptions and the consequences of such a commitment? At least the following: 1. Something happened in a world “out there.” 2. What happened can be described in a way that corresponds to it. 3. The informant is able to provide such a description. 4. What she says is such an accurate description of what happened that it even becomes possible to infer some practical suggestions from her story. Within this theory of language, the researcher acts as if the informant were a reliable witness and as if the propositional content of the story were (or at least could be) true. What happens when the researcher comes back to his/her desk and adopts the identity of the “analyst”—the identity of a postmodern analyst in particular? The researcher strategically changes his/her realist epistemology of language and shifts to an anti-positivist approach to verbal interactions in the field. What follows is a synthesis of the main theoretical perspectives a postmodern researcher refers to when s/he makes sense of the very same narratives in the field s/he has participated in.

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 ostmodern theoretical perspectives P on narratives-in-the-field Starting from the conversation analysis focus on the social organization of storytelling in everyday, naturally occurring conversations (Sacks, 1974; Jefferson, 1978; M. H. Goodwin, 1982, 1990; C. Goodwin, 1981, 1984, 1986; Heritage, 1985; Schiffrin, 1984), a large number of studies have been carried out on this social activity. Over the last decade, much European and American research has demonstrated how and to what extent storytelling is one of the most pervasive and effective ways by means of which individuals make sense of the reality they are talking about (Ochs, Smith, & Taylor, 1989; Ochs, Taylor, Rudolph, & Smith, 1992; Pontecorvo, 1991; Fasulo & Pontecorvo, 1997; Jedlowski, 2000; Smorti, 1997). In and by way of storytelling interaction, people construct and negotiate the meanings attributed to events, propose explanatory systems, and develop some shared or folk theories about the world. Literature on storytelling in everyday, naturally occurring conversations shows how much this activity of sensemaking and theory-building depends on the refigurative nature of tales (in the sense of Ricoeur, 1986) and on the interactive and joint process of their construction. Paralleling this tradition of studying everyday storytelling, some students have addressed their attention to the storytelling occurring during a particular linguistic event: the research interview (Briggs, 1986; Mishler, 1986a, 1986b; Moerman, 1988; Atkinson, 1990). All these studies move away from an epistemological positivist frame of reference (Briggs, 1986) and distance themselves from the behaviorist analytic perspective on question/answer interactions in the field (Mishler, 1986b). They argue against a strong and enduring analytic tradition that views narratives occurring in the field from the standpoint of an implicit epistemological realism.

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According to these critical remarks, the positivist or behaviorist epistemological framework encourages the analyst to look at narratives as if they mirrored true facts occurring “out there.” Stories told during field dialogues are analyzed to seek out information they are supposed to give about the events they supposedly refer to. Analysis gives no leeway to the narrative form in which information is organized in discourse, and misses the world-making work carried on by means of the narrative organization (Atkinson, 1990). Stories-in-interviews are seen from a “fishing rod” (Briggs, 1986) or a “thermometer” perspective (Powney, & Watts, 1987): the researchers’ role and that of their questions is to stimulate the emergence of something that was already supposedly there. No room is afforded for the occasioned nature of talk and for the social organization of storytelling-in-interview, as if the stories and the meanings they create were accomplished by just one author. All these critical approaches to the traditional uses and abuses of field dialogue share a particular theory of language. Language is considered a performative tool for coordinating activities in a consensual way (Steier, 1991). Description—defined as an accountable linguistic representation of reality—is one of the joint activities coordinated through the social use of language. According to this approach, discourse is more than a shared symbol system for representing the world. The representational function (or “ideational” one, as Halliday, 1973, puts it) does not belong to language itself, but is rather an interactive achievement of language users. In a way as simple as it is destabilizing, these studies show that the language and the discursive practices we use as the tools of our research are not immune from those characteristics we are ready to attribute to the language and to the discursive practices we study as the objects of our research. When a story takes place during a field conversation, the participation structure of the communicative event changes and

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becomes increasingly polyphonic. The informant becomes a teller who is seldom also one of the characters of the story; the interviewer becomes the audience that has to follow the story and—contemporaneously—has to maintain the general topic of the encounter. As a teller, the informant constructs the story by selecting and keeping some events together; s/he portrays the characters by providing them with intentions, thoughts, goals, emotions, and makes them act in some way; s/he establishes causes and effects, reasons and motives (Ricoeur, 1986). In so doing s/he creates the tale. Faced with this, the postmodern analyst’s relevant question becomes: why that story in particular among all the possible stories? Why this selection of these events (Bruner, 1990)? But before becoming an analyst, the researcher is the audience of that story. As an audience, s/he participates in the story construction more then s/he is ready and willing to accept. Trained simply to support informant discourse, to give nothing but semantically neutral contributions, echo answers, or listening signals, the researcher is supposed to act as if s/he were not there. But s/he is, and the story told is being told for the researcher. Even though semantically neutral, audience feedback is not ineffective from an interactive point of view. As we know, there is nothing neutral in any audience attitude toward a storyteller and his/her speech: even the absence of feedback or the so-called “neutral attitude” is feedback contributing to story construction. At the very least, the researcher is the recipient, and any teller whatsoever constructs the story according to a recipient design (Duranti, & Brenneis, 1986; C. Goodwin, 1984, 1986; Pontecorvo, Amen­dola, & Fasulo, 1994; Caronia, 1997). A great deal of the meaning and function of the story depends on its being told here, now, and, what’s more, for a researcher. A story can be produced to persuade the researcher, to demonstrate a personal theory, to display the informant’s direct knowledge of what the interview is about, to give examples of

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how things are or have to be. In short, some pragmatic functions are accomplished through the action of telling a story. These functions depend strictly on the particular audience to which the story is addressed, and directly influence the story construction. Even when it looks like a monological text, the story is a joint and cooperative product whose possession, rights, and responsibilities have to be shared between the teller and the audience (Ochs, Taylor, Rudolph, & Smith, 1992, p. 39). Provided with such theoretical perspectives, the postmodernoriented researcher recognizes the constructed nature of narratives and has to analyze the narratives in the field according at least three levels of construction: 1st level of construction This refers to the author’s/teller’s own perspective on the events he/she is talking about. Here the configurational work made up to produce a narrative account of events appears. 2nd level of construction This refers to the social organization of the storytelling in an interview. Here is the unavoidable (albeit not always analyzed) co-narration that takes place during the field interaction. The researcher here has the role of the audience and the audience is—even in that case—a coauthor of the story. 3rd level of construction This refers to the researcher’s making, unmaking, and remaking work performed in and through the writing practices and choices s/he adopts as an author of his/her tale of the field (van Maanen, 1988) . It is quite evident that such an approach is based on some anti-positivist and anti-realist core assumptions:

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1. Reality is a version of the world constructed by people through their discursive practices. 2. There is not a world out there, just ways of world-making. 3. Truth is a consensual achievement about the adequacy of one those versions.

 ecoming a constructivist-oriented analyst: B The change of paradigm As postmodern researcher, I used to analyze my field data according to such a theoretical framework, and took into account the three levels in which a version of reality is jointly constructed through discourse. Once I adopted this theoretical framework, I analyzed the story told by the teacher from a point of view that was totally different from the one I adopted when participating in the storytelling in the field. It would be too long to reproduce a complete constructivist analysis of the story (Caronia, 1997). Nevertheless, I would like to give a few examples. When a researcher takes a constructivist approach in analyzing narratives, s/he first takes into account the teller’s discursive strategies (1st level of construction above). In my own case, I considered the teller’s rhetorical strategies through which she constructed the conflict as generated by cultural differences. I considered, for instance, the sequential position of the story, the metapragmatic cues (i.e., the use of the “etcetera” clause), the use of membership categorization devices (i.e., “woman,” “male”). What follows is an example of how I analyzed the story about a teacher, a father, and his son (Caronia, 1997, pp. 225–226): To report the critical event of the story, where the narrative climax is located, the teller uses a gender category: “woman” and “male” are the membership categorization devices (Sacks, 1972) used to depict the characters of the story. It is not a story about a teacher and a pupil and his father, nor it is a story of a

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middle-aged woman (or teacher) and a four-year-old pupil and his father. It is a story of a woman, a male child, and his father. The terms used to designate some of the characters work as contextualization cues (Gumperz,1982): through them the speaker establishes cultural diversity as the frame by which to situate the whole story, make sense of the events, and account for them. It is inside this frame that the teacher’s interpretation of the father’s interpretation of her gestures and words becomes reliable: the father is depicted as someone who interprets as an insult what for the teacher was an affective gesture. A classical cultural misunderstanding. Any other interpretation of that reaction is not at hand: hypothetically speaking, that parent could have reacted like that for a lot of other reasons, for instance, because he thought the teacher’s attitude was not very effective with pupils of that age, or as a result of other pedagogical assumptions not neces­sarily depending on his “Arabic” origin. But the teacher as author of that story seems to know well the reasons for the conflict between the characters of the story: the reasons are cultural. After the critical event, the teller goes on with the resolution sequence of the story (see turn 339). Here again the teacher’s action is categorized as being a “mistake”: the teller evaluates the teacher’s behavior as something that ought not to be done. This evaluation (Labov & Fanshell, 1977) contributes to constructing the whole story as a story about cultural misunderstanding. But to appreciate this, an expansion (ibid.) has to be made to the extra-textual world. The recipient of the story (the researcher as audience in the field) is supposed to share a taken-for-granted pedagogical assumption: in (Italian, at least) pre-primary school it is considered good and proper to touch children and say sweet nothings to them. If this behavior is seen as a mistake (see turn 341) this is because it was directed to an Islamic boy by a female teacher. But the construction of the story as a cultural incident goes on. The teller’s account concerns what happened afterward. She portrays herself as conversing with the pupil’s father and quotes her own words: “I explained to him that for me—etcetera etcetera ...” — The “for me” clause evokes a world of cultural different values, cultural different interpretations of gestures, and cultural

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different rules governing intimacy talk. After a Eurocentric attitude that the teller has evaluated as being a mistake, the character is now depicted as able to act in a culturally relativistic oriented way. This is the good way of acting in a world where cultural differences are at the very source of misunderstanding. An ethnicist frame of reference (Figueroa, 1991) is at work here to grasp and account for what happened in that school. — The “etceteras” clause has a metapragmatic function. It indicates to the audience (and to the analyst!) how and to what extent the teller considers the cultural relativism frame as an obvious framework of reference both for herself and her audience. As a consequence of this obviousness the teller does not need to proceed to quote the whole conversation. And in fact she does not.

As we may note, the constructivist analysis of this story underlines that the ethnicist frame of reference is the interviewee’s perspective in constructing her version of the events and the related story. This is not to say that cultural differences are the reasons for conflict relationship in a world “out there.” What we infer from such an analytic approach is that the teacher interprets whatever happened as a cultural misunderstanding. A rigorous constructivist analysis also takes into account the role of the audience in constructing this version of the story, and of course I did so. It would take too long to analyze how I analyzed the discursive contribution of the researcher (2nd level of construction). The basic idea is that the responsibility for such a construction is shared with the audience, that is, with the researcher-in-the-field. Through this postmodern analytic approach, the researcher (as an analyst at his/her desk) has produced a deep understanding of the meanings and functions of the original story and of the activity of producing it in that context. She also knows how these meanings and functions have been constructed; she has an appraisal of the ways in which this story sounds truthful and of some of the consequences of this truthfulness (i.e., its working as a model for reality). But a question arises: what kind of knowledge has she achieved by means of such an analytic approach?

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 ostmodern analysis of discursive data: P The knowledge we may gain If the informant/teller/actor can return to his/her world of action endowed with theoretical or practical knowledge accruing from his/her own narratives, what about the researcher/coauthor/analyst of these stories? What can s/he get out of them? As we have seen, a constructivist-oriented analysis can serve to figure out the constructed nature of narratives-in-the-field. The recipients of this kind of analysis (the researcher him/herself, the academic community, the practitioners’ community, etc.) will receive a fair amount of information about the following: 1. What are the teller’s frames of references and what are the cultural beliefs s/he uses to produce this version of the events’. In this case, we know that the teacher organizes her understanding of her everyday working context according to an ethnicist frame of reference and according to “cultural relativism.” 2. What are the rhetorical strategies adopted to make the story reliable and plausible? 3. What can be gathered concerning the reliability of the informant, a trait that has largely to do with some rhetorical strategies (telling a story is one of them)? 4. How and to what extent does the researcher contribute in a very reflexive way in creating the story s/he is supposedly just “listening” to? 5. How and to what extent is the storytelling-in-interview submitted to a “truth commitment”? 6. How is the “reality effect” of the whole story a contextdependent effect? This is an enormous amount of knowledge. It dramatically improves our understanding of … this is the question: of what? Through my research, I’ve been able to reconstruct the interpretive repertoires (Potter & Wetherell, 1987) of the teachers

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involved in the study—their patterns of meaning, the ways they make sense of their daily reality. It was extraordinary, but I never took the responsibility to affirm something like: “My research shows that conflicts or misunderstandings between ethnic minority parents and teachers at school depend on cultural differences.” Why? Why did I never shift from statements about the teachers’ point of view in describing their daily life to some statements on the features of this daily life? I never shifted because I was rigorously committed to a postmodern, anti-realistic approach to “language and reality.” After having deconstructed the first two levels of the constructed nature of tales from the field, what can we make of our data? What is obvious for a narratologist, what is nothing more than a sophisticated postmodernist approach to field data for some social scientists, is a serious problem for anyone concerned with the practical outcomes of research. And some social sciences—such as research into education—have to deal with this epistemic issue.

 n some epistemic consequences of the researcher’s O commitment to a constructivist epistemology If as postmodern researchers we accept that “for the ethnographer as for the conversation analyst the world out there is a verb not a noun; a social activity and not a pre-formed thing” (Moermann, 1988, p.102), the relevant questions become: 1. Can we say something about this world “out there” the goes beyond the subject’s activity of telling and the rhetorical strategies of tellers and co-tellers? 2. Are we legitimated in pushing our analysis beyond people’s methods to construct, co-construct, and re-construct the world through their story-telling? 3. Can we use narratives from the field to know something about the world they are about or to draw inferences about it?

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4. Can we glean an understanding of reality defined as “what narratives are about”? Unfortunately, the only answer consistent with a postmodern constructivist epistemological approach is: no, we can’t. There is nothing we can legitimately infer about the world the teller is recounting. According to a constructionist approach, the story the teacher told about the relationships between the school and ethnic minority families at her school, does not inform us in any way about the “relationships between school and ethnic minority families in that school.” The story may tell us something about the speaker’s cognitive world and the discursive strategies she adopts to persuade the audience that things are as they are accounted for. This is more or less all we can gain from “narrativesin-the-field” as viewed from a constructivist approach. These are some of the epistemic limits that arise when the researcher moves within a constructivist epistemological frame of reference. They are not the only ones, nor they are—in my opinion—the most difficult ones. They are “only” epistemological queries that have to do with the kind of knowledge we are able to construct and submit to scientific or practitioner communities. We can simply suspend the question, admit that this approach does not pretend to supply any knowledge about a world “out there,” and treat all the questions as relatively unproblematic. But there are other limits that concern the ethical level of the research.

 n some ethical consequences of the researcher’s O commitment to postmodernism If we are committed to a conception of truth as a consensually constructed version of reality, if we are committed to a theory of language as a performative way of world-making, some serious consequences arise.

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Denying or suspending any referential value of the narratives, declaring that the knowledge coming from such verbal field interactions may not be about a world “out there”: 1. Aren’t we delegitimizing our informants’ talk? 2. Aren’t we delegitimizing our informants as reliable witnesses of the world they live in? 3. Aren’t we denying our informants’ skill to tell the truth? I fear that the answer to this second class of questions is: yes, we are. As Silverstein pointed out, the referential function of language is not—of course—the only one, but it is the only one clearly perceived by people in their everyday use of language. Moreover, our selective acknowledgment of language functions lies at the core of what we can consider the speaker’s folk theory of language (Silverstein, 1981). If in the philosopher’s eyes, language is a performative tool to create a shared reality and to coordinate discourse activities, in the eyes of speakers it is a means to describing the world as it is. If in the eyes of analyst or in those of the ethnographer the world is nothing more than a constructed version coming from social activity and not a “pre-formed thing,” for our informants (as for us when acting in the field as laymen) it is a pre-formed thing depicted by our words. What happens when a postmodern-oriented researcher takes a distance from this folk theory about the relationships between language, reality, and truth? I fear that—even if in a more subtle way than in the past— s/he still situates his/her perspective in an upper position with regard to the informants’ eyes upon the reality they inhabit. In so doing, the anti-realist researcher makes the same mistake for which poststructuralist ethnography has reproached structuralist ethnography. In other words, s/he considers the natives’ perspective and their talk as nothing more than naive first-level data.

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Thus, the natives’ reconstructions of the world they live in can only be seriously taken into account to demonstrate ... their naiveté or—in a more sophisticated way—to display the strategies by which they construct their world as such.

Some conclusions The lost of the idea of a referential reality is a distinguishing feature of postmodernism in contemporary social sciences. Have we learned to cope with this? More or less it seems. When we analyze discourses that pretend to refer to a reality out there, when we encounter people who wish to give us some information and knowledge about this reality, may we just consider their discourse from a purely rhetorical point of view? Of course we may. But in this case, what is the relevance of this kind of research, which transforms and reduces politics into aesthetics? What is the ethics (if any) of changing our paradigms as we move from the lived field interactions with real people to the analysis of data at our desk? Is there any ethics in an investigation that denies any referential value of the words of people in flesh and blood and merely analyzes their styles of talking and thinking? Critically reflecting upon such issues doesn’t mean nostalgically going back to some positivist or realist framework. Of course this cannot be the answer anymore. It is perhaps too soon to find some answers to these questions. But the time has come to rethink our commitment to postmodernism. References Agar, M. H., & Hobbs, J. J. (1982). Interpreting discourse: Coherence and the analysis of ethnographic interviews. Discourse Processes, 5, 1–32. Atkinson, P. (1990). The ethnographic imagination: Textual construction of reality. London: Routledge.

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Gumperz, J. J. (1982). Discourse strategies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Halliday, M. (1973). Explorations in the functions of language. London: Edward Arnold. Heritage, J. J. (1985). Recent developments in conversation analysis. Sociolinguistics 15, 1–19. Hymes, D. (1974). Foundations in sociolinguistics: An ethnographic approach. London:Tavistock Jedlowski, P. (2000). Storie comuni: La narrazione nella vita quotidiana. Milano: Bruno Mondatori. Jefferson, G. (1978), Sequential aspects of storytelling in conversation. In Studies in the organization of conversational interaction. Ed. D. Schenkein. New York: Academic Press. Labov, W., & Fanshell, D. (1977). Therapeutic discourse: Psychotherapy as Cconversation. New York: Academic Press. Lynch, M. (1993). Scientific practice and ordinary action: Ethnomethodology and social studies of science. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Maturana, H. (1991). Science and daily life: The ontology of scientific explanation. In Research and reflexivity. London: Sage. Mishler, E. G. (1986). Research interviewing: Context and narrative. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Mishler, E. G. (1986b). The analysis of interview narratives. In Narrative Psychology: The Storied Nature of Human Conduct. Ed. T. R. Sarbin. New York: Praeger, 233–255. Moerman, M. (1988). Talking culture: Ethnography and conversation analysis. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Mortari, L. (2007). Cultura della ricerca e pedagogia: Prospettive epistemologiche. Roma: Carocci. Ochs, E., Smith, R., & Taylor, C. (1989). Detective stories at dinner time: Problem solving through co-narration. Cultural Dynamics 2, 238–257 . Ochs, E., Taylor, C., Rudolph, D., & Smith, R. (1992). Storytelling as a theory building activity. Discourse Processes 15, 22–37. Pontecorvo, C. (1991). Narrazione e pensiero discorsivo nell’infanzia. In Rappresentazioni e narrazioni. Ed. M. Ammanniti,& D. N. Stern. Roma-Bari: Laterza, 141–158. Pontecorvo, C., Amendola, S., & Fasulo, A. (1994). Storie in famiglia: La narrazione come prodotto collettivo. Età evolutiva 46, 18–34.

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Potter, J., & Wetherell, M. (1987). Discourse and social psychology: Beyond attitudes and behaviour. London: Sage. Powney, J., & Watts, M. (1987). Interviewing in educational research. London: Routledge. Rabinow, P., & Sullivan, W. M., eds. (1979). Interpretive social sciences: A reader. Berkeley: University of California Press. Rabinow, P., & Sullivan, W. M., eds. (1987). Interpretive social science: A second look. Berkeley: University of California Press. Ricoeur, P. (1986). Du texte à l’action. Essais d’hermeneutique II. Paris: Seuil. Sacks, H.(1972). On the analizability of stories by children. In Directions in sociolinguistics: The ethnography of communication. Ed. J. J. Gumperz & D. Hymes. New York: Holt Rinehart & Winston. Sacks, H. (1974). An analysis of the course of joke’s telling in conversation. In Explorations in ethnography of speaking. Ed. R. Bauman & J. Sherzer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 337–345. Saville-Troike, M. (1989). The ethnography of communication: An introduction. Cambridge: Blackwell. Schiffrin, D. (1984). How a story says what it means and does. Text 4(4), 313–346. Schiffrin, D. (1990). The management of cooperative-self during argument: The role of opinions and stories. In Conflict Talk. Ed. A. D. Grimshaw. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 241–259. Silverstein, M. (1981). The limits of awareness. Sociolinguistic working chapter no. 84, Southwest Educational Development Laboratory, Austin, TX. Smorti, A., ed. (1997). Il sé come testo: Costruzione delle storie e sviluppo della persona. Firenze: Giunti, 1997. Spence, D. P. (1982). Narrative truth and historical truth. New York: W. W. Norton. Steier, F., ed. (1991). Research and reflexivity. London: Sage. Van Maanen, J. (1988). Tales of the field: On writing ethnography. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Wittgenstein, L. (1958). Philosophical investigations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Methodological Issues in Video-Based Research on Immigrant Children and Parents in Early Childhood Settings Joseph J. Tobin, Susanna Mantovani and Chiara Bove Abstract: In this Chapter we present the design and methods of an inter­ national study, “Children Crossing Borders.” This study extends the video-cued, multivocal ethnographic approach introduced by J. Tobin in Preschool in Three Cultures (1989). The video-cued, dialogical approach we employ in the study uses videos of a typical preschool day as the starting point to give voice to the beliefs and concerns of teachers and immigrant parents about the education and care of young children. Using the process of shooting and editing a video we made in a pre­school in Milan as an example, we discuss the video-cued ethno­graphic method and reflect on its connections to phe­nomenological research. We highlight the importance of narrative, drama, plot, and the interplay between the artificial and the real in our version of video ethnography.

