Part One: The Context Of Educational Research Part Two: Planning Educational Research Part Three: Styles Of Educational Research Part Four: Strategies And Instruments For Data Collection And Researching Part Five: Data Analysis

Research Methods in Education

Since critics first allegedthat feminism claimed tospeak universally for all
women, feminist researchers havebeen acutely aware ofthe limitations of 
genderas a single analyticalcategory. In fact, feministsare perhaps alone in
the academy in theextent to which theyhave embraced intersectionality – the 
relationshipsamong multiple dimensions andmodalities of social relations
and subject formations – as itselfa central category ofanalysis. One could 
evensay that intersectionality isthe most important theoreticalcontribution 
that women’s studies,in conjunction with relatedfields, has made sofar.1

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/426800

The Complexity of Intersectionality

Some 70 years after its development in Frankfurt, Germany, critical theory retains its ability to disrupt and hallenge the status quo. In the process, it elicits highlycharged emotions of all types—fierce loyalty from its roponents, vehement hostility from its detractors. Such vibrantly polar reactions indicate at the very least that critical theory still matters. We can be against critical theory or for it, but, especially at the present historical uncture, we cannot be without it.

Rethinking Critical Theory and Qualitative Research

This paper puts forward arguments in favor of a pluralist approach to IS research. Rather than advocating a single paradigm, be it interpretive or positivist, or even a plurality of paradigms within the discipline as a whole, it suggests that research results will be richer and more reliable if different research methods, preferably from different (existing) paradigms, are routinely combined together. The paper is organized into three sections after the Introduction. In Â§2, the main arguments for the desirability of multimethod research are put forward, while Â§3 discusses its feasibility in theory and practice. Â§4 outlines two frameworks that are helpful in designing mixed-method research studies. These are illustrated with a critical evaluation of three examples of empirical research.

http://gkmc.utah.edu/7910F/papers/ISR%20combining%20IS%20research%20methods.pdf

Combining IS Research Methods: Towards a Pluralist Methodology

While neorealism and world-system theory both claim to be “structural” theories of international relations, they embody very different understandings of system structure and structural explanation. Neorealists conceptualize system structures in individualist terms as constraining the choices of preexisting state agents, whereas world-system theorists conceptualize system structures in structuralist terms as generating state agents themselves. These differences stem from what are, in some respects, fundamentally opposed solutions to the “agent-structure” or “micromacro” problem. This opposition, however, itself reflects a deeper failure of each theory to recognize the mutually constitutive nature of human agents and system structures—a failure which leads to deep-seated inadequacies in their respective explanations of state action. An alternative solution to the agent-structure problem, adapted from “structuration theory” in sociology, can overcome these inadequacies by avoiding both the reduction of system structures to state actors in neorealism and their reification in world-system theory. Structuration theory requires a philosophical basis in scientific realism, arguably the “new orthodoxy” in the philosophy of natural science, but as yet largely unrecognized by political scientists. The scientific realist/structuration approach generates an agenda for “structural-historical” research into the properties and dispositions of both state actors and the system structures in which they are embedded.

/pdf/the-agent-structure-problem-in-international-relations-xrm8vlqru1.pdf

The agent-structure problem in international relations theory

Part one Conceptions of science 1. Positivist philosophy of science 2. Realist philosophy of science