Introduction The research methods, issues, and tensions we discuss in this chapter come from a project called “Children Crossing Borders.” This is a comparative international study of parent and staff perspectives on early childhood education and care programs serving children of recent immigrants in five countries (England, France, Germany, Italy and the United States).1 In this project, “Children of Immigrants in Early Childhood Settings in Five Countries: A Study of Parent and Staff Beliefs,” Bernard Van Leer Grant, 222.2004-039, coordinated by Joseph J.Tobin (Arizona State University, USA), www.childrencrossingborders.org. 1

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research teams working in Birmingham, Paris, Berlin, Milan, and Phoenix selected a preschool in each city attended by children whose families are recent immigrants, and made a videotape of a typical day in a classroom of four-year-olds. The video footage was edited down to twenty minutes and then used to stimulate focus group discussions among staff and parents, first in the preschool where it was shot, then in other preschools in the same country, and finally in the other countries involved in the study. A basic assumption of our method is that the video material is richer, better contextualized, and less abstract than verbal questions as a tool to stimulate discussion. In our presentation of this project at the International Human Science Research Conference in Rovereto, we were able to reproduce the experience of the focus group discussion sessions and to illustrate the points we wish to make in this chapter by showing some scenes from our videos; in the present chapter, however, we must confine ourselves to using written words to describe the content of the video, the workings of the method, and the discussions of the participants. It is a bit frustrating when sharing perspectives, as we aim to do in this chapter, with an audience from different cultures, countries, and first-languages (where language can be a barrier to mutual understanding) not to be able to show some videos and thereby to take advantage of the power of well-crafted visual stimuli to communicate across languages and cultures. But we will do our best. In our study we use video cues followed by focus group discussions to give voice to the ideas, beliefs, and concerns of immigrant parents about the education of their young children. The method we used in this study extends the multivocal, videocued ethnographic approach introduced by Joseph Tobin, David Wu, and Dana Davidson in their Preschool in Three Cultures study (1989). The focus of the new study is on how the early childhood education and care systems of five countries are serving the children of recent immigrants, and particularly on what

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parents who have recently migrated from another country want for their children in early childhood education and care settings. At the heart of this study is a comparison of ideas about preschool held by practitioners and immigrant parents. A basic assumption of our research project is that preschool programs can better serve immigrants when parents, teachers, and other stakeholders engage in dialogue. Our project aims to serve as a catalyst for dialogue among parents, practitioners, scholars, and policymakers about the problems and possibilities of creating preschool programs that reflect the values and beliefs both of immigrant communities and of the societies to which they have immigrated. Although immigration is a key issue confronting modern societies, there is a critical shortage of studies on the experience of children of immigrants in early childhood education settings and on what immigrants from different cultures want for their children. Discussion of approaches to early childhood education rarely includes the voices of parents, and this is particularly true when the parents are recent immigrants. For most young children of parents who have come from other countries and cultures, their child’s early childhood education and care program is the first context in which they come face to face with differences between the culture of home and the public culture of their new country. For parents who have recently immigrated to a new country, enrolling their child in a preschool program is the paradigmatic moment where cultural values of their home and adopted culture come into contact and, often, conflict. If things go badly, feeling of estrangement, exclusion, and anger are likely to increase. The basic assumption that guides this project is that early childhood education settings are key sites to engage with immigrant families, to hear their voices, to interpret what they have to say about their children’s experiences in early childhood education, and to contrast their perspectives with those of their children’s teachers. Preschools, ideally, can function as a site for interaction and discussion not only among children,

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but also among adults, that is, for teachers and parents, including parents from different cultural backgrounds whose children are in the same classrooms (New & Mallory, 2005). This is also a comparative study of early childhood education in five countries. The five countries involved in the research represent five very different approaches to serving children of recent immigrants, approaches that in turn reflect profound social and cultural differences among these five countries. All five countries are democracies, but with significant differences in notions of citizenship, nation, federalism, public services, and civic responsibility, and with very different systems of early childhood education. Our study stands at the intersection of the disciplines of pedagogy, anthropology, child development, and sociology. The Italian part of the study is most strongly influenced by phenomenological strains within the study of pedagogy (Bertolini, 2001; Caronia, 1997, 2004, pp. 21–47); by studies on intercultural education (Sirna Terranova, 1997, 2003; Giusti, 2004; Cambi, 2006); by cultural psychology and pedagogy (Bruner, 1996; Shweder, 1991; Bove, 2004); and by anthropology (Tobin, Wu, & Davidson, 1989; Rogoff, 2003). It represents an attempt to develop a methodology that combines theoretical reflection on education with systematic data collection, coding, and interpretative analyses. It aims to construct an analysis of the public discourse and culture of early education and immigration, in formal and informal settings, through the eyes and voices of insiders and outsiders. The hypothesis is that each voice is an expression not only of the thoughts and consciousness of an individual, but also of thoughts and consciousness of a group and a reflection of a larger discourse (Bakhtin, 1988).

Objectives Our research has multiple goals. The first, as stated above, is to give voice to the hopes, beliefs, and concerns of immigrant parents

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about the education and care of their young children. Listening to the voices of immigrant parents contributes to our understanding of diversity in early childhood education and care. The voices of immigrant parents introduce perspectives on the social, emotional, and cognitive dimensions of children’s development—perspectives that can broaden and in some cases challenge dominant Western European and United States representations and attitudes. The second goal is to identify and explicate five national models of working with children of immigrants in the hope that the countries participating in the study (as well as other countries) can learn from each other, not necessarily by directly borrowing, but rather by being exposed to approaches that will expand the repertoire of the possible and challenge taken-for-granted assumptions. The countries involved in this study, as well as the schools involved in each country, have much to gain from being exposed to a range of different approaches in education. The third goal is to model a process for parents, immigrant parents, and teachers to engage in dialogue about what is best for young children. It is our hope that the materials we produce in this study and the methods we are experimenting with will eventually be turned into processes and tools for stimulating discussion among teachers and parents about the means and the end of early education and care.

Methods The core method of this study follows the approach used by Tobin, Wu, and Davidson in the seminal study Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China, United States (1989). In this method, videotapes of typical days in preschools are used not as data, but as a stimulus for discussion. In this study typical days were filmed in preschools in Berlin, Birmingham (England), Milan, Paris, and Phoenix. The videos were then edited down to twenty minutes and used to stimulate focus group discussions with teachers and

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parents in each country, and within each country, in different cities. The steps of the method include selecting a preschool in each city that balances issues of “comparability” across nations with “typicality” within each nation1; shooting a video of a “more or less” typical day in a classroom of four-years-olds in each preschool selected; editing the video down to a twenty-minute version; and discussing the video with parents and teachers in the school where the video was shot, in other schools in the same city, in other cities of the same country, and finally in different countries. The process of shooting and then editing the video followed the same steps in each country: the research team in each country spent an entire week in the classroom selected for videotaping. During the first two days the researchers let the children and the teachers become comfortable with the cameras and microphones, and selected potential protagonists on whom to focus the cameras (boys and girls interesting for their behaviors, for their role in the group, for their relation with the teachers, and so on). On the third day the researchers shot the video with two “prosumer” level digital video cameras and both camera-mounted and wireless microphones. On the fourth day, each team showed some of the rough footage and had discussions with the classroom teachers, and then on the fifth day with the children and their parents. Based on the initial feedback provided during these initial discussions by these teachers, children, and parents, each research team edited the ten to sixteen hours of videotape (five to We are aware that this method raises questions of typicality: how can one early childhood setting per country be enough? How can we claim that one setting can be “typical” of a country, or that the day we videotaped is a “typical day” in that setting? The method introduced in the field by Joseph Tobin in his seminal study provides a solution to the problem of the typicality of field-sites: by showing the tape made in one setting to audiences in other settings in this study, we can use the reactions of our informants to understand in what ways the day we have videotaped is typical and to what extent it reflects local and cultural variations within the country. By asking the participants to tell us whether or not the tape shows a “typical” day, and if not, in what ways it is atypical, we solved this methodological issue (Tobin, Wu, & Davidson, 1989). 1

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eight hours per camera) down to approximately two hours and then, with input from all five research teams, down to about twenty minutes. The logic of this process has been to select those shots that best reflect the program’s approach to working with children of immigrants and shots that will have the capacity to function effectively as cues to stimulate informants to explicate their beliefs and philosophies. The process of selecting and choosing the shots for the final version of the video involved each team, the participants of each school videotaped, and the research teams of the other countries. This process made explicit certain culturally varying understandings, and a first level of interpretations about what is a preschool; what is an Italian (or French, or British, or German, or American) preschool; and what preschool activities are most important and typical, as well as what activities should be included in the edited videos to elicit surprise, curiosity, and dialogue. Each of these twenty-minute videos is therefore a negotiated text that includes multiple voices, interpretations, and perspectives. Once the video was edited into the final version, each research team showed the video and held discussions with parents and teachers in multiple sites in each country. The process of discussing the video shot in one site with audiences in other sites was a key way that we were able to form a judgment on the typicality of the preschool in each video. One of the first questions we asked groups of parents and teachers at each discussion was “Does the preschool in the video look like your preschool? In what ways is it the same and different?” Each of the videos was then shown in two other countries. Italian informants, for example, discussed the German and English tapes, while United States informants discussed the Italian and French tapes. The focus groups in each country were audiotaped and sometimes videotaped, and then transcribed, translated, and coded using Hyperresearch.1 Some sections of the transcripts have been analyzed using an interpretive analysis approach inspired by 1

Website: www.researchware.com/hr.

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literary interpretation and by Bakhtin’s writings on citationality, heteroglossia, and dialogism (Backhtin, 1988; Tobin, Arzubiaga, & Mantovani, 2007). In the rest of this paper we describe the process we went through in filming and editing the video in a preschool in Milan, focusing on how the decision-making process led us to come to realize both the importance of narrative, drama, and plot in video ethnography and the tension between reality and artificiality in filming, editing, and discussing the video. To address larger issues in the uses of video in educational research, we will discuss the nuances we encountered in this research in watching and discussing a tape with groups of parents and teachers and of making sense of what they have to say.

Methodological challenges  ilming and editing videos: Narrative flow, F key characters, and dramatic events The video tells the story of one day in a Milan preschool, focusing on a few key characters. We believe that this featuring of protagonists, combined with an attention to narrative provokes discussions far more effectively than would a video that had a more “scientific” or self-consciously neutral or objective feel (as could be created, for example, by including mostly wide angle shots of the whole classroom rather than our use of a lot of close-up shots of the faces of individual children). Our focus on characters and narrative, combined with the inclusion of segments that present some ambiguity, encourages informants to talk by “suspending” or “postponing” the process of viewers falling back on the habitual knowledge and conventional responses elicited by an “educational film.” A source for this method is the tradition in psychodynamic psychology of using an ambiguous visual stimulus, such as an

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inkblot or a drawing, as a tool for allowing the investigator to uncover unconscious psychological processes. Our idea of using ambiguous scenes in videotapes of typical days in preschools as interviewing cues was particularly influenced by the work of Henry A. Murray, the father of projective testing, who argued that people’s personality styles and core concerns can be analyzed by asking them to tell stories about drawings selected to get at different psychological issues (see Henry, 1956). For example, in Murray’s “Thematic Apperception Test,” Card 1, a drawing of a boy sitting in front of a violin, was included to get at conflicts about achievement motivation. In his development of a technique he called the “picture interview,” William Caudill adapted Murray’s “Thematic Apperception Test” method, turning it from a method for analyzing the psyches of individuals to an ethnographic tool for analyzing cultural beliefs. In one study, Caudill hired an artist to make simple line drawings of scenes of interpersonal intimacy (for example, scenes of children bathing together in a tub, of a woman tending to a sick man, and of a man and woman sitting on a bed), then showed these drawings to Japanese and American informants and asked them to tell him a story about each picture. Caudill analyzed these stories told by Japanese and American informants to explicate differences and similarities in the cultural patterning of physical and emotional intimacy in Japan and the United States (Caudill, 1962). In our method, each scene in our videos is like a moving, noisy version of the drawings Caudill used in his studies. In order to function effectively as provocations or stimuli, videos need to be hybrid constructions that are both “scientific texts” and “works of art” (Tobin, Wu, & Davidson, 1989). Good images are potentially worth showing, but in order to provoke reactions the images need to be edited to tell “a/the story.” When the images are edited, they add to the customary goals of documenting and informing the further goals of provoking self-reflections, challenging taken-for-granted assumptions, entertaining,

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and “giving pleasure” (Tobin & Hsueh, 2007, pp. 77–92). It is a different perspective than that of using videos for showing and analyzing situations in real time, as it is often done in educational research and training, where the aim is to view, describe, view again, and redescribe, in order to help educators reach more subtle and shared perceptions of what is shown and to “train the eye,” negotiate what is “really” there, and decide what it “means” by reviewing the material several times. In our study, the videos are (heavily) edited. They are based on real life (a real full day in a real school with real teachers and children), but they have a narrative flow, key characters, and dramatic events. In each country the videos were shot to include a set of routines found in all countries’ preschools: shots of arrival, free play, bathroom, morning activity, lunch, nap or rest, afternoon activities, and departure. Within this common structure, each country’s video represents different interpretations of this daily schedule and of some central educational issues: homeschool transitions and “attachment” styles—images of children and parents saying goodbye and reestablishing contact at the end of the day in happy, detached or anxious ways (Mantovani, Saitta, & Bove, 2000); a conflict between children or a misbehaving child (also including the reactions of the classmates and the teachers); sequences of free play or scenes of adult-centered play; and so on. The five countries’ videos produced in our study are five cultural versions of the same sets of routines, five versions of a “typical preschool day.” In each of them, different interpretations of childhood and early education are represented. The construction, from the filming to editing, has been an exercise in giving “ecological validity” to each of our films, and make each “ring true” for its domestic audience. At the same time, the similarity in structure and content of the five videos—a similarity that was made possible by lots of discussion among the research teams from each country, and by the international coordinators of the project participating in the videotaping and .

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editing of all five videos—allowed us to achieve comparability across the videos. The key to the method is to remember that the videos, in fact, are not our data; the data are the discourses and dialogues provoked by the films. Each video contains some provocative scenes and images. In our Milan video, one of the most provocative and controversial scenes, as we have learned from the discussions of the team and of the different groups of informants during the focus groups, is the opening scene of the film where a boy, Gennaro, gets emotional and fusses before and after saying goodbye to his mother. It is 9 a.m. and Gennaro, after his arrival at school, is standing close to his mother and “taking his time” before saying goodbye. He stands in front of the classroom door holding his mother’s hand with his right hand and the teacher’s hand with his left, not letting hold of either of them and pleading with his mother about her going to work and his father coming in the afternoon to pick him up from school. “Mamma,” he repeats several times, “Please, tell my father to pick me up at school this afternoon. Please, tell him to come. Please, remind him to come.” While the child talks to his mother, the teacher observes their interaction, smiles, and stands near them in the classroom’s doorway. After a while, the teacher tells Gennaro to say goodbye to his mother for the last time and to enter the classroom. His mother kisses Gennaro and leaves, but soon after he starts crying and complaining about other children. The teacher consoles him and scolds him jokingly and suggests that he can go at the window to wave to his mother (as he does, his mother tells us later, every morning). The scene ends with the child’s waving to his mother through the window of his classroom, while the mother is on the street in front of the school building, waving back. American teachers and parents who watched this video comment that Gennaro is not dealing with the normal daily separation in a normal way, but that he uses a “dramatic voice,” and acts in a “dramatic way,” which for them

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meets their stereotype of Italian boys and their mothers. Gennaro is a “cute boy” dealing with the separation in a very intense and dramatic way, and this provokes smiling and strong emotional reactions in the viewers. The American members of our research team insisted on having Gennaro’s long “goodbye scene” as a start of the film. When our American colleagues watched this scene they were impressed by the dramatic tone of this interaction and they told us that Gennaro looked “like a typical Italian boy” dealing with his separation (in this sense, the American team members share the stereotypical view of the Italian family that the American teachers and parents expressed). They correctly anticipated that this scene would function effectively as a cue to provoke in-depth discussions of family-school interactions, adultchild relations, and educational practices, perhaps because in American early childhood education and care settings such practices of long goodbyes are not considered as common or viewed as being as normative as they are in the Italian context. On the other side of the ocean, we (the Italian researchers) were ambivalent about the “adequacy” of this scene: we resisted considering Gennaro as “typical,” as our American colleagues did. We worried that he was not representative, and that perhaps he was extra dramatic because Gennaro, a little handsome boy whose family come from Naples (our stereotype as Italian Northerners of the “dramatic Napolitano” comes out here!) is something of a character even before we decided to feature him in our video. In the end we included this scene in our video. When we discussed the Milan video in other Italian cities—for example, in Parma and Rome—it became clear that Gennaro’s scene had the potential to provoke interesting discussions within our insider informants too, but in a quite different direction from the discussions in the United States: some teachers said during a focus group discussion that the teacher in the video was “too detached” and “cold” in the interaction with Gennaro during the goodbye. She did not reassure him enough when he

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started crying; she did not hold him; and she was not as focused on the mother-child interaction as she should or could have been. “We take more care of relationships,” one Italian teacher told us, in saying so telling us something not about the film, but about the educational philosophy and practices in her school and city. Video-making is the first step in this complex intercultural research design that takes place within the research team, with the other research teams from the other countries, and with the teachers and parents in the preschools where we videotape. By discussing and interpreting images through different eyes and from different perspectives, we end up with a different sort of video than each country team would have produced on its own. We suggest that this process accelerates our task of bringing cultural meanings to the surface and makes the videos more effective as stimuli, because by the time the editing process is complete, they already contain within them a variety of contrasting interpretations. Our discussion above of Gennaro’s goodbye scene suggests how this video could be used in educational research. By saying that the Milan teacher is “cold,” “detached,” and “insufficiently focused” on Gennaro’s emotions, the teacher in Parma ends up revealing much about her beliefs about the role and function of warm relationships and about her ideas of good educational practices. We argue that this process stimulates awareness and provides new ideas about care, education, and early childhood in intercultural settings, which is one of the main goals of our research.

Ideal ambiguity We included in the Italian video the image of a group of children playing with some slides in the science corner while the teacher is sitting at a table near Gennaro, who is using a kaleidoscope. In this scene, the teachers asks Gennaro some questions (e.g., “What are you seeing in the kaleidoscope? What does it look like?”) and takes notes. When our American colleagues

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watched the video, they reacted to this scene, asking for explanations about the teacher’s role and more specifically, about the fact that she was writing. “What is the teacher doing?” they asked us. “Is she assessing the child?.” The image of the teacher writing during the interaction with a single child immediately evoked assessment in American and English informants, while Italian teachers and parents tend not to notice the scene or to assume it is the normal daily “documentation” of a scientific project and that she is recording (documenting) Gennaro’s thoughts, not assessing him. Ambiguity elicits discussion: the example above shows an instance of ambiguity. We strive for a level of “ideal ambiguity,” by which we mean a level of ambiguity in a scene that is not so great as to produce confusion or to lead to wild speculation, but ambiguous enough to provoke reactions and discussions and to allow for multiple interpretations. The videos in our study are not documentaries, but neither are they fictions. They are artificial, but they show real behaviors of real actors.1 The challenge of finding the right balance between the feeling of reality (verisimilitude) and the feeling of artificiality (artistic-latitude) in editing the video becomes more problematic when we discuss the use of videos in educational research, where images are bound to be read as possible models.

Editing as a cultural process. Ethical implications A further challenge we faced during the editing of the Milan video was related to the participation of immigrant parents. As we outlined above, our method implies a strong relationship with the participants at each of the steps: before filming, during the filming, while we edit, and during the discussions. The edit1 Before filming, we spent time observing the children and the teachers. Based on our observations and on our discussions with the teachers, we identify some key children on whom we focused our camera’s attention.

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ing process requires negotiating and striking a balance between our favorite scenes or shots and the preferences of our participants. During the editing of the Italian video, for example, we felt that one of the best images in our film would have been the arrival time of a girl (Imane, one of our key children) and her immigrant North African mother. We selected these two characters for several reasons: they were beautiful, they were striking, and they were immigrants. When we showed our draft video to the parents involved in the classroom where we videotaped, Imane’s mother was, to our surprise, very upset. When we asked them if there was anything that they did not like in the video, she told us that she did not want to be “in the video” and that when she and her husband had agreed to participate in the research process, she had not been anticipating the inclusion of images of herself. She was pleased that her child was there, but she did not want to be in the video. We of course deleted the unwanted images, and then we invited this mother back to the school to check our video once again. We showed her the new version and we asked her how she felt. She then explained to us that the reason she did not want to be in the video was that her husband, who is very jealous, would have been upset. At this point, the discussion began to flow. We told her that we understood her position as well as the position of her husband (“I can understand,” said one of our researchers, “You are so beautiful!”). But was this the reason? Has it to do with beauty, jealousy, or with other issues? How could we turn this “cultural accident” into an opportunity for cultural dialogue, an opportunity to talk about a delicate theme and to enhance mutual recognition and respect? This was an important lesson for us about the ethical implications of using videos in educational research. We are aware that attractive images of attractive people, good sound, dramatic events, and compelling story lines improve the potential of the video as a cue or a stimuli to provoke discussions

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among participants (to this end the editing represents a very important phase of the research). Scenes in the video that capture the attention of our informants are therefore needed to produce an effective tool to stimulate dialogues and discussions. This all contributes to the sense of verisimilitude that is a central issue in video-making in educational research: when we edit a video, we need to be aware that we are editing a story that our audience will be able to follow from shot to shot, from scene to scene. Issues of editing require a balance between coherency, novelty, and storytelling. In other words, a good video provides the audience with the sense that events in the tape are unfolding logically (Erickson, 2007, pp.145–155). By editing the video we artificially construct these sequences and artificially provide a sense of connection and coherence from scene to scene (artificial because we have cut many events that happened in between the scenes). Thus, by assembling the images that we have selected, we produce a linear structure that—although artificial—provides our audience with a sense of coherence that reproduces the coherence of events in real life. We arrange the scenes in chronological order and we construct the “illusion” for our audience of a whole day passing in just twenty minutes.

 iscussing videos in groups: sharing meanings D and suspending judgments The videos in this research speed up the ethnographic process. In traditional ethnography, the anthropologist first spends an extended time observing and participating in events in a community, and then later asks the participants to share their reflections on the meanings of these events. Our approach collapses this process into one week of participant observation followed by several days of structured interviewing and reflection. When our participants view and experience the videos, they experience a variety of emotional and intellectual reactions: they

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react not only to the images of the videos (to the story, to the characters, to their behaviors) but also to the experience of watching the video with others and to the experience of watching a more or less typical preschool day. They talk to each other, first about the video, and then, quickly and much more, about their experiences as parents or teachers. Sometime the video is just a conversation-starter that rapidly gives way to personal narratives. Our claim is that, compared to other research tools, our approach accelerates and focuses the processes of self-reflection and interpretation. The special characteristics of the videos in our study (the fact that the video is not the reality, but “a representation of the reality”; that the video suspends time and collapses events to stimulate the construction of interpretations; that the video is an “out-there-description” of a real experience; that the video produces a sensory, emotional, and intellectual experience in its viewers; and so on) make the access to “meanings and interpretations” possible. The images edited in our videos are (artificial) constructions, but they become comprehensible, meaningful and real when our informants watch them and discuss them.

Intentionality and educational responsibility Video-based research, and especially video-based intercultural research on education (and any research with educational implications), needs to find a way of moving from direct to reflective experience and to create dialogue and co-construct meanings among subjects who usually do not have opportunities to share experiences. This in turn implies that each choice in our method (that is, when we film, what we choose to focus on in our shot selection and in our editing, how we organize the showing of the films and the subsequent discussion) needs to be negotiated by the researchers and the informants. We can define this process as one of “interpretation of interpretation” (Alvesoon & Sholdeberg, 2000), as it has a recursive character that is both

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intrinsic and fundamental to our approach, as well as being a source of constant frustration and doubt. The educational experiences we address are complex; they are embedded in cultural experiences and in universal concerns of parents and adults in a community about the upbringing of children, concerns that involve feelings, ideologies, and values. Studying them through this video-cued method, we create a powerful “experience” for our participants, an experience that is “expanded and increased” when we use as stimuli videos from other countries. Because of this potential, these experiences have to be constructed with attention, cultural and human sensitivity, and a readiness to modify and even limit the research design according to the experiences and needs of our subjects. When our informants watched the German video, they were impressed by the level of physical freedom and autonomy that they observed in the behavior of children and teachers: during free play in the park, we see boys and girls playing and engaged in mock “fighting” with long branches, in a sort of ritualized dance. Teachers and parents in the Milan schools were amazed by seeing that no harm resulted from such a “risky” activity. We later discovered from the German team that “risk” is an important category in German pedagogy and therefore an interesting theme to discuss in further depth, as it relates to age, gender, school activities, and autonomy. In the German school, children are allowed to argue harshly (at least it seems harsh to our eyes); at the same time, they are treated tenderly, and their mother tongue and traditions are recognized and encouraged. Being exposed to such themes in other countries’ videos leads participants to begin to reflect upon their own experiences and to put them in perspective. In our focus groups, where many interpretations are made possible by the dense, ambiguous video stimuli we employ, we try to create a dialogical dimension, to give voice to participants with the goal of co-constructing new and deeper meanings through an

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ongoing process of intuition and approximation. Our informants, and especially immigrant parents, do not directly tell us something about themselves (or gaps of cultural background, languages, and experiences and the researchers’ ignorance precludes such direct understanding). Instead, we gradually come to understand more about each other through seeing the same scenes through different eyes and talking about them in our heterogeneous voices. Across these divides, meaning and understanding emerge. The practice of discussing, sharing, reacting to the videos, and interpreting is unusual with and among immigrant parents, who seldom have voices in our research or in our schools. These voices are important to us not only as data in our current study, but also for conceptualizing ethically sound practices for future educational research involving adults (parents and teachers) and children, especially when they come from varied cultural backgrounds. When each participant reacts to the same set of images and is given the opportunity to explain the thinking behind his/ her feelings and actions, we have the chance to understand more about their experiences and feelings, as well as more about our own. In this way we can become aware of their interpretations of the educational contexts that we have created and that are usually taken for granted, and we can also aspire to induce a change in attitudes and practices. By interpreting and having a more articulate understanding of the possible meanings of routines and educational practices, we understand not just people’s behaviors but their “praxis,” which we can define as “behavior plus intention” (Erickson, 2007, pp.145–155). Intentionality, i.e., the consciousness of experiences and its orientation from the first-person point of view, is a key concept in phenomenological research and also an orienting concept for pedagogy, which constantly inquires and directs our efforts not only to understand the complexity of educational events, but to orient “reactions,” turning them into responsible, well-formed, educational practices (Bertolini, 1998, 2001).

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Harper, D. (2005). What’s new visually. In The Sage handbook of qualitative research. Ed. N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 747–761 Henry, W. E. (1956). The analysis of fantasy: The thematic apperception technique in the study of personality. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Husserl, E. (1965). Idee per una fenomenologia pura e per una filosofia fenomenologia [1913]. Trans. G. Alliney. Ed. E. Filippini and G. Alliney. Torino: Einaudi. Marcus, G. E., & Fischer, M. M. J. (1999). Anthropology as cultural critique: An experimental moment in the human sciences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Mantovani, S. Pedagogy. (2007). In Early childhood education: An international encyclopedia. Ed. R. S. New & M. Cochran. Vol. 4. Westport: Praeger, 1114–1118. Montovani, S., Saitta, L. R., & Bove, C. (2000). Attaccamento e inserimento: Stili e storie delle relazioni al nido. Milano: Franco Angeli. Merleau-Ponty, M. (2003). Fenomenologia della percezione [1945]. Trans. A. Bonomi. Milano: Bompiani. Mirzoeff, N. (1999). An introduction to visual culture. London: Routledge Murray, H. A. (1938). Explorations in personality. New York: Oxford University Press. Mortari, L., (2007). Cultura della ricerca e pedagogia: Prospettive epistemologiche. Roma: Carocci. New, R., & Mallory, B. (2005). Children as catalysts for adult relations: New perspectives from Italian early childhood education. In Contemporary perspectives on families, communities, and schools for young children. Ed. B. Spodak & O. Saracho. Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing, 163–179. Rogoff, B. (2003). The cultural nature of human development. New York: Oxford University Press; La natura culturale dello sviluppo. Trans. D. Sarracino.( Milano: Cortina, 2004). Shweder, R. A. (1991). Thinking through culture: Expeditions in cultural psycholog., Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Sirna Terranova, C. (1997). Pedagogia interculturale. Milano: Guerini. Sirna Terranova, C. (2003). Postcolonial education e società multiculturale. Lecce: Pensa Multimedia. Spinelli, E. (2005). The interpreted world: An introduction to phenomenological psychology. 2nd Ed. London: Sage.

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The Ethical Work of Expressive Research: Revealing the Remoralizing Power of Pathic Action Peter Willis and Sally Borbasi Abstract: This chapter explores expressive, phenomenological research as a foundation for a transformative and humanistic mythopoetic pedagogy. It is especially directed to aspiring practitioners in health, learning, and social care who are seeking to generate a strong and informed commitment to the particular form of social care that interests them. Trainees in these fields are invited to dwell on their uncensored reactions to dramatized portrayals of the lived experience of events in the professional lives of the human service workers they hope to follow. The focus on inner orientation or “personal vocation” seeks to complement a more positivist idea of professional development as “prescribed per­ formance according to established criteria.

Introduction This chapter explores expressive forms of research as an appropriate way of representing and revealing what has been called the pathic or empathetic dimension of human services. “Pathic” engagement is said to contribute to remoralizing care, which safeguards the service client’s personhood against the abstracting—and what Frank calls “demoralizing,” forces at work in bureaucratized human services. The form of expressive research used in this study is underpinned by a phenomenological approach to inquiry. It uses aesthetic and poetic textual practices to attempt to make this interpersonal phenomenon recognizable

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and even somehow “present.” It attempts not to categorize the object under examination, but to portray it as a lived and minimally interpreted phenomenon, to show the reader what pathic engagement in human service work (in the context of this chapter, nursing) is like. The title of the chapter reflects our attempt to address an innovative methodological way to represent an ethical dimension of human service, one that involves the service provider consciously attending to the humanity of his/her client. The chapter has two major sections. The first concerns two foundational ideas. It looks initially at the “pathic” dimension of human service and its remoralizing effect as found in such activities as nursing, education, counseling and other human service professions. The second part of the first section then examines expressive research as an appropriate presentational vehicle for this inquiry. The second section gives an example of a dramatized method used in this expressive research. It builds on a phenomenological approach to allow a portrayal of the lived experience of pathic engagement and its remoralizing effect to be revealed through the use of a relevant clip from a popular film followed by the incremental generation of a presentational text.

 oundations: Remoralization through pathic action F and expressive research Remoralization through pathic action. The gnostic and pathic hand Max van Manen, a distinguished exponent of phenomenological approaches to social science, suggests that in nursing practice, particularly when pursued in hospitals, there is a complementary difference between what he has called the gnostic and pathic hand. The touch of the gnostic hand palpates and

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explores the body looking to discover signs of pathology and of healing; it seeks knowledge linked to diagnosis, attempting to explain the symptoms in terms of an illness consistent with them. By contrast, the touch of the pathic hand connects holistically to the person in his/her healing. As he writes (1999, p. 28), In contrast with the knowing or gnostic hand of palpation, the nurse’s hand is pathic when it applies the dressing, straightens the bedding, starts an intravenous, administers the medication, speaks supportively, cleans the skin, provides relief from pain, supports the aching body in its time of healing, or even when the nurse is simply present. True, the nurse’s hand is also knowledgeable of medical science. But (outside of the highly technologized intensive care, emergency or technical tasks) the patient still expects that primarily this is a healing hand, a caring hand which does not only touch the physical body, it also touches the self, the whole embodied person. This pathic quality may well constitute the core meaning of the healing act of nursing care.

From a constructivist perspective, it could be said that the gnostic hand foregrounds or discursively and interactively creates the “diseased” symptomatic body, while the pathic hand foregrounds and creates discursively and interactively creates the personal and suffering body. In every form of interpersonal human service already mentioned, such as education, counseling, correctional services, and the like, there seems to be a similar division between gnostic and pathic action. Service providers in health or education or counselling, etc., need to engage and question their clients in order to discover their circumstances. This is so they can be classified as having some illness for which treatment can be prescribed or belonging to certain categories such as single mother, long-term unemployed, repeat offender,etc., for which specific resources and provisions can then be provided. In order to soften this reductionist bureaucratic process, which can be experienced as reducing or even destroying the client’s personhood and autonomy,

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professionals are encouraged to take up a more human stance and engage the client as a person rather than a category, and to have some empathy for the difficulties and pain that people in such circumstances often have. This second empathetic stance seems similar to the nurse’s pathic hand—and these can both be seen to have been generated and guided by what can be called pathic knowledge.

Demoralization and remoralization It is possible to elaborate the distinction between the gnostic and pathic forms of knowing using the work of Arthur Frank, a Canadian sociologist interested in the effects of these two ways of engaging with clients. In reflecting on his experience of cancer treatment in large municipal hospitals in Canada he distinguishes between “de-moralization” and “re-moralization” effects. Demoralization refers to the de-humanising experience of people who on being admitted to hospital felt they were being reduced to an “object” of medical inquiry and treatment. In narrative terms, these people, with their stories of fear and woundedness, found themselves renamed as an element in the hospital’s story of inquiry, diagnosis, and treatment. Re-moralizing (which Frank largely attributes to the contribution of fellow patients meeting informally and more formally in support groups) refers to the process in which patients “regained their humanity” particularly through being central to the story they were part of—a story created through receptive conversations with patients in the support group. Remoralizing seems to be an effect of the “pathic hand” of the nurse (or the doctor, for that matter), the attending and healing hand that touches the whole embodied person, linked (as it almost always is) with an often largely tacit attention to the patient’s own story. The pathic hand informed by pathic knowing accompanies the nurses’ re-moralizing work. The following long quotation from Frank (2001, pp. 2, 3) does several things at once. It expounds Frank’s idea of demoralization

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and remoralization. By incorporating this into his academic paper, Frank is using an expressive form of research. It is an example of what this paper seeks to elaborate, namely, that the strategic use of an excerpt from a play can be an appropriate expressive textual genre for research attempting to represent a person’s lived demoralized and remoralized experience. Finally, in the last paragraph, it links back to the specific phenomenological character of nursing as “pathic care” suggested by van Manen. One of the most recent and best testaments to the need for medicine’s remoralization is Margaret Edson’s Pulitzer Prize– winning play, Wit (1999). Vivian Bearing, a distinguished professor of English, is dying of ovarian cancer. Although temporal intervals are not specified, the play takes place over about a year from her diagnosis to her death. Vivian often speaks directly to the audience while individual physicians or the medical staff speak their dialogue in the background. Thus after her oncologist, Dr. Kelekian, has broken the news by simply entering the room and telling her, “You have cancer” (in the production I saw, he looks down at the chart as he says this), he goes into a monotone description of medical details and the proposed treatment, and she carries on her own monologue. Vivian has some success establishing a relationship of mutual recognition with Kelekian—they find common ground in complaints about their students—but her demora­ lization becomes intense as she goes for various tests. The first technician, after asking her name, asks (without inflecting it as a question) “Doctor.” She answers, “Yes, I have a Ph.D.” “Your doctor,” he replies (Edson 1999: 16). In her next encounter she tries joking, but the joke only produces confusion. After the test the technician is annoyed because another technician has taken her wheelchair: “Well, how are you going to get out of here?” he asks. “Perhaps you would like me to stay,” she answers (1999: 17). Later in her treatment, when she goes for a test she makes no attempt to establish any relationship to the technician; when he asks her name she speaks by rote, “B-E-A-R-I-N-G. Kelekian” (1999: 42) In the production I saw, that line is delivered with a heavy sense of defeat; all the wit of the earlier exchanges has been extinguished. The medical system has nei­ ther time nor interest in who people are; at most the amount of

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chemotherapy that Vivian infuses will be the subject of a medical journal article (1999: 43). Of course I also am writing a journal article, which may be an example of what Vivian is fond of calling irony (1999: 8). Wit has moments of remoralization, especially in Vivian’s rela­ tionship to her primary care nurse (she is being treated in a setting where she has a primary care nurse). If disenchantment is our fate, remoralization is our possibility. This essay extends that remoralization project by asking what disenchants contemporary life in general, how illness crystallizes this disenchantment, and how stories as a form of interaction can remoralize the world.

In light of van Manen’s and Frank’s ideas, it seems apparent that remoralizing, pathic activities are significant factors in”wellmaking” for human service clients and hospital patients, and worth research inquiry. The research being pursued here wants to explore and reveal what such pathic remoralizing action is actually like for the person offering it. Such an agenda is well explored with a phenomenological methodology and what has been called an expressive method. It will be another and necessary project to inquire into what pathic action is like for the “receiving” patient or client. This leads to the second section of this paper, which is concerned to explore expressive form of research—to see how it draws on and builds from a phenomenological inquiry which, as will become apparent later in this paper, often seems to have its own holistic and quasi-“pathic” quality.

Expressive research Explanatory and narrative expressive approaches The expressive research approach discussed here is built on a distinction between expressive and explanatory approaches to research into human social practice. This is drawn from an distinction between the positivist or paradigmatic approach and the narrative approach, a distinction expounded in the work of

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Jerome Bruner (1990, 1991) in psychology and Peter Reason (Reason & Rowan, 1981; Reason, 1988) in social science research. Positivist (or what Bruner called paradigmatic) explanatory approaches to research, which are often used in empirical science when applied to things that come into human notice, tend to use analytic and causative explanations. The analytic explanation examines a phenomenon to see to which general categories it can be said to belong. It answers the question: what is it? The causative explanation looks at the impetus that caused the phenomenon to come into being. It seeks to answer the question: what caused it? These can easily be linked to the gnostic agenda described above. In contrast, the recently developed “narrative expressive” approach using some of the insights of phenomenology, and drawing on and modifying Bruner’s and Reason’s idea of human narrative knowledge, attempts to capture the livedness of human action by seeking to portray various phenomena rather than explain them. The frequent response of a person to whom the question is put (particularly in regard to some significant experience): what was it like for you? is to tell a story in some kind of interpretive speech in which the events, their actual experiences, and their meanings are all conveyed at the same time. The following quotation from Bruner (1990, p. 111), complete with his italics and referring to the work of Spence (1984), provides a little more about this so-called expressive and narrative approach. The “truth” that mattered, […] was not the historical truth but something he [Spence] chose to call the narrative truth. Such narrative truth, screen memory or fiction though it might be, succeeds if it fits the patient’s “real” story, if it somehow manages to capture within its code the patient’s real trouble.

Narrative research sets out to explore this so-called narrative truth, which refers to how events are construed in people’s life stories, rather than a historical or so-called factual account. Nar-

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rative research can appear in report form and expressive form. The report form seeks to provide an ordered account of the various meanings of one or another event or phenomenon. Expressive versions seek to provide a vivid portrayal of what such experiences or are actually like. The expressive text, informed by a phenomenological approach similar to van Manen’s approach mentioned above, attempts to hold the “researching eye” on the lived experience itself rather than giving much space for the meanings and embroiderings that experiences routinely receive from their narrative interpreters. Thus the expressive agenda seeks to provide a metaphorical answer to the question “what was it like?” and seeks to name the ”itness” of the specific experience under examination. But since, according to the phenomenological approach, specific experience cannot be objectified and detached from the person engaged in the experience, the question needs to be rephrased as: What was it like for you? This tends to mean that a person being interviewed about an experience and usually mixing factual, metaphorical, and interpretive readings, will often have to be invited to adopt a phenomenological stance and attempt to “show” rather than “tell” the lineaments of an experience. An example of how this might work is provided in the second section of this paper. Expressive narratives, in the meaning developed here, are not concerned to present all the narrative meanings an event had. They are charged to represent what an event was like as a lived experience, and require language that will somehow serve to make the experience present in its wholeness. Expressive representation needs accurate poetic and metaphorical language to provide a recognizable account of the lived experience. For this, verisimilitude rather than verifiability is required. An expressive narrative seeks to hold the attention of the listener not so much on the meanings that the event had for the narrator, but on the experience itself. It has to “get it right’,” and walks the knife edge that routinely surrounds and threatens aesthetic projects.

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With its strong influence from phenomenology, the expressive approach attempts to name direct experience as being concerned with what the philosopher Merleau-Ponty (1964, p. 14) calls “perception”: “Perception does not give me truths like geometry but presences.” The “presences” refer to the outcomes of being constantly in the world as part of it, of being awake and aware of the world in which, and of which, one is. Perceptual research seeks to portray these presences; to generate expressive, so-called “immediate” knowledge of the entity researched, seeking to “bracket out” received views and namings; to provide a vivid portrayal; and to represent phenomena as far as possible as lived, contextual experiences. Merleau-Ponty (1962) spoke of “existential coordinates” that were taken up by van Manen (1990, p. 103), who talks about lived body, and lived time, lived space and lived other. The more the inquiry seeks to engage the whole person of the one experiencing the phenomenon in order to provide an evocative and powerful representation of that experience, the more the inquiry can be seen to have a pathic rather than gnostic “feel” to it. Expressive forms of research are offered as a significant complement to the more common “explanatory” forms of research. Examples of expressive forms of social research have appeared in artistic and literary artifacts such as paintings, novels, poetry, cinema, and drama, and have generated considerable questioning from the side of social science (how can this be social science?) and from the side of aesthetics, (how can it be artistic?). Elliot Eisner (1993, 1997) and Tom Barone (Barone, 1995; Barone & Eisner, 1997) have worked systematically in this area, and a collection of essays was published in Australia on this topic (cf. Willis et al. 2000). One of the foundational points in underpinning the claim for the validity and usefulness of expressive textual genres is that by this strategy, significant elements of a phenomenon—in this case, the pathic knowing and communication of the nurse—are revealed. Since pathic acts are linked so strongly with the remoralization of the patient or client, then by providing a lifelike

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portrayal of what this action is like, the research has an ethical function in its capacity to bring into strong relief what may often be otherwise overlooked. It can also be said to have a prophetic function in that it can serve to confront readers with the lineaments and deep value of pathic action. We now turn to the second section of this chapter which is concerned with an imaginative way of exploring and revealing the pathic as experienced in nursing. Expressive research in action The following section of this chapter uses a multimedia approach to portray the pathic actions of a nurse looking after a patient. It uses a clip from a contemporary film, The English Patient, as a form of compressed phenomenological text. The clip presents powerful pathic encounters between the nurse and her patient, encounters that are used as a springboard for further explorations. The section is divided into six processes in and through which the pathic actions of the nurse are revealed. These are: the drumroll (or prelude), dramatic performance, depicting, distilling, drafting, and display. After a prelude characterizing the task as a whole, we provide a brief context for an episode in the film indicating the setting and how the nurse and her patient came to be there. It helps if readers have actually seen the film. Drama enactment (deamatic performance) refers to the playing of the specially chosen film clip. Once the clip is finished, depiction begins. One of the researchers plays the part of the nurse and another the interviewer or researcher. In the ensuing conversation, the interviewer asks the nurse, what was it like, and finally, how did you feel. The first question is really to place the informant back in the situation, helper her to move into narrative mode and to indicate her ‘”stake” in the event—her expectations, aspirations and fears. The second question is a specifically phenomenological question that invites

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the nurse to move the experience away from the subjective into an exploration of its so-called “itness.” The third question invites the nurse to express the subjectivity of her pathic encounter.

Portraying Pathic Action The prelude: Cuing the audience What we are going to do is take an episode of nursing practice illustrated through a film clip from the film The English Patient (drama), which many people have seen. The clip focuses on pathic acts in nursing, although gnostic elements remain in the background. One of the researchers takes the role of an interviewer. (I) The second plays the role of the nurse (N). The interviewer (I) will then interview the second researcher (N) playing the role of Hana asking her to tell the story in her own words, and then, prompted by her interviewer, to show in some way what this caring experience was like for her. Once aware of the phenomenological task, the researcher taking the role of the nurse (N) consciously tries to focus on picturing the experience itself rather than analyzing it. She tries to “show” rather than “tell.” We want to begin to build up a picture of the experience so that we can to use it to write an expressive piece that not only portrays the pathic acts of the nurse, but leads, through the vividness of the process, to a deeper awareness and appreciation of the pathic elements of the nursing experience. The written piece that follows, with its holistic and pathic overtones, is seeking to be faithful to the nurse’s experience as presented in the film clip.

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Dramatic performance: The film clip Background to the film clip The film clip portrays the caring experience of a resourceful and kindly nurse who volunteers to stay with a dying patient, blackened and tormented by severe burns, when the hospital convoy stops briefly at a partially bombed country house at Villa San Girolamo in Tuscany, Italy. For Hana the nurse, the caring job she has to do will test her resilience and inventiveness. Unlike her nursing work in the hospital, she will need to rely on her own resources to provide food and shelter for herself and her patient. In many other ways it will be less stressful, since there will be no more shelling and no more wounded soldiers brought in for treatment. This time she will be “specialing” one patient in great pain and without much hope of improvement. Her nursing will require strong and constant palliative care if the patient’s pain is to be eased and some basic comfort achieved. At the same time, she has to look out for basic necessities—food, water for drinking and washing—and hope that there will be no attacks. In this setting her nursing work is strongly pathic, and it is this dimensions that is foregrounded so strongly in the film. The film clips There are two parts to the clip. The first shows the patient installed in the villa and the nurse making the bed around him, seeking his cooperation in rolling onto his side so she could get the sheet under him. In response to his question: “Why are you so keen to keep me alive?” she replies: “Because I’m a nurse.” The second part of the clip shows Hana walking into the patient’s bedroom and, after responding to his question about noises outside, says that she has found a garden and a plum tree. She takes a bite of a plum she has brought in, removes the skin with her

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teeth, and places a morsel into the patient’s mouth. Her act prompts the response that the plum was a “very plummy plum.”

Constructing the expressive text Two researchers now take the role of Hana (N) and an interviewer (I). They seek to construct a multilayered reading and rereading of the lived experience of the pathic action of the nurse presented in the film clip, from depicting to distilling to drafting and display. Depicting: N retells Hana’s story I: Hi Hana. What happened in there? N: That badly burned patient I had been nursing in the ambulance truck was brought in by orderlies and placed on a bed in one of the less damaged rooms. They were as careful as they could be but I could see he was nearly out of it with the pain and the jolting on the truck. After they left, I set out to make the place livable and to get myself as clean and trouble free as possible. I checked the sickroom and used old books from the library to fill in spaces in the broken stairs to the sickroom so I could get in and out easily. I returned to attend to the patient who was lying on the bed with the sheets and supplies beside him. I brought pillows I had found from other rooms in the house and lifted his head gently to place them under him. I managed to get the undersheet onto the mattress with him lying on it by rolling him to one side and then the other while I spread the sheet out on the side he wasn’t on. Then I tucked the ends in under the mattress. All this time the patient was silent and stiff and seemed inattentive to what was happening to him. At one point when I was getting him to roll back, he said to me in a kind of wonder with his cultivated English voice “Why are you so de-

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termined to keep me alive?” I answered while I was leaning over him, holding him on his side so I could complete the arrangements of the bed, “Because I’m a nurse.” He didn’t ask anymore. Later on I brought him some plums I had found in the garden. Because he had trouble chewing, I bit off a piece and removed the skin and placed a small piece into his mouth. To my delight, he tasted and chewed almost in wonderment, and then said that it was a “very plummy” plum.

Distilling: Looking for the “itness” of the pathic experience I: What was that nursing moment like? N: It was about getting it right, an embrace, as if my music had found a resonating instrument; it was like being let into a special sunlit space in winter. I: Can you think back to how it appeared to you as a bodily experience N: It was the converting body, intimate experience. My nursing body holds him against me while I unroll the sheet. My nursing body experience is mobile going to immobile, warm to cold, accepting the beginning of softening, trust generating holding going to painful immobilized and in pain. It is busy and intimate; loving and distant. The plum goes from my mouth to his almost like a holy communion I: What was it like as a spatial experience? N: This nursing experience was centered on the patient lying in the bare room. As a spatial experience, nursing is coming in; going behind, moving under and lifting, covering and uncovering. It is like coming to him from many angles and focusing on him in all places in the room. I: What was it like as an experience in time? N: Nursing was like a powerful “now” that held my attention on him and his precarious condition. He could die any minute; nursing in this time was like each moment was the first and last.

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I: What was it like as a social relations experience? N: Nursing was like being more mother than sister; intensely intimate, but initiative-taking, waiting for response; body openness and no false modesty. Nursing was being openly, non-intrusively intimate. I: How did you feel? N: I felt really happy in my work, I felt needed. For me the experience was a chance to deal carefully with a patient living unto dying. I felt happy in a quiet way; I felt a surge of energy to work and make things happen for the patient. I felt this feeling while at the back of my heart—in my heart as “Hana” rather than “Nurse Hana.” The nurse has just told about an experience of an episode of pathic nursing, focusing on the “fullness” of the experience for her. In the research process, the nurse is interviewed in a certain way— not looking to discover her diagnostic capacities nor implicit class relationships or vested interests in the infrastructural arrangements and discourses, but looking for what was that pathic nursing like for her at that moment, in that event. The researcher tries to understand, evoke metaphor, come close to a distillation of what the experience was like and to portray the fragmented images of the experience of this episode of nursing in a readable living text. Drafting: Creating the expressive text The inquirer here needs to illustrate pathic artistry through the creation and manipulation of a representative text. Working a text—the scholarly craft of writing and rewriting—is a process whereby one human attempts to convey meaning, through the intersubjectivity of language, to another person about lifeworlds. We’ve attempted to write a distilled portrayal of Hana’s pathic experience and have begun to draft and redraft a text. This is what we’ve written—we’re not sure if we’ve got the best text yet, but this is where the inquiry has got to.

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Nursing in action At the villa, nursing appears to Hana as coming in close to her patient for comfort and healing, it is like being hit by small joys, cheerfully making and amplifying small happinesses. In the intimacies of her practiced and skillful nursing, it comes to her as feeling her touch “getting through.” This is the quintessential pathic hand. For her the nursing experience is like makeshift materials becoming perfect, like colluding in aliveness and cheerful courtesy. There are also those times when the nursing experience lifts for her so that it is like dancing beautifully with another human being under the music of her own orchestra, like defenses crumbling into peace. The communion of the plum is one such moment. For Hana, nursing is also like being alone and in charge, being alive and vivacious with the patient and feeling death. Nursing comes to her here as being close and distant, like being alone and appreciated in the world with one person and all the others only in relation to him. Nursing comes to her as resisting despair and fatigue—as holding back “worseness,” holding back the wave of horror. For Hana at this time, nursing comes as time slowed and freed from others’ time, being caught in time webs of slow healing and fast death. The normalizing conversations she shares with her cultivated and stoic patient while engaged in the routine nursing functions (feeding, washing, administering medication, etc.) are experienced like moments of enrichment and consolation. In a way, it is her experience of his courteous way of living in the present that helps her to do the same. Display: The portrayal project The writer is then challenged to find the most appropriate way to craft this in a readable expressive text. Such a text might be a poem, a painting, a dance—some form of expressive communication that takes readers back to and into, the lived experience

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of the pathic care of nursing. The researcher’s tool for a project such as this is not the surgeon’s analytic scalpel, but the poetic pen or artist’s brush, called upon to produce focused expressive work. Its quality is to be judged not by the more positivist canons of validity and reliability, but by its degree of verisimilitude and integrity. In some ways the film itself represented Hana’s lived experience tacitly through framing various contextualized moments. The shot of the two of them munching quietly on their shared plum is such a moment. The following poem is another example of the use of a more textualized literary genre—a short poem attempting to reveal essential elements of the nurse’s lived pathic experience: Nursing My arms know what to do, Hold you up as you turn in pain on the clean, rough sheet I spread out for you. I watch you let go, Feel my work take hold As you surrender, yield back on the pillows I found for you. I bite a piece from the plum I found, Separate skin from pulp in my mouth, then take and place a piece between your wounded lips. You chew and taste, commend The plum’s plumminess. I watch you as we eat together.

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Out of your sight, I weep my own pain; And then I hear you moving, lift my head, move lightly, smiling to your need.

Conclusion Readers staying with the agenda of this chapter can ask themselves to what extent the poem carrieds and evokes the pathic dimension of the nurse’s work. Phenomenological expressive writing of this kind has to be highly aesthetic, highly crafted. Portrayal is an artistic work of verbal and textual expression. It takes a long time to “work” or “craft” a phenomenological text. It is not sometimes dashed off in a single draft—not a soft option. One could be forgiven for asking if it is a useful research tool. Why do phenomenological research at all? Is it too hard? What is its contribution to useful knowledge? Further reflection drawing from such a portrayal of the pathic dimension of nursing can lead to a strong gut-level understanding of its personal and professional demands. For some it may draw them into transformative learning and vocational preparedness. Others can be equally dissuaded. Insofar as expressive research sets out to provide a vivid portrayal of a phenomenon, there has to be a certain objectifying distance in order to keep attention on the “itness” of the experience in all its lived dimensions. It is in approaches like this that the full spectrum of pathic and gnostic processes can be revealed and noticed.

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References Barone, T. & Eisner, E. (1997). Arts based educational research. In Complementary methods for research in education. Ed. R. M. Jaeger. 2nd ed. Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association, 73–98. Barone, T. (1995). The purposes of arts-based educational research. International Journal of Educational Research 23(2), 169–180. Bruner, J. (1990). Acts of meaning. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Bruner, J. (1991). The narrative construction of reality. Critical Inquiry 18(1), 1–21 Edson, M. 1999. Wit. New York: Dramatists Play Service. Eisner, E. W. (1993). Forms of understanding and the future of educational research. Educational Researcher 22(7), 5–11 Eisner, E. W. (1997). The problems and perils of alternative forms of data representation. Educational Researcher 26(6), 4–20 Frank, A. (2001). Between the ride and the story: Illness and remoralization. In Ethnographically speaking: Autoethnography, literature, and the story: Illness and remoralization. Ed. A. Bochner & C. Ellis. Lanham, MD: Alta Mira Press, 357–369. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception [1945]. Trans. Colin Smith. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1964). The primacy of perception and its philosophical consequences. In The primacy of perception and other essays. Ed. J. M. Edie. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University press, 12–42. Reason, P., ed. (1988) Human inquiry in action: Developments in new paradigm research. London: Sage. Reason, P., ed. (1994). Participation in human inquiry. London: Sage. Reason, P. & Rowan, J., eds. (1981). Human inquiry: A sourcebook for new paradigm research. New York: J. Wiley. Spence, D. (1984). Narrative truth and historical truth: Meaning and interpretation in psychoanalysis. New York: W. W. Norton. van Manen, M. (1990). Researching lived experience: Human science for an action sensitive pedagogy. London, Ontario: Althouse Press. van Manen, M. (1999). The pathic nature of inquiry and nursing. In Nursing and the experience of illness: Phenomenology in practice.Ed. I. Madjar & J. Walton. Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 17–35.

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Willis, P., Smith, B., & Collins, E. (2000). Being, seeking, telling: Expressive approaches to adult education research. Flaxton, Queensland: Post Pressed. Film The English Patient (1996). Directed by A. Minghella; produced by S. Zaentz; distributed by Miramax.

Phenomenology as a Theoretical Perspective

Holism and the Human Sciences Christopher M. Aanstoos Abstract: A holistic vision can provide a coherent foundation for psychology as a human science, in ways that are timely and urgent. These holistic ideas, however, are not themselves new, but the legacy of twenty-five centuries of humanistic thought in Western intellectual history. Such thinking has had three major “waves” or periods when it has crested, deeply influencing its times: ancient Greece, the Renaissance, and the late 20th century. This chapter retrieves the conceptual bases of those waves, then proposes how such holistic foundations can be a source of deep purposefulness for the future of the human sciences.

Prologue I am convinced that holism is the timely defining idea for the future, not merely of humanistic psychology, but of all the human sciences, and really for the future of humanity, faced with the now acute dilemmas that are our heritage of centuries of dualistic thinking. I will return to that premise at the end of this chapter, but indicate a brief orientation to it now. I have been actively involved with the Human Science Research Conference since 1984, and have closely observed, and even helped shape, its development during that time. I published an article in 1987 summarizing the wide range of methods in evidence at the Human Science Research Conference (Aanstoos, 1987). During the 1980s, we were a young group, and it seemed wise to “let a hundred flowers bloom” seeking innovation, even if divergent. Indeed, the main convergent tendency was simply that we were all willing to stand under a banner that said “human science”

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(Aanstoos, 1984). But now, twenty years later, it seems an appropriate occasion to raise the question of whether there are core ideas that we cohere around, and if so, what are they. I think that as any approach matures, this is an appropriate self-inquiry. But I also think it is especially so for us, on account of the fact that we have not made the sort of progress within the mainstream of our disciplines that we had imagined twenty years ago we would have made by now. Yes, of course there has been some progress. Qualitative methods are now more acceptable across the pedagogical, health, and social sciences than they used to be. But let’s be honest: they continue to be a small minority, struggling to find a place in graduate programs, funding agencies, and major journals. Such lack of progress can, of course, be seen as due to many factors, not least of which has to do with the resistance by the dominant traditions rather than anything we have or have not done. Nevertheless, and perhaps even especially because this is the case, it seems to me that we ought to be really pressing to discern and articulate just what our core ideas are: what is it that we have to offer? Twenty years ago, I thought that our findings would be able to speak for themselves, illuminating our comparative advantage that would lead to a greater acceptance of human science. But our continued marginalization now leads me to conclude instead that we need something more than findings to effect the sort of paradigm shift we seek. I am convinced that we do share a core vision of holism, in contrast to the dominant vision of dualism. And I am convinced that this vision is a very special asset for advances in the human sciences, and, as I’ve already claimed, for humanity in our times. Let me prepare to justify that claim by first recollecting how holism has guided humanistic thought through history. A historical overview can help us better comprehend our own conceptual foundations and the dynamic of our own trajectory. Such a task requires a long-term perspective, for humanism has

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been an underlying tradition in Western thought for a very long time. However, for most of Western history it has been the “counter-tradition” to other mainstream viewpoints, whether these have originated in religion or natural science. But there have been “peak periods” in which the “wave” of humanistic thought crests and becomes especially manifest. There have been three such periods: the first occurred around 600–300 b.c.e. in ancient Greece; the second happened from around 1300 to 1600 in the European Renaissance; and the third began in the 1960s in the United States. I would like to summarize each next.

Being and Logos: The Greek roots of humanism Let us first consider the wave of humanism from ancient Greece. Here we encounter the first sense of how humanistic thought was founded on a holistic view, such that the profound Greek grasp of the meaning, fate, and destiny of being human was grounded within an even more encompassing context. To the ancient Greeks, the experience of wholeness was very palpable. Each thing was seen in relation to the whole. As Anaxagoras said, “Everything has a share in everything” (in Cahill, 2003, p. 148). The temple, for example, was not perceived as an independent entity, but sited in relation to the land, the hill, the sky, and the sea (Hamilton, 1930, pp. 221–248). Individual actions were seen nested within their larger, fateful historical context. Even the transient and the eternal wrapped round one another like a Möbius loop. Mind and spirit, the manifest and the hidden, the finite and the infinite, the human and the divine, go together! Indeed, heaven, and earth were not yet rent asunder. Gods and goddesses lived nearby, had human forms, and consorted with human friends and rivals. And the voices of the gods and goddesses were heard everywhere, in the babbling of the brook, in the sound of the wind, in the swaying of the tree (von Hildebrand, 1966). As Hesiod wrote in his Theogony, earth and

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sky were originally one. To the great Pre-Socratic philosophers, this vision of a unified whole guided their questioning about the nature of reality, about the nature of Being itself. They knew this was no merely analytic exercise, in which the whole is to be taken apart and then reassembled so as to discover what it is made of. No! They knew to approach the whole in terms that would be appropriate. Their approach was wonder and play. Their aim was to know. Their methods were oracular, visionary, lyrical, mythical, epic, dramatic. A standard for scholars looking for the flowering of Greek thought, is to focus on the “classical” period, the “golden age” of Athens roughly 500-–300 b.c.e., and especially on the major philosophers—Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle—supplemented by the major dramatists, Sophocles, Euripides, and Aeschylus. And this approach does indeed yield much valuable fruit at the hands of skilled classicists such as Hamilton (1930). But I think that Heidegger’s (1975; Seidel, 1964) insight about the significance of earlier Greek thinking is even more crucial for our inquiry into the holistic roots of humanism. For what Heidegger found is that these earlier Greek philosophers understood the human in relation to a very deep grasp of wholeness. His examination of the preSocratics raises crucial themes of holism at a profound ontological level, themes that laid the foundations both for the dominant intellectual traditions of Western thought and for the humanistic counter-tradition (Heidegger, 1992; Heidegger & Fink, 1979). This prior start needs to be better understood. So let us seek this holistic vision by searching earlier, farther back into the ancient Greek roots of Western humanism. From the start, Being presenced as a whole. For Thales, the first philosopher (7th Century b.c.e.), there was no fundamental distinction between mortality and immortality—all things are alive, all are full of gods, and the gods are blended with all things. For his follower, Anaximander (6th century b.c.e.), this transcendent unity was infinite and boundless. He called it the

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apeiron. But it was for the next two generations, those of Heraclitus and Parmenides, that this wholeness of reality would be articulated. For them, it was clear that reality, as Physis, or Being, presences. This presencing, this original laying down of meaning, this primordial Logos, is the very upsurging itself. As Heraclitus said, according to the Logos, One is All. Or as Parmenides said, Physis and Logos are one—the laying down and the gathering of meaning (Heidegger, 1975; Wheelright, 1966). And we who gather meaning, we are the place of this concealment/unconcealment, the very Logos-ing of Being. Yes! For the Greeks, Being itself presences! And we are capable of knowing Being, of knowing what it means to be. That is our human potential and our human responsibility –our destiny, and the destiny of Being itself. For with this presencing of Being, says Heraclitus, “the fateful occurs: One unifying All” (Heidegger, 1975, p. 75). This is obviously holism in the very big sense of that word—human/Being as an ontological whole. But it is also quite a riddle to our contemporary ears. And it was not easy for the ancient Greeks either! For, ultimately, as Heidegger points out, their effort to articulate this presencing of Being, this very coming-forth-into-appearance of Being, lent itself to a basic misunderstanding, one which, over time, gradually rent that unified whole. Over the three centuries from Thales to Aristotle, the effort to articulate this presencing came more and more to take the form of a twofold: “the presencing” itself and “that which presences” through such presencing. Over time, “that which presences” came more and more to resemble “beings”— that is, objects, entities, separate things. And the “presencing” itself became a more and more abstract notion. Plato was the last to try to hold together the creative tension of this twofold, but his already dualistic sense of it led directly to his student Aristotle’s simple reversal of his teacher’s idealistic view of it into an empirical one. A fateful fissuring of Being ensued, a legacy that, in the hands of the subsequent Roman-Hebraic-Christian syn-

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thesis, became the seedling of the dualistic Western tradition. As Heidegger wrote, “the lightning abruptly vanished. No one held onto its streak of light and the nearness of what it illuminated” (Heidegger, 1975, p. 78).

 enaissance humanitas: R The irreducibility of human experience But of course, this heritage was not really lost forever. Rather, it lay dormant, beneath a medieval cosmology that very sharply divided earth from heaven, this life and the next, the temporal from the eternal, the true faith from the damned. Wholeness waited for a re-awakening, a renaissance. This occurred in Italy in the 14th century and spread through Europe, deeply infusing the Western tradition, for a while, with a reinvigorated sense of humanism. And once again, this sense of humanism had a taproot in a profoundly holistic vision. Many different influences sparked this renaissance, from the bubonic plague to the new mobility of money. But most of all it was the impact of ancient Greek texts that inspired a new generation of thinkers and artists. The artifacts and ruins of GrecoRoman antiquity had lain buried for a millennium in virtually every farmer’s field in Italy, but with the discovery and faithful translation of original texts by a small band of humanist thinkers, a renewal in our conception of ourselves was launched, an enlarged conception, one that reintegrated the “voiceless zone” (Hale, 1993) of that previous medieval era. These new voices included: women—who could now be scholars, orators, poets, politicians; “the heart”—in contrast to the abstract Scholastic tradition whose mental gymnastics had nothing to contribute to real life; and “the pagan”—those pre- and non-Christian scholars whose texts now came into prominence once more. A new vision was emerging: the world itself came to be seen, not as the Devil’s playground of temptation and sin, but as

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enchanted. Likewise, the human was understood not as a hopelessly befouled creature, but a worthy emanation of the divine. Human and world possessed a divine spark (Tarnas, 1991). Perhaps the clearest example of Renaissance humanism was Pico della Mirandola’s Oration on the Dignity of Man. He argued that the greatness of human being is our freedom to choose our own way, and that can we attain this ambition responsibly through knowledge and love. He then grounded this claim in scriptural sources from the New Testament, then from the Old, and then from pre-Christian sources, Greek and Asian. His tour de force, synthesizing the worlds of Christianity and antiquity, set a clear tone for the holistic aims of the Renaissance. What medieval theology had rent asunder, man was now putting back together, bringing the contrapuntal, the paradoxical into an enlarged whole. This humanistic vision was an antidote to the medieval dualism, and proceeded with a “determined decompartmentalization” (Tarnas, 1991, p. 230). Painting lends us many fine examples. Early on, Botticelli’s two most famous paintings, The Birth of Venus and Primavera brought together the Christian and pagan. But perhaps Raphael’s School of Athens will best exemplify this point. Commissioned by the Pope, and painted as a fresco on the wall of the Stanza della Signatora, the room in the Vatican where the pope signed key documents, it faced on the opposite wall his fresco Disputa del Sacramento—a vision of the glories of the Christian church through an assemblage of dozens of its historical and biblical figures. To face this august religious assembly, Raphael now chose to paint “the glorification of philosophy”: half a hundred figures summing up rich centuries of Greek thought, and all gathered in an immortal moment under the coffered arch of a massive pagan portico ... Plato ... Aristotle ... Socrates ... Pythagorus ... Heraclitus ... Diogenes ... Archimedes ... Ptolemy ... Zoroaster ... all in all, such a parliament of wisdom had never been painted, perhaps never been conceived before. And not a word about heresy, no philosophers burned

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at the stake here; here, under the protection of a Pope too great to fuss about the difference between one error and another, the young Christian has suddenly brought all these pagans together, painted them in their own character and with remarkable understanding and sympathy, and placed them where the theologians could see them and exchange fallibilities, and where the Pope, between one document and another, might contemplate the co-operative process and creation of human thought. This painting and the Disputa are the ideal of the Renaissance— pagan antiquity and Christian faith living together in one room and in harmony. (Durant, 1953, pp. 459–460)

But in contrast to the theological, the humanistic viewpoint does not have a similarly univocal legitimating authority. This is surely not only a weakness, but also its source of innovativeness and range of topics (Bullock, 1985)—namely, the whole human experience. As the great French Renaissance scholar, Montaigne, pointed out, everything we know comes through our experience, and so the key is to be fully human, to cultivate our actual experience. Modernism and postmodernism have both incorrectly identified the Renaissance with the maxim that “man is the measure of all things” (see, e.g., Barnes, 1937). But that maxim (actually derived from Protagoras) is a decisive mis-characterization of the true Renaissance project: namely, that the proper study of mankind is man (from a poem by Alexander Pope in 1870 and linked to the Renaissance by many, e.g., Durant, 1953). Emphasizing this primacy of experience, the humanists of the Renaissance redirected the focus from the abstract metaphysical questions of medieval Scholasticism to the practical concerns of actual life: “the art of living.” As Petrarch, an early Renaissance humanist, argued, people have a right to concern themselves with their actual human life, to enjoy an open delight in the here and now, to augment its beauties, and to seek fulfillment in it (Barzun, 2000; Durant, 1953). Writers provided books of advice on good living, such as Marsilio Ficino, whose contribution, The Book of Life, recommended sleeping well, not

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repressing sexual desire, and laughing and being merry as often as one can. They brought philosophy back down to earth by reintroducing the old Greek question of how to live a good life. But what, exactly, does it mean to “live a good life”? For the humanists of the Renaissance, this question involved much more than mere frivolity or good-natured conduct. They understood that people are embedded within a world. Their answer to this question was that one lives a good life by an active involvement in the world and that men and women, through education (as paidea—the old Greek sense of education), could sharpen and use their curiosity, their imagination, their will, their creative and free power to transform themselves and to affect their fate and aspire to the highest excellence. The key to the good life was to develop one’s capacity for awareness. But awareness of what? Ultimately, of one’s self and of one’s situation, one’s context, one’s relation to the world. To wake up, to become aware, for them, meant understanding these world-relations. Regarding one’s self, the depth and complexity of one’s own consciousness became a key discovery. A telling example of this insight came through the development of the new use of perspective in Renaissance art. Alberti systematized the theory of perspective that Brunelleschi had begun But perhaps the best illustration of the use of perspective can be seen in the bronze cast panels on the doors on the Baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence, sculpted by Lorenzo Ghiberti. These magnificent panels offered a revolutionary new vision, in two respects. First, through the use of innovative techniques in gradation of relief, a sense of perspective is achieved, so that the standpoint of the beholder is implicated, thus achieving in bronze casting the effect newly developed by Renaissance painters. Furthermore, what the viewer is invited to stand in relation to is also unprecedented. In contrast to previous pictorial relief work, in which solitary figures were immersed in a hazy and vague atmosphere, an undefined and indefinable space, these

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panels portrayed not merely isolated figures, but astonishingly complete situations, including their background. The narrative complexity of each panel was far more comprehensive and coherent than anything previously envisaged. In these ways, Renaissance art disclosed the humanistic conception of people existing within the world of their involvements, rather than as detached figures lacking any intrinsic relatedness. This same grasp of our human situatedness was also being utilized in architecture. Palladio’s buildings are still masterpieces for their excellence in this regard, such as his La Rotonda and the Villa Poiana near Vincenza, and the Basilica in Venice. By placing the person in the world, humans acquire an awareness not only of the world, but of themselves as participants in this world. This holistic grasp of self, this conscious self-awareness is the basis for the Renaissance call to fulfill the potential of human being. Hickey calls Palladio’s house “a house undivided” and credits Palladio with “the science of happiness.” He adds: An aura of sweet self-consciousness [...] less critical or ironic than joyfully self-aware [...] rescues his buildings from the vice of pretension by the simple stratagem of not pretending [...]. Palladio is never impersonating classical architecture, he is performing it [...] the real benison of Palladio’s performances is the good-natured permission they grant us to take the stage he has provided and perform with commensurate self-conscious elegance. (Hickey, 2003, p. 69)

So human experience is accorded its full due as awakened conscious being-in-the-world, and is accorded its due as the proper study of mankind, a study that synthesizes its philosophical interest in the profound meaning of being human with the practical affairs of everyday life. This Renaissance impetus may be best exemplified by Leonardo da Vinci’s masterpiece: the Mona Lisa. Here is Durant’s description of da Vinci’s “engaging merger of painting and philosophy”:

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This, then, is the face that launched a thousand reams upon a sea of ink. Not an unusually lovely face [...]. It is her smile that has made her fortune through the centuries ... What is she smiling at? The efforts of the musicians to entertain her? The leisurely diligence of an artist who paints her through a thousand days and never makes an end? Or is it not just Mona Lisa smiling, but woman, all women, saying to all men: “Poor impassioned lovers! A Nature blindly commanding continuance burns your nerves with an absurd hunger for our flesh, softens your brains with a quite unreasonable idealization of our charms, lifts you to lyrics that subside with consummation—all that you may be precipitated into parentage! Could anything be more ridiculous? But we too are snared; we women pay a heavier price than you for your infatuation. And yet, sweet fools, it is pleasant to be desired, and life is redeemed when we are loved.” (1953, p. 212)

“Sweet fools,” she smiled. Yes, when we embrace the whole of Being, it is good, and all foibles are forgiven. As with the Greek spirit of “play,” so too the Renaissance placed its value on “all consuming laughter.” But as Kundera (1996) has pointed out, humor, play, laughter signify much more than mere mirth. Something deeper is being brought forth—a relation to the world in which dogmas are relativized, presuppositions called into question, and self-importance deflated by implying alternative possibilities. “Laughter is the instrument of detachment; it breaks down the spiritual rigidity that seeks to clutch at its values as if they were so many coins hoarded by a miser” (Barrett, 1972, p. 204). Renaissance humanists were “urbane and lusty spirits ... who feed and live on this legacy of mental freedom, esthetic sensitivity, embracing its joys of sense, mind, and soul; and hearing ever in their hearts, amid hymns of hate and above the cannon’s roar” (Durant, 1953, p. 728), an all-embracing ode to joy.

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 e Ascendency of the scientific attitude: Th Excluded knowledge and the humanistic critique This Renaissance spirit spread north from Italy, through much of Europe. France, Holland, and England were particularly imbued. We can recall Erasmus’s quirky and brave In Praise of Folly, a mischievous satire against orthodoxy. Or we can turn to Rembrandt’s work—for example, his magnificent painting The Night Watch—to gather an illustration of the power of seeing people within their engaged world-relations. In contrast to previous group portraiture, wherein the people merely stood still, Rembrandt’s painting captures them in the moment, in action, moving about the nighttime streets of the town, on duty. The effect was a startling revolution in vision. But the Renaissance did not survive the violent reactions to the schism within Christendom that followed the Protestant Reformation. When the humanist ruler of France, Henry IV, who had sought to institutionalize multidenominational tolerance, was assassinated by a religious fanatic, the hopes of the Renaissance were eclipsed by a continent-wide plunge into sectarian religious warfare, the infamous Thirty Years War. It became a generation-long slaughter, ultimately decimating central Europe as effectively as had the Black Death of the plague. Positions hardened with the battle lines, orthodoxy was reestablished, and the deviant were driven into silence. Sin and guilt became paramount once again, along with the compulsory darkened confessional box. Women covered themselves, and chastity once more replaced ecstasy. But the slaughter went on, and on, and on, as the Catholic and Protestant sides were relatively evenly matched. And so millions were massacred, in the name of religion. It finally ended when, under the cynical tutelage of Cardinal Richelieu, Catholic France switched sides and fought with the Protestant faction to defeat the Catholic empire of Austria, to attain the preeminence of the major land power on the continent. All in the name of religion.

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From that catastrophe, intellectuals recoiled in horror at the corruption of the authority of religion, and rushed to put together another basis for legitimation, an authority that could not be so cynically corrupted. Science, of course, was their alternative. And the next two generations, from Descartes to Newton, built an edifice of certainty based on science as the legitimating authority (Toulmin, 1992). But this science derived its authority from an epistemology of dualism and a metaphysics of mechanistic causality. Newton’s science of nature was not about the world of human experience but only the world of “brute” matter (Burtt, 1932). However, this approach, promising the desperately sought for certainty, was quickly adopted not only for physics, but for all the human studies. For example, the British empiricists saw the mind as likewise governed by “laws of association,” and in the next century the search was on for the “elements” of consciousness, analogous to the periodic table of elements from chemistry. Modernity dawned, not as a continuation of the Renaissance (as is sometimes mistakenly assumed by postmodernists, e.g., Kvale, 1990), but as its repudiation.

Contemporary humanistic psychology in the United States And for the next three hundred years, this view of science dominated inquiry into human experience as well as into nature. When, in the late 19th century, the various social sciences established themselves independently from philosophy, they very selfconsciously proclaimed their adherence to this standard of science. Indeed, as the recently converted so often do, they strove even to out-orthodox the orthodox—hence the long sterility of modern psychology, locked into a dualistic conception of its own subject matter. But its long search for the “laws of mental life” proved barren, epitomized by the reign of behaviorism through the mid–20th century.

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Finally, as part of a larger shift in the Zeitgeist, a reform movement emerged within European and American psychology. Inspired by previous developments in existential-phenomenological philosophy, psychologists on both sides of the Atlantic began to revision the basic presuppositions of elementism and mechanism, and a new wave of humanistic thought emerged. Key figures included Binswanger, Boss, van den Berg, and Laing from Europe, and May, Rogers, Maslow, and Giorgi in the United States. This was a very loosely emerging movement, with no sole leader, so there were many different lines of development. But guiding and pervading this movement was a sense of valuing the human as a whole. One of its early and most prominent advocates, Rollo May, even characterized it in 1958 as “the endeavor to understand man by cutting below the cleavage between subject and object which has bedeviled Western thought and science since shortly after the Renaissance” (May, 1958, p. 11). This depiction was entirely in line with the thrust of phenomenological philosophy, of which Merleau-Ponty wrote: “the chief gain from phenomenology is to have united extreme subjectivism and extreme objectivism in the notion of the world” (Merleau-Ponty, 1962, p. xix). Likewise, Beauvoir (1945, p. 363) said: One of the immense merits of phenomenology consists in having restored to man the right to an authentic existence by abolishing the opposition between subject and object. It is impossible to define an object while cutting it off from the subject by which and for which it is an object. And the subject reveals itself only through the objects in which it engages itself. Such an affirmation merely makes explicit the content of our naive experience. but it is rich in consequences... Hence it is of extreme importance to establish solidly and to restore to man that child-like audacity which his years of verbal docility have deprived him: the audacity to say “Here I am.”

For this audience, I am sure I do not need to further demonstrate this holistic taproot contributed by phenomenology to

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contemporary human science. Rather, I would now like to emphasize how relevant and timely holism is as we move toward the future of the human sciences.

The impact of a holistic vision So I will close by considering some of the prospective benefits from a holistic vision. I had indicated in my introduction that it was urgent for our times. There are many areas in which we could demonstrate that claim, but in the interests of brevity I want to focus our attention on four crises in which this is particularly so: the medical, the social, the spiritual, and the ecological. Holistic health Despite enormous and ever increasing expenditures, health care in this country is in a state of seemingly intractable crises. Immunities weaken while bacteria become resistant, fitness declines while obesity increases, cancer is epidemic while toxins proliferate, and the population consumes ever larger amounts of Prozac in the face of an epidemic of depression. And worldwide we find “rising incidence and prevalence of psychosomatic diseases, mental disorders, anxiety and neurosis” (Lambo, 2000, p. 114). The old “medical model” seems unable to comprehend or respond adequately to the new challenges we face, precisely because they do not conform to the old, mechanistic view of the body and disease. In the past twenty years, however, humanistic psychologists such as Achterberg (1985), Borysenko (1988), and Criswell (2001) have been developing a “holistic” approach, in the sense of a “mind/body” holism. Such developments have already demonstrated many significant concrete results, such as the healing potential of imagery, counseling, meditation, and yoga on lifethreatening illnesses, from heart disease to cancer. The next step is to comprehend the even larger whole: beyond one’s own mind/

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body is the wider relationship of person/world, most clearly manifest through the immune system, and approached through the emerging field of pscyhoneuroimmunology. And the powerful impact of an even more comprehensively holistic vision on health is only now beginning, as we start to study nonlocal and transpersonal impacts on healing (Dossey, 1999). Globalization and its discontents As technology weaves its world wide web, the planet has become smaller than ever. Transnational corporations now exercise tremendous power everywhere, as capital has become so incredibly mobile that a country’s currency can be withered overnight. The resultant acceleration in the pace of economic development has disrupted Indigenous economies and cultures, forcing upon them within a single generation the changes Western cultures took the previous three centuries to transition. The serious crises generated by rapid globalization have accrued because thinking and planning on this issue has tended to be too short term and too fragmented. The contextual interrelationships woven within an Indigenous culture (such a local farming techniques for this particular region, rather than a generic chemical-based agribusiness) have been ignored or simply overlooked (Diaz-LaPlante, 2007; Norbert-Hodge, 1991), leading to increasing divisiveness between young/old, urban/rural, and different ethnic and religious groups. These differences are not endemic, but have been exacerbated by economic tumult. It is the humanistic vision of holism that can redress this neglected awareness, and thus humanize this wrenching shift of globalization. A spiritual emergence Mainline religions have become less meaningful and people drift increasingly toward fundamentalism, or substance abuse,

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driven by a spiritual hunger the modern era knows no way of satisfying. The loss of meaning, or anomie, has been the haunting side effect of the most materialistically abundant century in the history of humanity. Our culture now pays entertainers far more than thinkers, as distraction and escape become ever more paramount goals. As the distinction between religion and spirituality is increasingly recognized by humanistic psychologists (e.g., Elkins, 1998), the value of a holistic vision of spirituality is now becoming more evident. Contemplative, meditative, and mindfulness traditions are now being deployed in many arenas, from chronic pain (Kabat-Zinn, 1994) to psychotherapy (Epstein, 1995; Welwood, 2000) to living everyday life more fully (Kornfield, 2000; Walsh, 1999), while other scholars are striving to build a psychology fully integrative with spirituality (e.g., Wilber, 1995, 2000). Questions of meaning and the ultimate purpose of one’s life simply cannot be drowned out by television and antidepressants. They must eventually be addressed by a holistic psychology uniquely positioned to serve the spiritual well-being of the next generation. The ecological crisis Daily we are now confronted by clues of looming ecological disasters: the polar ice caps are melting as we live through the hottest decade on record, penguins are washing up on shores a thousand miles off their traditional migratory path as even the ocean currents have been shifted to that extent, the accumulation of greenhouse gases has changed global climate and weather extremes become ever more commonplace, the air is poisonous smog, the rain is acid, the ozone is depleted; the land is deforested and oxygen endangered, deserts are growing and topsoil lost, groundwater is contaminated; and mountains of nuclear waste will remain radioactive until the sun burns out. A “deep ecology” movement (e.g., Naess, 1986) has increasingly been

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coalescing around the basic vision of radical interconnectedness. The utter compatibility of this movement with the humanistic vision is just now being comprehended, and an emerging subfield of ecopsychology is being born. Metzner (1999, p. 2) urges psychology to undergo a “fundamental […] revision that would take the ecological context of human life into account.” Pilisuk & Joy (2001, p. 107) note that ecological and humanistic thought converge in challenging the basic assumption of a mechanistic worldview. Roberts (1998) and Roszak, Gomes, & Kanner (1995) provide that subfield with a variety of practices aimed at restoring the earth and healing the mind.

Conclusion To conclude, holism is no merely current fad. It is the deepest taproot of our civilization, and the gift of 2500 years of humanism. As the philosophical heirs to this legacy, the contemporary human sciences have the opportunity, and responsibility, of bringing this vision of wholeness to fulfillment—precisely when it is most needed. References Aanstoos, C. M. (1984). A reflection on the foundational themes of the conference. Paper presented at the Human Science Research Conference, Carrollton, GA. Aanstoos, C. M. (1987). A comparative survey of human science psychologies. Methods 1(2), 1–36. Achterberg, J. (1985). Imagery in healing. Boston: Shambhala. Barnes, H. (1937). From the renaissance through the eighteenth century. Vol. 2 of An intellectual and cultural history of the Western world. New York: Dover. Barrett, W. (1972). Time of need: Forms of imagination in the twentieth century. New York: Harper.

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Barzun, J. (2000). From dawn to decadence: Five hundred years of Western cultural life. New York: Harper Collins. Beauvoir, S. de (1945). La Phénoménologie de la perception de Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Les Temps Modernes 1, 363. Borysenko, J. (1988). Minding the body, mending the mind. New York: Bantam Books. Bullock, A. (1985). The humanist tradition in the West. New York: W. W. Norton. Burtt, E. A. (1932). The metaphysical foundations of modern science. Rev. ed. New York: Anchor Books. Cahill, T. (2003). Sailing the wine dark sea: Why the Greeks matter. New York: Doubleday. Criswell, E. (2001). Humanistic psychology and mind/body medicine. In The handbook of humanistic psychology. Ed. K. Schneider, J. Bugental, & J. Pierson. London: Sage, 581–591. Diaz-LaPlante, J. (2007). Humanistic psychology and social transformation: Building the path toward a livable today and a just tomorrow. Journal of Humanistic Psychology 47, 54–72. Dossey, L. (1999). Reinventing medicine: Beyond mind/body to a new era of healing. New York: HarperCollins. Durant, W. (1953). The Renaissance: A history of civilization in Italy from 1304 to 1576 A.D. Vol. 5 of The story of civilization. New York: Simon & Schuster. Elkins, D. (1998). Beyond religion: A personal program for building a spiritual life outside the walls of traditional religion. Wheaton, IL: Quest. Epstein, M. (1995). Thoughts without a thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist perspective. New York: Basic Book. Hale, J. (1993). The civilization of Europe in the Renaissance. New York: Knopf. Hamilton, E. (1930). The Greek way. New York: W. W. Norton. Heidegger, M. (1975). Early Greek thinking [1950–1967]. Trans. D. Krell & F. Capuzzi. San Francisco: HarperCollins. Heidegger, M. (1992). Parmenides [1982]. Trans. A. Schuwer & R. Rojcewicz. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Heidegger, M., & Fink, E. (1979). Heraclitus seminar [1970]. Trans. C. Seibert. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. Hickey, D. (2003). A house undivided: Andrea Palladio and the science of happiness. Harpers, April, 57–69.

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Kabat-Zinn, J. (1994). Wherever you go, there you are. New York: Hyperion. Kornfield, J. (2000). After the ecstasy, the laundry: How the heart grows wise on the spiritual path. New York: Bantam Books. Kundera, M. (1996). Book of laughter and forgetting. New York: HarperPerennial. Kvale, S. (1990). Postmodern psychology: A contradicto in adjecto? The Humanistic Psychologist 18, 35–54. Lambo, A. (2000). Constraints on world medical and health progress. In One world: The health and survival of the human species in the 21st century. Ed. R. Lanza. Santa Fe: Health Press. May, R, Angel, E., & Ellenberger, H., eds. (1958). Existence: A new dimension in psychiatry and psychology. New York: Basic Books, 3–36. Merleau-Ponty, M. (1962). Phenomenology of perception [1945]. Trans. C. Smith. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Metzner, R. (1999). Green psychology: Transforming our relationship to the earth. Rochester, VT: Park Street. Naess, A. (1986). The deep ecology movement. Philosophical Inquiry 8, 10–13. Norbert-Hodge, H. (1991). Ancient futures: Learning from Ladakh. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books. Pilisuk, M., & Joy, M. (2001). Humanistic psychology and ecology. In The handbook of humanistic psychology. Ed. K. Schneider, J. Bugental, & J. Pierson. London: Sage, 101–114. Roberts, E., ed. (1998). Humanistic Psychology and Ecopsychology. (Special issue of The Humanistic Psychologist 26, 1–3. Roszak, T., Gomes, M., & Kanner, A., eds. (1995). Ecopsychology. San Francisco: Sierra Club Books. Seidel, G. J. (1964). Martin Heidegger and the pre-Socratics. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. Tarnas, R. (1991). The passion of the Western mind. New York: Ballantine Books. Toulmin, S. (1992). Cosmopolis: The hidden agenda of modernity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Von Hildebrand, A., ed. (1966). Greek culture: The adventure of the human spirit. New York: Braziller. Walsh, R. (1999). Essential spirituality. New York: J. Wiley.

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Welwood, J. (2000). Toward a psychology of awakening: Buddhism, psychotherapy, and the path of personal and spiritual transformation. Boston: Shambhala. Wheelwright, P., ed. (1966). The presocratics. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Wilber, K. (1995). Sex, ecology, spirituality. Boston: Shambhala. Wilber, K. (2000). Integral psychology: Consciousness, spirit, psychology, therapy. Boston: Shambhala.

Going through Postmodernity with the Phenomenology of Life Daniela Verducci Abstract:

Friedrich Nietzsche was the first to propose overcoming nihilism by going through it instead of opposing it. He intended to recover human creativity and put it to work, not as arbitrary and evasive imagination, but in its full engagement with life, in such a way as to exploit life’s quality of spontaneous autoproduction—a quality he had brought to light anew. Husserl and Scheler assumed such reference to life as well; thus their reflection was phenomenological, that is, essentially based on living experiences. But it was only in the 1960s that Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka dis­ covered that there is a corporeal-conscious experience that pre­ cedes and sustains constituting consciousness, de-absolutizing it and placing it in an intimate relationship with the world of life. With the phenomenology provided by life, Tymieniecka proceeds beyond the essential givenness of the constitutive genesis of objectivity searching out instead its “inner working as the locus whence eidos and fact simultaneously spring.” Which amounts to saying that not constitutive intentionality, but the constructive advance of life which carries it may alone reveal to us the first principle of all things” (Tymieniecka,1986, p. 3). In this way, a new horizon of meaning is opened, that enables human beings to realize the vital “countermovement,” evoked by Nietzsche leading them through nihilism and toward a new existential positivity.

Post modernity and the human sciences The advent of so-called postmodernity1 and the end of the modern claim to confer unified meaning on reality through the Reflection on the fundamental characteristics of the contemporary world was inaugurated by the French thinker J. F. Lyotard (1925–1998), who became famous throughout the world for having set out the guidelines for the current era in La condition postmoderne: Rapport sur le savoir (1979). For a comprehensive examination of the phenomenon of postmodernity, cf. Chiurazzi, 2002. 1

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efficacious action of an agent-principle—the “subject,” to use Hegelian terms1—has in the blink of an eye cast us into the strange environment of a unilateral technological objectivity, hyperpervasive and continually de-/re-constructing itself. In this environment, we still are not able to embark upon reflective journeys that might finally focus on the fundamental question, all too elusive to modernity, of the overall and common meaning of being and thinking (cf. Bontadini, 1952), a meaning lost and never again recovered after the affirmation of the theory of “double truth” espoused by post-Thomist voluntarism.2 And this is not all, for we have run aground on the shoals of the paralyzing logic of “all or nothing,” that Husserl portrayed as the dualism of transcendental subjectivism and naturalistic objectivism.3 Thus since the modern subject has shown itself to be so inadequate in responding to the current question about meaning that by now we deem it nothing short of inconsistent, we believe we have no other alternative than to cast ourselves outward into the nothingness of subjectivity, forgetting that (at least according to Nietzsche) our primitive forebears named themselves with the word “man,” meaning “he who measures,”4 they sought to highlight what seemed to them man’s best and most unique property: namely, the ability to institute a mediation between apparently incommensurable entities in such a way as to draw them into the horizon of their own knowledge 1 Hegel, 1965, §5: “In my view—a view which the developed exposition of the system itself can alone justify—everything depends on grasping and expressing the ultimate truth not as Substance but as Subject as well.” Cf. http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/ph/phconten.htm 2 This outlook was present in the historiographic hermeneutics of Windelband, 1892. 3 See Husserl, 1970, §11, entitled: “Dualism as the reason for the incomprehensibility of the problems of reason; as presupposition of the specialization of the sciences; as foundation of naturalistic psychology”; cf. also Cambi, 2007, p. 17. 4 F. Nietzsche, Menschliches, Allzumenschliches II, in 1967, Der Wanderer und sein Schatten, §21.

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and action, and make them the basis for congruous finalizing decisions and effective realizations. Besides, Nietzsche had foreseen precisely this paralysis as the almost certain corollary of the anthropological situation of the 20th and 21st century: with the advent of nihilism, “an interpretation has faded away; but since it was in force as the interpretation, it seems as though existence no longer has any meaning, that everything is in vain (umsonst).”1 This unilateral thought of “existence, just as it is, without meaning and purpose” seems to us postmoderns “the most scientific of all possible hypotheses,” since “we deny final purposes” in obedience to the positive consideration that “if existence had one [a purpose], it would already be attained.”2 All this has had dire fallout on the so-called human sciences, which arose precisely from the premise that the scientific method established in the sphere of the natural sciences could be applied to their object of study, the human being. The postmodern crisis of subjectivity, in fact, has meant in the human sciences the increasingly looming risk of treating the human—beginning with the humanity of the one practicing human sciences—inappropriately, preciesly by no longer being able to grasp the features of subjectivity that characterize the human (cf. Armezzani, 1998, 2002, 2004). Oscillating between the two epistemologically inadequate extremes of treating the object of inquiry either with the distance proper to the physical-natural sciences or with the closeness that belongs only to lived human relations, the human sciences have therefore become incapable of introducing a congruous measure of their own. In his Prague lectures, Husserl denounced, “the tragic failure of naturalistic modern psychology,” pointing out that its implosion into psychologism led to the disavowal of the “enigma of subjectivity,” of “the emergence of a set of world-enigmas which 1 2

F. Nietzsche,1974, §4. Ibid., §6.

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were unknown to earlier times” (Husserl, 1970, p. 5). For this reason, even in the crisis of the modern symbolic system that had vexed them so surely, the human sciences, having come onto the scene of mature modernity with so much toil,1 still struggle in the postmodern era to find a methodical gauge that will enable them to proceed in cognitive, educative, and clinical research and practice in a way that is neither anthropologically reduced nor anthropologically impoverished. In fact, the young Scheler had acutely revealed that the methodical dissection to which scientific psychology had subjected the complex of psychological faculties (Seelenvermögen), had transformed the soul, which until then was a rigorously organized construction, into a sum of processes (eine Summe von Vorgängen) and events (Ereignissen) that, as “fluid volontaristic formations” (fliessende voluntaristische Gebilde), interacted reciprocally and joined together in a totally autonomous way, independently of any “unitary psychological essence” (in einem einheitlichen Seelenwesen), upon which to converge as the point of their intimate co-belonging.2

The Transvaluation of the human being Nietzsche, on the other hand, had clearly grasped that psychology, far from resolving the human question, represented instead the new “way that leads to the fundamental problems.”3 In fact, from “psychological observation” conducted under the guidance of the French moralizts and the work of his friend Paul 1 We well know that in his Essay concerning human understanding (1690), Locke only imagines what can happen to a blind person as s/he recover his/her sight; he analyzes the human mind by reasoning and observing, but never experimented. Kant also denies, in 1786, the possibility of a scientific psychology (cf. Kant, 1911, p. 471). Comte erased at all psychology from his system of sciences and divided its field of investigation among physiology and sociology (cf. Comte, 1969, pp. 34–37, and « Tableau Synoptique,” p. 1).  2 Scheler, 1971a, p. 12; see also Verducci, 2005, p. 96. 3 Nietzsche, 1968b, I, 23.

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Rée,1 Nietzsche had seen the emergence in the soul, in addition to the reassuring self-preservational pulsion, of a “propulsive force” (treibende Kraft) that pushes every living being to “become something more” (um mehr zu werden).2 For this reason, he had even gone so far as to consider psychology the science bearing “the morphology and evolutive theory of the will to power”3. But with the entrance into circulation of this Nietzschean idea, and the related anthropological conception of the superman, it is no longer to the human being’s advantage to be “all too human,” 4 and the Pindaric motto to “become what you are,” 5 which had seemed to contain the entire trajectory of human formation with the forms of knowledge related to it, now does not seem up to the task of mastering the anthropological vicissitudes currently exceeding the limits of any kind of well-known humanism. Today it is no longer possible for us to orient ourselves formatively, limiting ourselves to articulating and developing a paradigm of humanity, known and shared in its essentiality, as in the case of the Greek paideia (cf. Jaeger, 1959) or of the animal rationale of the Latin tradition (cf. Heidegger, 1976)! Peter Sloterdijk, recently in the limelight because of his 1999 talk, “Rules for the Human Park: A Response to Heidegger’s Letter on Humanism,”6 also holds that “humanistic anthropotechnique,” from which humankind as we know it derives in its historic humanitas, has by now become entirely inadequate. Founded 1 Nietzsche, Menschliches, Allzu menschliches I, 1967, §36. In other quotes there appear the names of Charron, Pascal, Montaigne, La Rochefoucault, La Bruyère, Fontenelle, Vauvenargues, and Chamfort. 2 Nietzsche, 1964, fragment 688. 3 Nietzsche, 1986b, I, 23. 4 Nietzsche, Menschliches, Allzu menschliches I, in Nietzsche,1967, §224. 5 Nietzsche, 1969, pp. 253-372. We are using the translation available online at: Ecce homo. How One Becomes What One Is, in: http://www.geocities. com/thenietzschechannel, which is compiled from translations by W. Kaufmann, R. J. Hollingdale, and A. M. Ludovici. 6 Regeln für den Menschenpark. Ein Antwortschreiben zum Brief über den Humanismus—die Elmauer Rede, Die Zeit, 38(1999), now in Sloterdijk, 2001, ch. 6.

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on the complex biopolitics of house, human, and domestic animal, one of its preferred techniques of domestication was school training, which could be summarized in the trinomial imperative to read, sit still, and calm down. For this reason, the humanistically educated person finds it almost impossible to resolve the conflict underway in our culture between inhibiting media directed at mass literacy and the uninhibiting media such as television and violent films.1 In fact, what is needed in the contemporary phase of Western culture, in which “the supreme values lose their worth, the purpose is missing, the response to the question ‘Why?’ is missing,”2 is to promote in human beings the activation of the capacity for transcending and surpassing themselves that Nietzsche showed to belong to their nature3 and that the most recent philosophical anthropology has confirmed4—a capacity for transcendence, however, that does not anchor them to any stable idea of themselves, but instead continually pushes hem beyond themselves doing nothing else than positioning them before the ever new challenges that history sets before them. Thus postmodernity has seen that the self-consciousness of the Western human being has been transformed. Humankind no longer conceives of itself as anchored to a substantial and static 1 See the Italian translation of Sloterdijk’s talks, Regole per il parco umano. Una replica alla lettera di Heidegger sull’umanismo, aut-aut 301/30( 2001), pp. 127, 132, 137; cf. also the interview conducted by Heik Afheld and Bernd Ulrich, which appeared in Der Tagspiel online (8 March 2001). 2 Nietzsche, 1964, fragment 2. 3 Cf. Nietzsche, 1968a; (here citing the T. Common translation): “I teach you the Superman. Man is something that is to be surpassed” (Prologue, §3); in addition: “what is lovable in man is that he is an over-going and a down-going” (Prologue, §4). 4 We refer first of all to M. Scheler, A. Gehlen, and H. Plessner, the protagonists of the so-called “anthropological shift” that occurred in the 1920s. They promoted ideas of humankind that highlighted its capacity for transcendence, in comparison to other living beings—above all animals—that are lacking in it. In fact, the human being is presented as essentially weltoffen characterized by an exzentrische Position (Plessner, 1926); or finally understood as Mängelwesen (Gehlen, 1978).

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nature; at the same time, however, human beings acutely feel the lack of a unitary idea of themselves, one in which they can comprehend and put to work the principle legacies to which they are the heirs: the Judeo-Christian tradition, the Greek tradition, and recent scientific thought on natural evolution (Scheler, 1975a, p. 7). In no era of history has humanity been so enigmatic to itself (ibid.), so much so that we find ourselves agreeing with Scheler and Nietzsche when they acknowledge that whatever might restore the unity that humankind has lost can only be set in the future—in the unity of a common goal, in a task to be set for the multiform and variegated natural human essence (Scheler, 1987, pp. 49–50). The essential quality of human nature has in effect moved from the substantial level to the moral one, and today we feel we can glimpse the manifestation of this quality in the fact of being the still open decision about what the human being wants to be wants to become.” 1 As the Polish sociologist Zygmunt Baumann observed in a recent little volume, Liquid Life (2005, ch. 1), the only nucleus of identity surely destined to emerge unharmed, and perhaps even strengthened by the continual change, is that of the homo eligens—”the one who chooses,” but not “the one who chose”!—a stably unstable “I,” completely incomplete, definitively indefinite, and authentically unauthentic. But for the current state of anthropological self-consciousness to generate itself and transmit a renewed sense of its own humanity that, empowering the practitioners of the human sciences and reinvigorating their self-consciousness, also revivifies anthropological knowledge, all this is not enough: still something more is required.

Genetic anthropotechnique In this sense, increasing consensus is being awarded to the hypothesis of replacing humanistic anthropotechnique, prisoner of the inhibition-uninhibition dynamic of the medias, with a 1

Scheler, 1975b, p. 150. Cf. also Verducci, 2003, pp. 87–96; 2002.

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genetic project of raising and domesticating the human being. In fact, modern scientific laboratories are gestating a new anthropotechnique that will make any other kind of education superfluous. Bringing to completion German Iiealism’s philosophy of nature as exemplified in the early Schelling,1 the ambition of this genetic anthropotechnique is to allow the human species to subvert the fatalism of birth and, through explicit social planning of the genetic characteristics believed to be the most functional, to attain optional birth and prenatal selection that will bring to light only suitable human individuals, that is, those that are psychologically and physically in conformity with the development planned by the human collectivity. This disquieting scenario is set forth by Sloterdijk (2001, ch. 6), according to whom critical thought cannot avoid dealing with the current success of a growing technical capacity of production of nature as such, in its inorganic and organic aspects and, within the latter, in its vegetative and animal aspects. In effect, one is led to ask: if humanistic anthropotechnique, which had its origins in an intact patrimony of humanity, has led—because of the unilateral use of the biopolitical complex of house, domestic animal, and human—to the present impoverishment of the human, producing only a sedentary little man,2 incapable of any self-transcendence whatsoever, falling back upon domesticated animality, then what reduction of humanity will ensue if we apply genetic anthropotechniques, based as they are on preventive selection that curtails humankind’s genetic patrimony? Sloterdijk notes that, all things considered, in this case as in the previous one, man would end up being calibrated in accordance with their animality. But he quickly adds that the use of eugenics will place us in the presence of a monstrous animality, in which “the monster will be a mirror of our form.” 3 Cf. the interview with Sloterdijk, conducted by Heik Afheld and Bernd Ulrich, which appeared in Der Tagespiel on line on 8 March 2001. 2 Nietzsche, 1968a, “The Bedwarfing Virtue ,” Part III, ch. 49. 3 Cf. the interview to Sloterdijk, op. cit. 1

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For that matter, Nietzsche had already affirmed—in an entirely original way compared to geneticists of his time such as Francis Galton,1 that in order to promote the empowerment of the human, selective technical interventions should not be utilized, even though they derived from a science of heredity that observed the lines of development of the factors of cultural superiority in order to reproduce them artificially. So it was quite clear to Nietzsche that the human is promoted with the human, because technical stratagems, even the most advanced, always operate exclusively on the level of the causal dynamics proper to biological evolution, and are unable to reproduce that endogenous “spontaneity of conception,” also underlined by William James, from which humans draw the capacity to organize their experience in an unusual and peculiar way, transcending themselves and qualifying as “superman.”2 Nietzsche’s “superior type” does not derive at all from simple genetics, but from “cultural genetics” that delivers the human being from the deterministic dynamics proper to psychological and physical evolution and instead consigns humans to the exercise of the will. “My concern,” says Nietzsche, “is not to establish what can take the place of man, but what kind of man must be chosen, wanted, raised as species of superior value.”3 For this reason, the “conditions of birth and preservation” of the type of the superman, even though different from that of the average man, 4 presuppose the existence of the latter. In fact, it is precisely the adaptive movement of the species that, channelling all energies into a continuum streamlined for typological determination, guarantees the minimum expenditure and maximum It was J. Paneth who gave Nietzsche F. Galton’s Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development (London, Macmillam, 1883); cf. Fornari, 2004. 2 Cf. Franzese, 2000, pp. 19–63. Perhaps Nietzsche had read the essay by W. James (1861) on “Great Men and Their Environment” in its French translation in Critique philosophique (Jan.–Feb. 1881)—see Campioni, 2001, p. 32. 3 Nietzsche, 1977, pp. 6, 42. 4 Nietzsche, 1970, pp. 128–129. 1

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capitalization of these energies: from such an original accumulation of forces the superman draws benefit, using it to break evolutive continuity and “to invent his superior form of being.”1 In the light of this, therefore, not even the discovery of autopoiesis as the dynamic structure identifying the individuality of living beings (Maturana & Varela, 1980, 1992) can be considered sufficient to establish a modality of education of man for human beings that is suitable for promoting humanity and thus establishes itself as radically innovative, inasmuch as it is no longer exclusively directed at developing human beings within the limits of their being-given, but devoted above all to cultivating the specific attitude of humans to set their own goals for themselves as Herder (1966) and Bolk (1926) have observed. In fact, even though Maturana and Varela gained for all living beings spaces of relative autonomy within the biological determinism of the species, they still remain prisoners of a reductionistic anthropological hermeneutics that claims to comprehend the human being’s humanity itself in a single comprehensive poietics that hosts on the autopoietic level the living beings capable of producing themselves, and gathers on the allopoietic level all the other devices/mechanisms whose functioning produces something different from themselves (Maturana & Varela, 1972). It is not by chance that the autopoietic structure of the living being discovered by Maturana and Varela constitutes the foundation of the systemic paradigm in the social sciences theorized by Luhmann(1984, 1986). In this paradigm, society is represented as an organizm that lives and reproduces itself according to an autopoietic schema by which each system spontaneously and automatically generates subsystems, which in turn proliferate, giving rise to the social entirety, which thus qualifies as an accumulation of reproductive systems and is not itself the carrier of substantial new developments. 1 Ibid., 9 [17] and 10 [17]. In this regard, cf. Campioni, 1993, pp. 161– 196; Richter, 2001; Moore, 2002.

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Making the human grow with philosophy Thus the attempt to transvalue the human by disengaging from traditional anthropotechnique still does not seem to be crowned with success. The recourse to techniques of genetic selection to improve the human actually seems to lead a highly reductionistic paradigm that yields no superman, but only a humanity further impoverished in its capacity of transcendence. Sloterdijk, as well as Maturana and Varela, remain—notwithstanding their undeniable merit in having brought to light the points of effective crisis facing traditional humanistic education— well below the ambitious goal they had perhaps set for themselves, namely, to open new paths to the formation of humankind in response to the need to surpass what Nietzsche had called the “all too human,”1 when he prophesied the overcoming of nihilism. In fact, neither reference to technique nor accommodation of the biologistic-vital level seem sufficiently to valorize the component of creativity, which represents the proprium of humans, who, unique in the universe, are able to bring themselves beyond themselves, and successfully face the challenges that continually arise in history, the latest of which is the development of biomedical technologies and their application to human life. For that matter, it is only through this innate creativity exponentially potentiated and potentiable in the relationship with their kind,2 that the human living being—the beings most defective from the biological and evolutionary point of view, inasmuch as they are the least adapted at their birth—have been able to bring about, in their life and that of the entire cosmos, the unimaginable development of civilization that the nihilistic disease impedes us from enjoying fully and developing adequately. Thus the issue is to recover human creativity 1 It seems to us that despite their differences, both Derrida (2002) and Agamben (2002) have already undertaken this path. 2 Cf. “anthropological ultrasociality” as the indispensible vehicle explaining the lightning-quick cognitive evolution of human primates, identified in Tomasello, 1999.

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and put it to work, not as postmodern arbitrary and evasive imagination,1 but as fully geared into life, in such a way as to exploit life’s quality of spontaneous autoproduction and elevate it to the human poietic level, which does not stop at reproducing being, but can promote it beyond all expectations. This is the point where it is absolutely necessary to engage in a work of radical metaphysical reelaboration: it is necessary once again to employ the philosophical method of the search for the first principle of all things, covering the field of being no longer just in its ideal internality, which embraces all-that-is, but also, and above all, in its concrete articulation as historically unfolding itself. This will involve accepting a positive comparison with the challenge of comprehension that each-new-being, that appears on the horizon flings at philosophical speculation: we must succeed in philosophically thinking in such a way as to validate the results of the inquiry only in the presence of principles that are likewise living forces. Without tarrying to destroy the history of ontology (Heidegger, 1977, §6), the task at hand is to transform traditional ontology, which is static and lacks a future, into a thought of being, that succeeds in grasping its intrinsic interpenetration with becoming. This must happen in such a way that metaphysics is transformed from being the locus of the dogmatic immobility of meaning, by now in disintegration, and becomes the arena in which the integration of being and becoming is realized, expanding continually to permeate every ontological level. In fact, if now humans conceive of themselves as “a rope over an abyss,” “a bridge and not a goal,”2 as beings whose nature consists in “becoming” Regarding the value of creativity in the realizative and economic sphere, a lively debate is underway in the online magazine, «Cato Unbound», between R. Florida, author of the best-seller, The rise of the creative class and how it’s transforming work, leisure, community and everyday life, New York, Basic Books, 2002, and R. Hanson, an expert in “Idea Futures.” Cf.: R. Hanson, Idea Futures. How making wagers on the future can make it happen faster, in: WIRED, Issue 3.09, Sept. 1995. A section was quoted in the 30 August 1995 Wall Street Journal. 2 Nietzsche, 1968a, Prologue, §4. 1

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what they are, then the primary urgency before the new anthropological condition is to attempt a reflective journey whose destination is to open a new horizon of being that makes those metaphors positively meaningful, enabling the rope not to plunge into the abyss, enabling the bridge to reach its goal, enabling becoming to acquire the consistency of being without losing its own dynamism. In the face of the loss of the European humanistic inheritance that Heidegger interpreted as the destruction of the idea of humanitas (cf. Heidegger, 1976), one can in fact try to establish that “countermovement” (Gegenbewegung) that Nietzsche had discovered as the modality for crossing throughthe nihilism produced by the unilateral triumph in Europe of the Judeo-Platonic-Christian paradigm, a countermovement applied to contain the fear of life and thus to start off that “transvaluation of all values,”1 that Nietzsche heralded so many times but never made operative. Only by gaining such a further, mobile horizon of meaning can one hope to conserve and promote humanity, without which not even the so-called human sciences can have a future. In fact, human life has become “liquid,” to use Baumann’s apt expression, indicating the characteristic of modern society where the situations in which humans act are modified before their way of acting can consolidate into habits and procedures(Baumann, 2005, Introduction). Thus, the nuclei of meaningful experiences are rapidly thwarted and the action of fixing traditional cognitive and ethical categories is ineffective. Baumann suggests updating education, developing it in the same way as the evolution of ballistic weapons: in trench war, missiles could have a fixed trajectory established at the beginning, but now that they are employed against a mobile adversary, they have become intelligent missiles, capable of changing direction during flight according to the changes of circumstances, perceiving instantaneously the movements of the targets, obtaining the information 1

Nietzsche, 1964, Preface, §4.

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necessary to ascertain the targets’ final direction and velocity, and extrapolating from this information the exact point where their respective trajectories will meet. Nay, continues Baumann, even more intelligent missiles will be able to choose their targets after they are launched, guided by an evaluation of the greatest possible result, based on their own technical capacities and on the potential targets that they have the best chance of hitting; thus there will be a sort of overturning of instrumental rationality because now, the means available will decide which objective is chosen (ibid., ch. 6). In plain terms, it is thus a matter of rethinking the acquisition and administration of scientific and scholarly knowledge with an eye to the current need for education that makes women and men more profoundly human, so humanly creative in the interpretation, instant by instant, of their own individual and social existence that they will be able to grasp in the unpredictability of circumstances the best way to hit the target of a fully realized human life, even in the progressive dissolution of the various frameworks developed over time. In the past, attempts were made to face this social need for creativity by assuming exclusively reductionistic attitudes, such as the fight to the death against so-called notionism (nozionismo, implying education focused on concepts and information) or the emphasis on “methodologism.” Now we realize that this response has taken away from the young generations substantial parts of the cognitive patrimony that had been accumulated by preceding generations and that was theirs by right; in addition, it has hidden from us the road of a living education, one nurtured by human experiences in flesh and blood, the only experiences that—penetrating as deep as the living material, in physiologicis, as Nietzsche said1—succeed in prompting to life-tran­s­forming action. At this point, then, not only should we take up again the tradition of the cultural, cognitive, ethical, and technological patrimony that previous generations have accumulated, but we 1

Nietzsche, 1969, “Why I am so clever,” 2.

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also ought to take care that this transmission be shared through the personal mediation of “masters,” so that while the categorical, cognitive and ethical structures continually dissolve, there is an equally continuous possibility of drawing from the flow of creative human life into which each person who comes into the world is grafted and from which each can draw the personal inventions/ discoveries of the modalities needed in order to face the new and unpredictable situations that continually present themselves. But in order for all this to come to realization in education, wishes, advice, or orders are not enough. A new vision of philosophia prima is needed, one that opens out to a broader horizon of being in which all the new developments of postmodernity, including the neoanthropology of beyond-man, can position and develop themselves in synergy.

From metaphysics to metaontopoiesis Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka has succeeded in setting herself at the heart of the issue of transvaluation. She was not content with the philosophical gains of the first and second generation classic phenomenologists of the realistic tendency. They limited their speculation to the level of essential givenness, assured by the constitutive genesis of objectivity, while she proceeded beyond in order to find the point of contact between consciousness and the vital and creative “inner workings” striving toward constitution. She wanted to arrive at the “the locus whence eidos and fact simultaneously spring,” at the juncture of human experience from which logos and life branch out, in the conviction that “not constitutive intentionality, but the constructive advance of life which carries it may alone reveal to us the first principles of all things” (Tymieniecka, 1986, p. 3). From this position Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka was able to show that the creative function that presides over the evolution of life, determining its growing specialization and complexity,

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finds its culminating expression in the stage of development in which the human being appears, the living being endowed with Imaginatio Creatrix. “The creative function, guided by its own telos, generates the Imaginatio Creatrix in man, as the means par excellence of specific human freedom: that is, freedom to go beyond the framework of the lifeworld, the freedom of man to surpass himself ” (Tymieniecka, 1988, pp. 25–26). Therefore, when life attains the level of the human creative condition, it no longer stops at reproducing itself; instead in the acts of the life of human beings it always interprets itself in existence, giving rise to forms of life that are not only new and previously unimaginable, but also congruent and adequate to the becoming being of life, of which humans alone possess the cipher (see Tymieniecka, 1998). For this reason, humans are radically the carriers of the metaphysical exigency: to make the virtualities in their possession into positive realizations, they need both to find the reasons of “beingness” and to avail themselves of the principle of being through which they can confer on creations the indispensable character of humanly adequate “objective” form that makes them graspable and usable. Of crucial importance at this point is the fact that being, spontaneously put into play in this way, does not limit itself to maintaining the signification of “indispensable essential factor of all beingness,” in the sense of classical metaphysics, that is, inasmuch as it “concerns beingness in its finished, formed, established or stabilized state.” Rather, in the measure in which it appears in the acts of the human living being, being manifests itself as “the intrinsic factor of the constructive process of individual becomings.” This means that since “becoming is a process in its own advance, in qualification,” and since “the individual remains always in the process of becoming,” that is, continually proceeding toward what is not yet, then being—engaged in the creative acts from which becoming proceeds—acts as the intrinsic stabilizing forerunner of the acquisition and transformation of form that

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characterizes the natural evolution of individual life. In this sense, compared to all the other givennesses, that of humans within their world is not simply comparable to a process, but expresses a specific type of “constructivism,” which furthermore does not reduce itself to what it develops during life. The human being does not operate just as a “meaning-bestowing-agent” and producer of the lifeworld, as Husserl proposed. Instead, humans begin first to “create according to being” (= ontopoiesis) because “his [man’s] very life in itself is the effect of his self-individualization in existence through inventive self-interpretation of his most intimate moves of life” (Tymieniecka, 1988, pp. 4–5). For this reason, cognition and the intentional network of its highest manifestations could not discover the origin of the order that humans prescribe for the lifeworld and for their social world: such factors must be integrated with the essential modalities with which the human being both delineates the enactment of the course of life and actually enacts it. The guiding factor of the progress of life, in fact, lies in its enactment: even cognition is designed for such enaction, and the very principles of the emergence of cognition and of its nature function toward the performance of this enaction. Moreover, in the reality of experience, there is no solution of continuity between the two operative series, and while human individuals determine the course of their lives, formulating and enacting reactions, deliberations, selections, choices, imaginative inventions, plans, etc., they realize their self-interpretationin-existence, mixing the use of the apparatus of enactment of life and that of cognition for the common purpose of accomplishing “the essential work of life-meaning establishment.”1 Thus it is revealed that the creative act of man is the prototype of the 1 R. Eucken (1899) as well exhorted his contemporaries to battle for the goal of conferring a meaning on life, but his appeal was almost entirely ignored. Only Max Scheler, his student in Jena, declared that he drew from that work the starting idea for his 1899 essay, “Arbeit und Ethik” (1971b), where his reflection on work began.

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action capable of sparking off the progress of life. As in a crucial device, here the enactment of life and the cognitive function of the human being are rooted, and “the entire span of man’s questioning emerges in its full extent with a pristine appearance in which all the lines of life’s assumed progress gather in order to receive their significance” (Tymieniecka, 1988, p. 7). The new ontopoietic outlook on life that gathers being and becoming in the human creative condition is being delineated, and Tymieniecka can conclude: “I call it [the becoming of life], going back to Aristotle’s Poetics, a ‘poietic’ process: onto-poietic. In brief, the self-individualization of life is an ontopoietic process.”1 Then she can add: Thus, man’s elementary condition—the same one which Husserl and Ingarden have attempted in vain to break through to, by stretching the expanse of his intentional bonds as well as by having recourse to pre-reduced scientific data—appears to be one of blind nature’s elements, and yet at the same time, this element shows itself to have virtualities for individualization at the vital level and, what is more, for a specifically human individualization. These latter virtualities we could label the “subliminal spontaneity” (Tymieniecka, 1988, p. 28)

Kronegger & Tymieniecka, 1996), p. 15. Here is the text: “‘Onto-’ refers here to the ‘firstness’ of this process with respect to the scale of existential formation. Before this schema’s articulations there is no beingness that we may ascertain with the criteria of our minds—which are attuned precisely to this and no other reality. ‘Onto-’ here also means the indispensable and universal character of whatever there could be in the ‘objective’ form proper to human reality in the sense of the classical metaphysics of ‘onto-’ logos, that is, ontology. However, and this is of crucial significance for the understanding of our vision, this indispensable essential factor of all beingness does not concern beingness in its finished, formed, established or stabilized state; it is the intrinsic factor of the constructive process of individual becoming. The individual remains always in the process of becoming. It acquires form and transforms it. ‘Becoming’ is ‘becoming something that is not yet.’ Becoming is a process in its own advance, in qualification.” 1

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In her fourth, most recent and monumental publication of the “Logos and Life” series, entitled Impetus and Equipoise in the LifeStrategies of Reason, Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka identifies philosophy as the eminent discipline for the procedure of ontologicalmetaphysical going beyond. In fact, through the course of history, we have seen that the semantic system of language cannot determine what a given philosophical inquiry aims at, since any new insight or fresh flight of creative imagination would disrupt the semantic logic of the system in the effort to reach further areas (Tymieniecka, 2000, p. 3).

Philosophical procedure demands that the system assumed at the beginning of the inquiry must inevitably be transformed or replaced by another emerging one. On the other hand, not even “the givenness of life,” the manifestation of which extends to multiple spheres of meaning, can adequately be led by any procedure of philosophical inquiry to disclose itself and be more clearly comprehended. Finally, we are by now aware of the fact that neither rigorously rational rules or logical interconnections, nor schematizations employed in the language of every rational discourse, can ever adequately evaluate and grasp “the vast sweep of the significant modalities entering into and interplaying in the vertiginous outburst of unfolding forces in the ongoing gigantic play of the manifestation of beingness” or reveal “all the fragments, sequences, segments of complete constructive processes subject to disruption by unforeseeable conditions and influences.” None of the so-called philosophical methods are appropriate to the numerous modalities of the real (ibid.), and thus one must concede postmodernism’s statement that in philosophy no approach can claim absolute validity compared to the others. However, we are duty bound in our situation—one in which we aspire to get to “the bottom of things,” “the source of truth,” “the spring of reason that carries on the great streaming edifice of life”—to perform a “twist” of thought on experience, enabling

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us to consider any “insight” falling ”within our purview.” This is therefore how conscious reflection reacquires life as its own context, “the vertiginous wealth of emerging, unfolding, transformation, degeneration—the vast spectrum of the dynamic fluctuations.” And philosophical discourse abandons “the stereo­typical language of so-called ‘scholarly’ discourse that would ape science but be merely pseudo-scientific” in order to replace it with the “sequential ‘therefore’ order of writing,” with an approach that is suitable for living life, that “streams in all directions and will at any point refract its modalities and their apparatus into innumerable rays that flow concurrently onward” and therefore requests the enactment of “all modes of human functioning, all human involvement in the orbit of life” (ibid., p. 4). Phenomenological givenness is experiencing an impressive growth: it no longer corresponds just to “cognitive processes of the human mind,” but to the “inward givenness of the life progress common to all living beings as such,” specifying itself as “the modality of a role fulfilled within the constructive process.” It is in this way that philosophical thought can embrace the opportunity “to disentangle and grasp life’s patterns,” for “it is only in a direct, immediate insight into the constructivism of life and its coincidence with our own constructivism that we may expect to disentangle and grasp life’s patterns” (ibid., pp. 4–5). From here we can see the beginning of a different philosophical modality, meta-onto-poietic, that measures itself against the becoming of life without renouncing the principle of being and that valorizes the anthropological capacity of transcendence even while maintaining a rigorous horizon of immanence. Taking on and developing this speculation, we may be able to think anew about education so it will be capable of empowering our humanity to the point that it can compete with the most intelligent of Baumann’s intelligent missiles. Translated by Sheila Beatty

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References Agamben, G. (2001). L’aperto: L’uomo e l’animale. Torino: Bollati Boringhieri. Armezzani, M. (1998). L’enigma dell’ovvio: La psicologia di Husserl come fondamento di un’altra psicologia. Padova: Unipress. Armezzani, M. (2002). Esperienza e significato nelle scienze psicologiche: Naturalismo, fenomenologia, costruttivismo. Roma-Bari: Laterza. Armezzani, M., ed. (2004). In prima persona: La prospettiva costruttivistica nella ricerca psicologica. Milano: Il Saggiatore. Baumann, Z. (2005). Liquid life. Cambridge: Polity Press. Bolk, L. (1926). Das Problem der Menschenwerdung. Jena: Fischer. Bontadini, G. (1952). Indagini di struttura sul gnoseologismo moderno. I. Berkeley, Leibniz, Hume, Kant. Brescia: La Scuola. Cambi, F., ed. (2007). Soggetto e persona: Statuto formativo e modelli attuali. Roma: Carocci. Campioni, G. (1993). Sulla strada di Nietzsche. Pisa: ETS. Campioni, G. (2001). Les lectures françaises de Nietzsche. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Chiurazzi, G. (2002). Il post-moderno. Milano: Bruno Mondadori. Comte, A. (1969). Cours de philosophie positive [1830]. Bruxelles: Culture et Civilisation. Derrida, J. (2002). E se l’animale rispondesse (finte e tracce). aut aut 310–311, 4–26. Eucken, R. (1899). Der Kampf um einen geistigen Lebensinhalt. Lipsia. Florida, R. (2002). The rise of the creative class and how it’s transforming work, leisure, community, and everyday life. New York: Basic Books. Fornari, M. C. (2004). Superuomo ed evoluzione. In Nietzsche e la provocazione del superuomo: Per un’etica della misura. Ed. F. Totaro. Roma: Carocci, 49–53. Franzese, S. (2000). L’uomo indeterminato: Saggio su William James. Roma: D’Anselmi. Gehlen, A. (1978). Der Mensch. Seine Natur und seine Stellung in der Welt. Wiesbaden: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft Athenaion. Hanson, R. (1995). Idea futures: How making wagers on the future can make it happen faster. Wired, Sept. (issue 3.09). Hegel, G. F. W. (1965). The phenomenology of mind [excerpts]. Trans. & ed. W. Kaufmann. In Hegel: Texts and Commentary. New York:

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Metabletics in the Light of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism1 Alan Pope Abstract: Metabletics and Indo-Tibetan Buddhism are quasi-pheno­me­ nological traditions that examine psychological life in diametrically opposed ways. Metabletics examines historicalcultural phenomena, placing its focus on the world, while Buddhism examines the mind and its workings, placing its focus inward. Although both traditions conclude that there is ultimately no separation between inner and outer, their diffe­ rent motivations and methods reveal varying understandings of the nature of reality. This chapter begins with an examination of how each approach would account for a handprint embedded in stone in a cave wall in Nepal; this image provides an avenue for articulating the underlying philosophies of each. Then methodological differences are explored, whereupon I argue that Indo-Tibetan Buddhism reveals an ontological self within which the psychological self of metabletics can be situated. Conversely, this psychological self provides a realm of imagi­ nation for which Buddhism cannot account. Together, meta­ bletics and Indo-Tibetan Buddhism provide complementary emphases on the immanent and transcendent aspects of reality and the psychological and spiritual aspects of humanity.

Introduction Outside the town of Pharping, Nepal, a cave wall famously bears the impression of a human handprint in stone. It is said that the hand belonged to the Indian Buddhist saint, Padmasambhava, 1 This chapter first appeared in Janus Head 10(2) (2008), 531–549. It is reprinted here by permission of Trivium Publications.

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who lived in the 8th century.1 Having been summoned to Tibet to help establish Buddhism, he had stopped in this cave to meditate. Upon realizing the emptiness of all phenomenal display, he pressed his flesh into stone in defiance of conventional reality. Understandably, this cave is a significant pilgrimage site for Buddhists, and one that I myself ventured from Katmandu one afternoon to see. Given that the skeptic in me assumed the alleged handprint would be unconvincing, I was quite astonished by the detail with which the impression in the rock actually did resemble a human hand. The artifact in question is pictured in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Padmasambhava’s handprint in stone 1 Padmasambhava is an actual historical figure who is revered by followers of the Nyingma lineage of Tibetan Buddhism as the Second Buddha. He is considered to have been fully enlightened.

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While it is tempting to assume that there is a rational explanation for this phenomenon—where “rational” in this context means preserving our ordinary understanding of reality—let us, in line with the phenomenological tradition, bracket this assumption. In this paper I examine two different philosophicalphenomenological systems and consider how they would accommodate and account for the possibility that Padmasambhava actually did press his hand into the stone. The first is, naturally, Tibetan Buddhism, grounded in Mahayana philosophy and practice, while the second is Dutch psychiatrist J. H. van den Berg’s phenomenological metabletics. Although both traditions are phenomenological in character, they originated roughly 2500 years apart on opposite sides of the globe. The motivations from which they arose were dramatically different, and their methodological foci are as opposed as their physical positions in the world. Nevertheless, in spite of these differences there is remarkable convergence and complementarity in the ways in which they understand the nature of reality and humanity. In this chapter, I use the philosophical and practical system of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism as a means of shedding light on metabletics through comparison and contrast.1 The use of the image of Padmasambhava’s handprint is deliberately provocative, and serves to begin the discussion grounded in a concrete (or at least stone) image. First, I will briefly examine the central tenets of metabletics and Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, explaining how each would account for the phenomenon of this handprint. With this foundation laid, I will tease out critical points of difference and similarity in order to situate each The term Indo-Tibetan Buddhism recognizes that Tibetan Buddhism is grounded in the philosophy of India, and it incorporates the Tibetan interpretation of the early schools of Buddhism (known as the Hinayana, or “Lesser Vehicle”) as well the later, more comprehensive and sophisticated philosophical and practice traditions of Mahayana (“Great Vehicle”) and Vajrayana (“Diamond Vehicle”). For the most part, these distinctions need not concern us for the purpose at hand. The interested reader may wish to consult Ray, 2000. 1

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vis-à-vis the other, with the hope of promoting a more integrative understanding of the nature of humanity, world, and reality.

The Metabletic View J. H. van den Berg’s historical psychology, named metabletics—literally, theory of changes—posits that cultural changes reflect changes inherent in the nature of human beings (van den Berg, 1961). In this perspective, the nature of reality is not fixed, but rather is variously revealed and concealed, in contradistinction to more standard teleological systems. In particular, the metabletic stance is at odds with transpersonal developmental theories that suggest human beings are evolving into ever higher levels of structural integration; rather, the quest for progress—itself a linear, rational enterprise—obscures more poetic and felt dimensions of human existence that are to be revealed rather than accomplished. As a phenomenology, metabletics rejects the Husserlian transcendental ego with its attendant idealism by casting its gaze not on consciousness itself, but rather on the world of which we are conscious (Kruger, 1985; van den Berg, 1971). This gaze is best accommodated by a Heideggerian conception of human being as being-in-the-world, locating reality in the co-constitutive relationship between humanity and world. Examining culturalhistorical phenomena with this view brought van den Berg (1961) to a new paradigm for historical study, which he announced in the preface of his first work, Metabletica (translated as The Changing Nature of Man) (pp. 7–8): The whole science of psychology is based on the assumption that man does not change […]. This book stems from the idea that man does change […] the supposition that man does change leads to the thought that earlier generations lived a different sort of life, and that they were essentially different. (original emphasis)

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As van den Berg goes on to suggest, the changing nature of humanity as well implies the changing nature of material reality, organic and inert. If reality is a relationship between humanity and world, then a change in one implies a change in the other. Van den Berg prolifically studied the psychological life of human beings throughout various historical ages. He supported these studies by noticing the timely appearance or disappearance of key cultural phenomena. For example, in suggesting that the splitting of the atom “raises the question of whether matter itself has not played a role in achieving this end” (van den Berg, 1971, p. 286), he argues that celestial explosions bearing similarity to those of an atomic bomb are not evidenced in any literature prior to the splitting of the atom. The implication is that such explosions were not described because they didn’t exist; prior to humanity’s splitting of the atom, the fundamental nature of matter was non-atomic. Accordingly, van den Berg asserts that it is methodologically inappropriate to import our own modern scientific viewpoint into the examination of phenomena from previous ages. Instead, we must suspend our habitual frameworks and imagine earlier times on their own terms, opening in sensitivity to their lived meanings. Robert Romanyshyn, whose own work extends that of van den Berg, views the metabletic approach as a form of dream analysis in which history itself is the dream (Romanyshyn, 1985, 1989). In this view, psychological reality is a metaphorical reality, and metabletics is recast as metaphorics. Because reality is inseparable from how humanity imagines or envisions it, psychological life is made visible in specific, concrete historical manifestations. Harvey’s discovery that the heart is a pump required that he first imagine it as a pump—otherwise he could not have found a pump upon cutting into the human body. However, lest we in this instance grant our imagination a transcendental egoic function, Romanyshyn (2001, p. 164) clarifies:

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This way of seeing and speaking in relation to which the pum­ ping heart appears does not create reality […] the Harveian heart is no more a thought in the mind than it is a thing in the world. It is not there before Harvey and his age envision it, it is ne­vertheless there when one looks and speaks in a specific way.

No position is granted literality here. The heart-as-pump is neither a product of thought nor a discovery; rather, it arises due to the irreducibly coordinated activity of mind and matter. In a similar vein, in comparing two paintings of Florence from different eras, Romanyshyn observes: “The Florence of 1359 and that of 1480 are different cities … and yet, it is the same city” (Romanyshyn, 1985, p. 100). Thus we have what Romanyshyn terms a paradoxical picture of reality in which “a thing is both what it is and not what it is” (ibid., p. 100). This statement recalls the famous Zen Buddhist maxim that undercuts both dualism and monism: “not two, and not one” (Suzuki, 1970, p. 25). Now let us return to the image of Padmasambhava’s handprint to consider how metabletics might explain this phenomenon. As an expression of a cultural-historical reality, Padmasambhava’s pressing his hand into stone can be viewed as a unique incident that signals a change in the relationship between humanity and materiality. Something has shifted in the way that Padmasambhava imagines the stone, and this stone has transformed into something that is receptive to such imaginings. In a different context, yet imbued with surprising applicability, Romanyshyn (1989, p. 32) states: Architecture is a visible expression of how a specific culturalhistorical age shapes its space and draws its boundaries between the inside and the outside. Church architecture in particular reveals how an age carves in stone its boundaries of the sacred and the profane.

For a nomadic yogi such as Padmasambhava, his cave was his church, and in pressing his hand in stone he drew the boundary

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between the inside and the outside in such a way as to underscore the inseparability between them—between self and other and between the sacred and the profane. Nevertheless, there is something quite remarkable about this particular metabletic shift that seems qualitatively different from those typically described by van den Berg. If we accept the idea that the relationship between Padmasambhava and his world was a dream made incarnate in the world, manifested in perpetuity as the handprint in stone, how do we explain that this shift remained the province of one individual and did not become a shared cultural dream? In this sense, it is as though Padmasambhava enjoyed his own private reality. According to van den Berg, metabletic shifts begin with a unique event, and when such events become the norm, they lose their significance. In this case, it is because this event did not become the norm that it retained its significance such that the handprint continues to draw pilgrims. However, if the stone in this new reality is malleable to Padmasambhava’s touch, how is it that we don’t find impressions of his body all over the cave? How is he able to walk without leaving a trace? Perhaps the handprint evidences a reality that enabled him to control when he pressed his flesh into stone and when he did not. Perhaps he had realized, as an “activity of making the reality of the world real” (Romanyshyn, 1985, p. 88), a state of consciousness that recognized and could consciously exploit the non-literality of reality itself. That is, Padmasambhava hadn’t simply recognized a new ontical reality—he had realized an ontological reality. In fully realizing the metaphorical nature of reality, he gained access to a meta-level with regard to metabletic understanding. Is that how we can account for the fact that Padmasambhava’s handprint-in-stone appears within a larger intersubjective reality? To gain deeper insight into this provocative situation, let us now examine the Indo-Tibetan view.

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The Indo-Tibetan Buddhist view Whereas van den Berg rejected examination of consciousness itself in favor of gazing upon the world, Prince Siddhartha, the man who would become Buddha (meaning, literally awakened one) abandoned the everyday world and turned his gaze inward. Upon learning that old age, sickness, and death await everyone, he left his kingdom, its exquisite palaces and pleasures, and his wife and son, choosing to wander through India engaging in austerities and meditation practices. His goal was to eliminate suffering, and his method was to find its source within his own consciousness. Van den Berg focused on noema; Siddhartha focused on noesis. Both discovered that the two are so integrally connected as to be inseparable. However, they diverged significantly in the ways they understood and expressed this reality, and in how they carried their insights forward. Despite beginning his investigations with the mind, Siddhartha, like van den Berg, ultimately rejected the notion of a transcendental ego. In fact, he found ego, or self, to be an altogether empty concept, an achievement won through training his mind. In gaining steady, concentrative focus, Siddhartha slowed his mind down and penetrated the ordinary veil of overlapping patterns of thoughts and feelings. In opening with mindfulness to the vast array of interconnected phenomenal experiences—including physical sensations and impressions in addition to thoughts and feelings—he came to deep insight into the true nature of the mind and of the world. He discovered that the self is nothing more than a constellation of compounded aggregates, known as the five skandhas, which include physical forms, feelings, perceptions, concepts, mental formations, and the experience of consciousness itself. Meditation master Chögyam Trungpa (1973, p. 8) explains: “This sense of self is actually a transitory, discontinuous event, which in our confusion seems to be quite solid and continuous. Since we take our confused view as being real, we struggle to maintain and enhance this solid self.”

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According to the Indo-Tibetan tradition, the insight into no-self forms the basis for the first of three rounds of teachings, or turnings of the wheel of dharma. The first turning comprises the four noble truths, which are presented in terms of how things appear to ordinary beings, whereas the other two turnings (which comprise the Mahayana, or “Great Vehicle”) are presented from the perspective of the way things actually are (Karr, 2007). The second-turning teachings emphasize the principle of shunyata, meaning that all phenomena are empty of independent selfhood. To realize shunyata is to cut at the root of one’s own ignorance and suffering, and to awaken one’s heart in compassion for the suffering of others whose own ignorance endures. Thus in this view, the goal of eliminating one’s own suffering transmutes into the goal of seeking enlightenment for the sake of liberating others.1 In turning one’s focus away from the self and toward others, the practitioner thereby eliminates self-importance and egoclinging, making possible a fuller enlightenment than can be achieved through the realization of no-self alone. It is important to understand that shunyata, or the emptiness of all phenomena, does not imply a nihilistic stance—an error of interpretation that long plagued Buddhism’s initial foray into the West. Rather, emptiness cuts through both nihilism (the doctrine that nothing exists) and eternalism (the doctrine that things exist in an intrinsically real way). In the Buddhist view, phenomena arise and exist as the manifest display of a whole host of causes and conditions in a process called interdependent origination. This principle accounts for the manifestation of an individual’s world and that of intersubjective reality as well. As the Dalai Lama (2005, pp. 68–69) explains: This motivation is known as bodhicitta, and the Mahayana path is known as the Bodhisattva path to emphasize the importance of waking up for the benefit of others. From the perspective of the Mahayana tradition, which is found in Tibet, China, Japan, Mongolia, and Vietnam, the schools that follow the first-turning teachings exclusively are know as the Hinayana, or “Lesser Vehicle,” regarding the realization of no-self and its attendant liberation to be a lesser form of enlightenment (Conze, 1980). 1

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The world, according to the philosophy of emptiness, is consti­ tuted by a web of dependently originating and interconnected realities, within which dependently originating causes give rise to dependently originated consequences according to dependently originating laws of causality.

The world of which the Dalai Lama speaks is the prima materia from which our sense of self is drawn, a stance compatible with the notion of being-in-the-world. That the world as it appears is contingent upon an infinite set of factors and relationships—and that the laws of causality that govern them are likewise dependently arising—offers an account for the discon­tinuous shifts in manifest reality in van den Berg’s vision. The Tibetan Dzogchen tradition refers to the phenomenal world as being like a dream, placing it in accord as well with the metaphorical reality described by Romanyshyn. The principle of interdependent arising is theoretically groun­ ded in Nagarjuna’s principle of the two truths (Chandrakirti, 2002). Relative truth refers to the matrix of interdependent phenomena engaged in cause-and-effect relationships, while absolute truth is the inherent emptiness of all phenomenal reality. This emptiness, again, means that nothing that appears has an independent, intrinsic selfhood. From the relative perspective, these two truths are mutually interdependent, and from the perspective of absolute truth, they are identical. Thus rather than dismissing relative reality, Mahayana Buddhism gives it an equiprimordial status with absolute reality. The Dalai Lama (2005, pp. 67–68) explains that “to reject distinct identity, causation, and origination within the everyday world, as some interpreters of the philosophy of emptiness [have] suggested, simply because these notions are untenable from the perspective of ultimate reality, constitutes a methodological error.” Within relative reality, we do have an ego, and that is what permits social interaction. Thus, Buddhism freely uses terms such as self, inner, outer, projection, and so forth, as descriptive of the relative realm, while remaining cognizant of their empty status.

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While the second-turning teachings deconstruct all conceptual formulations of reality, the third-turning teachings return to the world of appearances to characterize what actually is there. Although all constructed or conditioned phenomena are empty of intrinsic existence, in the Madhyamaka Shentong teachings, emptiness is understood to have its own essence, named the tathāgata-garbha, or Buddha-nature (Maitraya, 2000). This Buddha-nature is the primordial wisdom from which we see the suchness of the world, the world in its fundamental richness and purity. In terms of Western phenomenology, this world is synonymous with the Lebenswelt (Husserl, 1970), the pre-reflective lifeworld that we ordinarily distort by overlaying a conceptual framework upon it. The Buddhist analysis and practices, however, are oriented toward recovering this view in a permanent way while retaining the ability to function within the lawful, causal framework imposed by relative reality. Regarding the handprint in Nepal, from the Indo-Tibetan Buddhist view, Padmasambhava had so fully realized emptiness that he was no longer bound by conventional reality. In fully realizing, beyond the level of intellect, that nothing exists in a solid way, including his own ego, he was liberated into the vast expanse of natural mind beyond the distinction between self and world, between hand and stone, and in which all appears in its suchness, radiant and pure. Despite his newfound powers, Padmasambhava continued to function within relative reality so that he could pursue the benefit of others who remained bound in ignorance.

Metabletics and Indo-Tibetan Buddhism in comparison Both systems of thought accept the primacy of perception and articulate a vision of reality that is non-dual in character. They also delineate two modes of perception, one that is authentic, and another that conforms to a conventional understanding of reality. However, they differ considerably both in their understanding of

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these modes of perception and in their means of approaching their investigation. In this section, I examine their methodological similarities and differences with an eye toward establishing whatever rapprochement is possible between them.

Methodological differences Although each is phenomenological in basic character, neither metabletics nor Buddhism is a pure phenomenology. Van den Berg (1971) denied that metabletics is a phenomenology in order to distance it from the Cartesian and idealistic elements of the Husserlian transcendental ego. He observed (1971, p. 283): “The phenomenologist has—as officially stated in his method— bracketed the question as to whether the phenomena handled by him with such utmost care are real or not.” For van den Berg the question of reality is the central question, and he does not wish to deny reality to the phenomena that arise in his immediate experience. Nevertheless, his approach is to return to the things themselves in a way that Husserl had intended to accomplish, and in recognition of the debt owed to Husserl’s approach, van den Berg called his method “phenomenological metabletics.” Buddhism also returns to the things themselves, but it does so with the intention of eliminating the suffering that arises in ordinary living. As such, it places emphasis on the ways in which we tend to distort our immediate perception. These distortions are uncovered and investigated through meditative discipline conjoined with rational analysis of the nature of mind so as to establish an understanding of the ultimate nature of reality. Its use of critical inquiry gives Buddhism a rational character distinctly different from Western phenomenology. In this vein, it also stands in sharp contrast to metabletics, which places complete confidence in appearances and holds with suspicion the notion of a reality more fundamental that that which is revealed through our senses.

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Of course, the objects of their inquiry are very different. Metabletics studies cultural-historical phenomena with no reference to the mind. As Jacobs (1985, pp. 63–64) describes: “It is the contents of the togetherness of man and world which metabletics seeks to explore, with the result that light is cast on the meaning of our own existence, here and now.” Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, by contrast, focuses on the contents of the mind, not the world, and in doing so, it is not interested in the meaning of our existence here and now; rather, it is interested in the nature of mental process. In focusing on and dwelling with meaning, metabletics recovers that which has been lost by the conventional attitudes that shape our habitual ways of being and cover over more felt sensibilities; by focusing on the processes of the mind, Buddhism starts with that which provides the cover, exposing its insubstantial nature so that we might see what lies beneath. Whereas metabletics offers a cultural therapeutics that recovers metaphorical reality from the tyranny of linear and scientific modes of revealing (Romanyshyn, 1985), Buddhism offers a spiritual therapeutics that recovers the individual from the tyranny of all forms of abstraction and conception. Let us examine this difference more carefully. Romanyshyn (2001, p. 23) writes of Galileo’s admiration of Copernicus’s ability to “rape the senses” in order to conjecture that the world revolves around the sun. He observes that in disregarding the appearance of things for an idea, Copernicus promotes a psychological abandonment of the human body, thereby precipitating the dehumanizing modern technological age.1 At first blush, we might think that Buddhism is guilty of a similar “rape of the senses” for suggesting that there exists a genuine reality different from that which appears before us. If we mistake a piece of coiled rope for a snake, Buddhism argues, we are distorting reality and we suffer accordingly. In the moment we see the rope as a 1 Romanyshyn provides a convincing exposition of these developments in Technology as Symptom and Dream (1989).

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snake, it is not a snake—it is in actuality a rope. We are mistaken, and it is desirable to eliminate such perceptual errors. Consider, by contrast, the following similar scenario posed by Romanyshyn (2001). While driving his car one evening, he sees on the road before him a dark and sinister shape which later appears as a twisted tree trunk that has fallen. He nevertheless insists (2001, p. 156): “At the moment when I saw the dark and sinister shape, I was not seeing an illusion” (p. 156). For Romanyshyn, as with metabletics, the perception is real, and to suggest otherwise is to enter into an abstract realm that is removed from our sensory reality, thereby raping the senses. From this viewpoint, if we see what later appears as a rope to be a snake, it is, in that instant, a snake. Whereas the phenomenological attitude embraced in the metabletic stance is one of dwelling with phenomena in order to reveal their deeper meanings, Buddhism dwells with them in order to reveal their inherent structure. Toward this end, the Buddhist gaze is directed toward the subtler levels of our conscious experience to which we do not ordinarily attend, a process that not only does not rape the senses, but gives them extraordinary care and attention while situating them within the largest context possible. Our own mind, which is an integral part of this context, is regarded in Tibetan Buddhism as a sensory organ in its own right, accepting as its objects thoughts and emotions. If we train our minds sufficiently, we learn at a perceptual level to see phenomena in their fullness, which includes their interconnectedness to all other phenomena in existence. From that perspective, it is not an act of rape to see a phenomenal appearance as an illusion, provided that the illusion consists of seeing the phenomenon as separate from the overall context within which it appears.

Different tools for different worlds Although van den Berg recognizes that the nature of human beings changes across historical time, the methods of metablet-

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ics cannot account for changes over smaller periods, particularly those occurring moment-to-moment. Were we able to slow the speed of our minds sufficiently, as do meditation masters, we could recognize change at subtler and subtler levels, and at those levels we would see there is nothing solidly existing to be identified. This process of slowing the speed of one’s own mind in order to look more deeply is in some ways analogous to examining the workings of the mind with a microscope. The question becomes: what is the impact of introducing such a technology? In Things (1970), van den Berg discusses using a microscope to examine one’s own blood only to discover malarial parasites. He distinguishes between two structures, the first being lived experience and the second being the structure that we see peering through the microscope. If we take quinine to treat the malaria, we might get better in the first structure (lived reality), and doing so surely would coincide with the reduction or absence of malaria parasites in the second structure (amplified observation). Of this circumstance, van den Berg (1970, p. 14) argues: If, however, I regard this recovery in the second structure as the recovery of my illness, I am wrong. For I was ill, and only I can say of myself or my body that it becomes healthy. This reality of illness or health is something which escapes the microscope. For I cannot say that the observed slide is diseased or that it is healthy. By way of a neutral structure, which is neither healthy nor ill, I pass from illness to health. The relationship between these two structures is obvious, but also obvious is their difference. Between the two structures stands the magnifying glass—and everything connected with it. This takes the object out of its dimensions and takes away its meaning.

The applicability of this example to meditation is striking, for in its non-contemplative forms—such as Shamatha, Vipassana, or Dzogchen—meditation does indeed take away the usual meanings of our phenomenal experience. They do this by focusing not on the content of the experience, but on its form, its

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structure, its dynamic unfolding within the totality of interconnected phenomenal display. Insofar as Western phenomenology intends to uncover the structures of consciousness through meaning, Buddhism reveals them through direct empirical observation of consciousness itself. And just as the microscope that finds malarial parasites leads to a cure, meditation provides insight that leads to healing. At this point one might think that meditation, like the physical microscope, introduces a second order reality. However, consider the nature of the technologies used. The physical microscope intervenes to produce an image of a world that is wholly unlike that which would otherwise be available to our direct experience. It makes that aspect of our body present-at-hand in a way that it can never be experienced ready-to-hand.1 In the case of meditation, the tool used is our own mind, the same instrument through which our immediate experience is revealed to us. When we peer through this “microscope,” we do not lose our immediate experience—rather, we extend its range. By bracketing the meanings that we ordinarily attach to our phenomenal experience we recover not the lifeworld as reflected in our lived meanings, but the deeper structures of our conscious experience. In doing so, we learn to see through the delusions that arise when we conflate direct perceptions with concepts, enabling us to be more fully present to the lifeworld outside of our meditative experience. The meanings inherent in phenomenal appearance are not lost, but rather are contextualized in a richer way. Further, the physical microscope narrows the range of what can be seen, isolating that which is observed from its larger context in a way that meditation does not. In effect, the meditator 1 These terms come from Heidegger’s Being and Time (1927/1962). Those phenomena that are present-at-hand are brought into an objective framework in order to examine them from the scientific, linear gaze perspective. Phenomena that are ready-at-hand are simply available for our non-self-conscious use. Heidegger’s classic example, is the hammer that in use is ready-to-hand, but when broken becomes present-at-hand.

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peers through a microscope and a telescope at the same time: the technique known as shamatha cultivates concentrative focus, while vipassana orients us to the inherent spaciousness of our natural mind. The two processes are used in a coordinated manner in order to open the expanse of our awareness while simultaneously endowing us with attentive focus on the fine details of any particular phenomenon that arises. Phenomena are thus investigated in a way that not only preserves their larger context, but recovers them from an everyday mind made narrow by obsessive thinking, Heidegger “idle talk” (1962, p. 211) lived as an internal dialogue. Buddhism doesn’t merely recover the lifeworld from the tyranny of a mathematical, scientific reality; it goes further to recover the lifeworld from the tyranny of our own grasping. In this view, it is the latter state of mind that is the most fundamental root cause of modern technology run amok.

Psychopathology and Health In A Different Existence (1972), van den Berg critiques the psychoanalytic viewpoint that patients’ illnesses arise when their own opinions about their experiences do not conform to the facts of reality. To the patients, this subjective reality is real, and the best therapeutic approach is not to show them their errors or try to change their beliefs; rather, it is to take their world seriously, to avoid imposing conceptual theory on them, and to help them change their meanings. For van den Berg, the central meaning to psychopathology is loneliness. Rather than regarding a hallucination as a perception with no object, as would conventional psychoanalysis, van den Berg (1972, p. 107) asserts that hallucinations do have objects, and that these objects are for the patient alone, in the “world of his own that is founded in his isolation.” On the question of whether these objects exist, van den Berg points to the ambiguity of the question—it straddles the existence of two different

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worlds. The objects are most real for the patient, even as they are not for the healthy person. The same is true for delusions, which similarly isolate the individual in his/her own world. When we take into view the totality of the entire system, then the reality of the hallucination or delusion is a question of perspective, and as such, this view is in alignment with the Buddhist principle of shunyata or emptiness. In fact, van den Berg (1972, pp. 109– 110) provides his own eloquent version of the principle of interdependent origination when he states: With alienation, isolation, loneliness […] we can summarize the fact that all these mental states never stand by themselves and are never abstractions, but they ceaselessly reveal themselves in the reality of the surrounding world, in the reality of the objects, in the reality of personal relationships and in the reality of body and of time. Everything is mutually dependent and nothing comes first. No matter at what corner we start first […] we always lift the whole carpet […]. Even if we think we are adhering to our own particular theme—the description inva­ riably results in the description of the whole—everything is connected with everything else.

While Indo-Tibetan Buddhism would agree with van den Berg’s characterization of psychopathology and of hallucination, it would go further in applying a similar view to psychologically healthy individuals. Whereas what distinguishes neurosis or psychosis from the healthy individual is loneliness or isolation, what separates the healthy individual from the fully realized one is the belief in a solidly existing and permanent self. In this view, any sensation or thought that is contaminated with the notion of selfhood is a hallucination or delusion, accepting as an object something that is not inherently existing. That is, the self only exists relative to other selves and a host of other causes and conditions. In essence, the Buddhist view does not reject the psychoanalytic pretext that the patients’ illnesses arise when their own opinions about their experiences do not conform to the

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facts of reality; however, it does understand that illusion in a very different way, focusing not on ontical considerations, but rather on the ontological status of the self.

An integrative vision In developing a phenomenology of the historical world, metabletics draws the curtain away from the objectified empirical self of natural science and everydayness. In this process, metabletics reveals and recovers a psychological self that is the province of metaphor, poetry, and dreams and that is imagined as a figure in a story.1 With its focus on the mind and on the nature of self, Indo-Tibetan Buddhism similarly draws the curtain away from the empirical self, but in this instance reveals and describes an ontological self that is not separated from the entirety of phenomenal display, and is empty of independent or intrinsic existence. The ontological self is the fundamental ground of Being out of which the empirical and psychological selves manifest. Whereas metabletics hints at the ontological self, it is not equipped by its methods and goals to describe it; likewise, Buddhism works to recover the ground for the psychological self, but lacks the methods for engaging it by activating the imagination, revealing lived meanings, and undertaking the work of soul-making. This framework of three selves—empirical, psychological, and ontological—positions the Buddhist view as ontologically prior to that of metabletics. Let us consider this the other way around. In Technology as Symptom and Dream, Romanyshyn (1989, p. 190) refers to “the Buddhist denial of substance” as, itself, a “cultural dream.” Is the principle of shunyata merely a cultural-historical dream, or does it describe the actual nature of reality across all cultural-historical instantiations? If we adopt the metabletic stance that a reality as experienced by an individual be accepted on its own terms, then we must grant that for 1

This view is developed in beautiful, lyrical detail in Romanyshyn (2001).

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some people enlightenment is an actual phenomenon. If this is the case, then a Buddha such as Siddhartha or Padmasambhava can transcend cultural-historical ways of seeing. Perhaps the cultural-historical dream of Buddhism is one from which it is possible to awaken or, from the Mahayana point of view, dream in a lucid way. This does not logically invalidate the notion that emptiness is a cultural-historical dream—but it suggests that within such a dream there are possibilities that lie beyond the dream itself. Perhaps now more light is shed on the handprint in stone. We can similarly investigate metabletics as its own culturalhistorical dream, performing a veritable metabletics of metabletics. Van den Berg (1971, p. 283) implies this possibility when he states: Edmund Husserl […] started by pulling down the untenable wall between subject and object […] [however,] he has more or less restored the wall to its original state. What he wanted to achieve was apparently at his time not yet possible.

Does this imply that before the time of metabletics, subject and object were separate? Were human beings at one time constant and immutable, in line with the understanding of modern psychology? If so, what could have caused the state of constancy and immutability to have changed? If not, how do we know when a set of cultural beliefs reflects a different reality and when it does not? Metabletics distinguishes between the psychological reality that is genuine and the empirical reality that is not, but it is unable to bring them into rapprochement in the way that Buddhism does with its complex understanding of the two truths. From a Buddhist viewpoint, it is precisely because the entire humanity-world complex is empty that it can change, and therefore the principle of emptiness is the one indestructible truth. From that principle, we can understand the arising of both the empirical and the psychological realities, which themselves are ultimately bound together in the manner of interdependent arising.

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What is most important and valuable in metabletics is the recovery of a psychological life that is in line with psychology in its original sense as revelatory of soul. It provides access to dimensions of experience that tend to be leveled down by the natural attitude and modern technology. As such, the metabletic method is wary of logical analyzes, which are second order phenomena in comparison to immediate lived experience. Meanwhile, Buddhism recognizes the limitations of logic as operating strictly in the relative realm, yet appreciates how its proper use can ironically direct us toward an immediate experience that is freed of all conceptual contamination. The metabletician is like the filmgoer who suspends disbelief and resists distraction in order to experience the movie with all of its visceral impact, while the Buddhist is in the projection room marveling at the projector and the manner in which it makes the movie seem real. The two systems are interested in different aspects of human experience: one values meaning, while the other values wisdom; one revels in passion, the other in compassion; one views personal proclivities as a matter of choice, the other as a matter of karma.1 And of course, all of these dichotomies are, in metabletic parlance, not to be taken literally, and in Buddhist terminology, empty.

Conclusion Whereas metabletics directs its phenomenological inquiry at the history of humankind, Buddhism presents a phenomenology of the mind gained through contemplation and meditation. Metabletics asserts that owing to the co-constitutive relationship between the human being and the world, the basic nature of each is mutable across time. Although Indo-Tibetan Buddhism likewise understands the realm of relative, conventional reality 1 Karma literally means “action.” It conveys that the consequences of our previous actions create the reality in which we find ourselves, including whether we might feel more drawn to metabletics or to Buddhism.

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to be completely mutable, it places emphasis on a process of interdependent origination wherein that which we take to be reality is in fact no more substantial than a rainbow whose appearance depends upon a wide array of causes and conditions. These causes and conditions include the constitutive power not only of an individual human consciousness, but of other consciousnesses as well, including other humans, animals, and unseen beings. While the human imagination can generate a lived experience that may be taken as real for that person, there nonetheless exists a relative, conventional reality that, though mutable, operates with a lawfulness based on more than that person’s own experience. From the Buddhist perspective, this conventional reality is marked by a belief in the separate and essential self, and would be construed as the clay within which the various historical-cultural manifestations described by van den Berg are formed. Further, the methods of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism reveal the existence of an essential nature (tathāgata-garbha or Buddhanature) that is invariant across phenomenal manifestations. Although beyond change itself, this absolute nature is expressed, albeit in distorted ways, in and through the cultural manifestations that form the subject matter of van den Berg’s investigations. As such, Indo-Tibetan Buddhism offers a larger map within which metabletics can be situated, and it accounts ontologically for the ethical stance that van den Berg himself unquestioningly adopts. On the other hand, while Buddhism provides precise and astonishingly detailed descriptions of mental processes as they unfold within the moment,1 it fails to account for more temporal phenomena, such as the psychophysical development of the individual, let alone the psychological significance of historical phenomena. Metabletics for its part provides a means of reading the relative realm of appearances to reveal the 1 A sample of the sophistication of the early Abhidharma systems, expressed through detailed cartographies of consciousness, can be found in Govinda (1961).

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lived meanings that permeate our experience. Together, metabletics and Indo-Tibetan Buddhism provide complementary emphases on the immanent and transcendent aspects of reality and the psychological and spiritual aspects of humanity. References Chandrakirti. (2002). Introduction to the middle way. Trans.P. T. Group. Boston: Shambhala. Conze, E. (1980). A short history of Buddhism. Oxford: Oneworld. Dalai Lama. (2005). The universe in a single atom: The convergence of science and spirituality. New York: Morgen Road Books. Govinda, A. (1961). The psychological attitude of early Buddhist philosophy. London: Rider & Company. Heidegger, M. (1962). Being and time. Trans. J. Macquarrie & E. Robinson. New York: Harper & Row. Husserl, E. (1970). The crisis of European sciences and transcendental phenomenology. Trans. D. Carr. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. Jacobs, M. (1985). Geometry, spirituality, and architecture. The changing reality of modern man: Essays in honor of J. H. van den Berg. Ed. D. Kruger. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 62–86. Karr, A. (2007). Contemplating reality: A practitioner’s guide to the view in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism. Boston: Shambhala. Kruger, D. (1985). Introduction: Encountering J. H. van den Berg. The changing reality of modern man: Essays in honor of J. H. van den Berg. Ed. D. Kruger. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, ix–xx. Maitraya, A. (2000). Buddha nature: The Mahayana Uttaratantra Shastra with commentary. Trans. R. Fuchs. Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion. Ray, R. A. (2000). Indestructible truth: The living spirituality of Tibetan Buddhism. Boston: Shambhala. Romanyshyn, R. (1985). The despotic eye. The changing reality of modern man: Essays in honor of J. H. van den Berg. Ed. D. Kruger. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 87–109. Romanyshyn, R. (1989). Technology as symptom and dream. London: Routledge.

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Romanyshyn, R. (2001). Mirror and metaphor: Images and stories of psychological life. Pittsburgh: Trivium Publications. Suzuki, S. (1970). Zen mind, beginner’s mind. New York: Weatherhill. Trungpa, C. (1973). Cutting through spiritual materialism. Boston: Shambhala. van den Berg, J. H. (1961). The changing nature of man: Introduction to a historical psychology. New York: W. W. Norton. van den Berg, J. H. (1970). Things: Four metabletic reflections. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press. van den Berg, J. H. (1971). Phenomenology and metabletics. Humanitas 7(3), 279–290. van den Berg, J. H. (1972). A different existence. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press.

Notes on Contributors

Christopher M. Aanstoos received his Ph.D. in phenomenological psychology from Duquesne University. He has published two volumes (Exploring the Lived World and Studies in Humanistic Psychology) and has served as Editor of The Humanistic Psychologist and as President of the Division of Humanistic Psychology (of the American Psychological Association). Currently he is Professor of Psychology at the University of West Georgia. Sally Borbasi, R.N., Ph.D. is Professor of Nursing in the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. She is a long-standing nursing academic and qualitative researcher with a particular interest in phenomenological approaches. Her Ph.D. focused on the lived experience of clinical nurse specialists in the Australian health care sector and was influenced by the work of such scholars as Michael Crotty, Peter Willis and Max van Manen. Sally has a background in acute care nursing and has carried out a number of studies exploring the qualitative dimensions of health and illness. She is co-author of the book Navigating the Maze of Nursing Research and is on the editorial board of the Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology. Sally also reviews for a number of nursing research journals and is widely published on a range of nursing related subjects. Over the years, she has been involved in the phenomenological work of Peter Willis in education and brings to it a health perspective that they have presented at a number of differing research forums. Chiara Bove is Researcher at the University of Milan-Bicocca, where she teaches Qualitative Methods in Educational Research. Her research has dealt with the first transition of infants and toddlers into

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childcare, with parents’ and caregivers’ ideas on attachment and separation in Italy and the United States; with school and early childhood education; and with research methods in a “cultural perspective.” Among her publications are Le idee degli adulti sui piccoli: Ricerche per una pedagogia culturale [Adult’s ideas of young children. Research for a “cultural” pedagogy], Edizioni Junior, 2004; Attaccamento e inserimento [Attachment and transition into childcare], with S. Mantovani and L. R. Saitta, Franco Angeli, 2000; the entry “Parent involvement” for the Encyclopedia on early childhood education, ed. B. New and M. Cochran, 2007; and Ricerca educativa e formazione [Educational research and professional development], Franco Angeli, 2009. Letizia Caronia is Professor at the Faculty of Education (University of Bologna, Italy), where she teaches Philosophy of Education as well as Epistemology and Methods in Qualitative Research. She is Visiting Scholar at the Centre of Interdisciplinary Research On Emerging Technologies (Department of Communication, University of Montreal), where she currently leads research projects on the domestication of information and communication technologies in everyday life. Her research deals with the role of everyday language, interaction, and culture in children’s socialization within family and school. She has authored and co-authored more than fifty chapters in collective books and articles in national and international scientific journals. She has also written, co-written, and edited several books in Italian, English, and French, including Sguardi venuti da lontano [Views coming from afar], Bompiani, 1991, with an “Introduction” by Umberto Eco; Costruire la conoscenza: Interazione e interpretazione nella ricerca in campo educativo [Constructing knowledge: Interaction and interpretation in educational field research], La Nuova Italia, 1997; La socializzazione ai media: Contesti, interazioni e pratiche educative [Media socialization : Contexts, interactions, and educational practices], Guerini, 2002; Cultures mobiles  : Les nouvelles pratiques de communication [Mobile cultures: The new communicative practices], PUM, 2005; and Moving Cultures: Mobile Communication in Everyday Life, McGillQueens University Press, 2007.

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Scott D. Churchill earned his doctorate in clinical phenomenological psychology at Duquesne University in 1984. He is currently Professor and Graduate Program Director for the Psychology Department at the University of Dallas, where he has been teaching for three decades. His professional focus is on the development of phenomenological and hermeneutical methodologies; he teaches classes on a wide range of topics, from primate studies and clinical psychology to film, history of psychoanalysis, and existential phenomenology. Dr. Churchill is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association and an active member of the APA’s Division 32 (Society for Humanistic Psychology) as well as Division 24 (Society for Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology). He is the Editor-in-Chief for The Humanistic Psychologist (A Division Journal for the APA), having served as Editor of Methods: A Journal for Human Science from 1989 to 2003. He has also served as a Consulting Editor for Encyclopaideia: Journal of Phenomenology and Education, Human Studies, Journal of Phenomenological Psychology, Qualitative Research in Psychology, The Janus Head, The Psychotherapy Patient, and the Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology. Giancarlo Gola received a master degree in Education at the University of Trieste, then completed a Ph.D. in Sociology, Education Science Social Work Education at the same University. He is currently Lecturer in Pedagogy at the University of Trieste. His research interests are teachers’ education and development; teachers’ practical knowledge, qualitative research methods in education; lifelong learning and informal learning in the workplace; narrative inquiry and grounded theory. His publications include L’apprendimento informale nella professione: Ricerca Socioeducativa supportata dal software (2009) [Informal learning on the job. Social and Educational research supporting of software]; La didattica nascosta. Prospettive di ricerca sull’insegnamento [Hidden sides on didactics. Prospective on teaching research] (in press). Mia Herskind, Ph.D, is Assistant Professor at the Danish School of Education, University of Aarhus, having also received Master of Science and Master of Educational Psychology degrees. She is en-

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gaged in pedagogical-psychological research that concerns learning processes in different kinds of institutions, using phenomenological-hermeneutical frame of reference and carrying out movement analyses—often in combination with interviews—in order to identify participation strategies, experiences of participation, and emotional dimensions of participation in social practice. Her research projects and publications include an evaluation project concerning day-care staff and their bodily engagement in movement activities; a research project on how to set up and practice within a movement-oriented indoor space in day-care, from a staff perspective; “Movement analysis and identification of learning processes,” in Learning Bodies, ed. T. Schilhalb, M. Juelskjer, and T. Moser (2008); and Bodiliness in day-care: Children’s and adult’s learning processes (in Danish), Billesø og Baltzer, 2007. Susanna Mantovani is Professor of Education at the University of Milano-Bicocca. Her work in the past thirty years has dealt with early childhood and early childhood policies, making her one of the leading figures in early childhood education and care in Italy and a consultant for many international projects. Her research and writings are on ECEC, research methodology, and since 2000 on immigrant families and children. Among her publications are La ricerca sul campo in educazione: I metodi qualitativi [Field research in education: qualitative methods], Bruno Mondadori, 1998, and Nello stesso nido: Famiglie e bambini stranieri nei servizi educativi [In the same “nido”: Immigrant families and children in ECEC settings], with Graziella Favaro and Tullia Musatti, Franco Angeli, 2006. She is the coordinator of the Italian entries for the Encyclopedia on early childhood education, ed. B. New and M. Cochran, 2007. Luigina Mortari received a Master’s Degree in Theory of Educational Organization (University of Milan) and a Ph.D. in Education (University of Padua). She is Professor of Methodology of Educational Research at the University of Verona. Her main research areas concern education as care practice and phenomenological research in educational contexts. She is the author of several contributions and peer-reviewed articles. Her other publications include Aver cura della vita della mente (2002); Apprendere dall’esperienza

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(2003); Un metodo a-metodico (2006); La pratica dell’aver cura (2006); and Cultura della ricerca e pedagogia: Prospettive epistemologiche (2007). Alan Pope is Associate Professor and member of the graduate faculty in the University of West Georgia’s humanistic/transpersonal psychology department. He received his Ph.D. in existential-phenomenological clinical psychology from Duquesne University. His research generally aims to elucidate the processes of psychospiritual transformation resulting from suffering and from spiritual or creative practice. His current interest is in re-visioning Western psychology through the perspective of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism. He is the author of From Child to Elder: Personal Transformation in Becoming an Orphan at Midlife, published by Peter Lang. Chiara Sità completed her Ph.D. in Education at the University of Milan. She is Researcher in Education at the University of Verona, where she teaches in the field of educational research. Her own research focuses on parent support and educational practice. She has done research on this topic in Italy and in France, at the Observatoire National de l’Enfance en Danger - Paris. Among her publications include Il sostegno alla genitorialità: Analisi dei modelli di intervento e prospettive educative (2005). Massimiliano Tarozzi first earned a degree in Philosophy and one in Education at the University of Bologna, then completed a Ph.D. in Education at the same university. He is currently Associate Professor of Qualitative Research Methods, University of Trento, Italy, where he also teaches in the areas of social and intercultural education, and is the founding director of a master’s degree program in research methodology in education. He has been Visiting Scholar at the Department of Education of the University of California, Los Angeles, and at the International Institute of Qualitative Methods, University of Alberta. He is the Editor of Encyclopaideia: Journal of phenomenology and education. In addition to thirty-five scientific articles, including ten in international peer-reviewed journals, he has written or edited about ten books (in Italian), including Che cos’è la grounded theory [What is grounded theory],

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2008; Cittadinanza interculturale: Esperienza educativa come agire politico [Intercultural citizenship: Educative experience as political acting], 2005; and Pedagogia generale: Storie, idee, protagonisti [Education. Stories, ideas, protagonists], 2002. He has also recently translated The discovery of grounded theory by B. Glaser and A. Strauss (Armando, 2009). Joseph Tobin, the Director of the Children Crossing Borders project, is the Nadine Mathis Basha Professor of Early Childhood Education at Arizona State University. His research interests include rosscultural studies of early childhood education; children and the media; and qualitative esearch methods. Among his publications are Preschool in Three Cultures: Japan, China, United States; Good Guys Don’t Wear Hats: Children’s Talk about the Media; Pikachu’s Global Adventure: The Rise and Fall of Pokemon; and Preschool in Three Cultures Revisited (2009). Solfrid Vatne is Associate Professor at the Department of Health at Molde University College, Norway. Her degree is in Nursing Science from the University of Oslo (2003), where she focused on limit setting in mental health. Her main interests in research are milieu therapy, usercooperation, empowerment and quality of life; she has also published several international articles and two textbooks in Norwegian. She teaches in the master’s degree program in health and social work, and her focuses are clinical relationships—theories and research; qualitative methods and action science; and theory of science. She is serving as the Rector of Molde University College from August 2007 through 2011, and was the host of the 2009 Internatioal Human Science Research Confernece in Molde, Norway. Daniela Verducci has been Researcher at the University of Macerata, Department of Philosophy and Human Sciences since 1982. Since 2005 she has been Associate Professor in Moral Philosophy, and at the present she is teaching Philosophical Anthropology at the Faculty of Sciences of Education in the University of Macerata. She has worked on the philosophy of labor, taking Max Scheler ‘s phenomenology as a point of departure (cf. Il segmento mancante: Percorsi di filosofia del lavoro, Carocci, 2003). Currently her interest is focused on

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Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka’s phenomenology of life (cf. Pensare la vita: Contributi fenomenologici, Il Calamo, 2003). She is a member of the Max Scheler Gesellschaft and General Secretary of The International Society for Phenomenology and the Sciences of Life, affiliated with The World Phenomenology Institute. Since 2003, she has participated in the editorial board for Phenomenological Inquiry: A Review of Philosophical Ideas and Trends. She is in the Scientific Committee of Annali of the Faculty of Education Sciences of the University of Macerata and contributes to the Springer series Analecta Husserliana and Islamic Philosophy and Occidental Phenomenology in Dialogue. Peter Willis is senior lecturer in education at the University of South Australia specializing in the education and training of adults. Before his academic career, he worked first as a religious missionary priest and then an adult educator in community development and cultural awareness education with Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people in the outback Kimberley area of North Western Australia and in Central Australia. His recent book, Patrons and riders: Conflicting roles and hidden objectives in an Aboriginal development program (Post Pressed), is a critical reflection on the relationship between missionaries and Aboriginal people in the Kimberleys. He has been active in the adult education movement in Australia for more than twenty years and has spent several years on the national and state executive boards of the Australian Association for Adult Education, now known as Adult Learning Australia. His main research areas concern transformative and “second chance” learning among adults; learning in healing; and the relationship between religion, spirituality, aesthetic life, and civil society. He pioneered the use of phenomenological approaches in arts-based research in two recent publications, Inviting learning: An exhibition of risk and enrichment in adult education practice (NIACE), and an edited collection entitled Being, seeking, telling: Expressive approaches to qualitative adult education (Post Pressed). Other recent edited publications are Lifelong learning and the democratic imagination (with Carden) and Towards re-enchantment: Education, imagination, and the getting of wisdom (with Heywood, McCann and Neville). He is currently working with Tim Leonard on an edited book entitled Pedagogies of the imagination: Mythopoetic curriculum in educational practice.

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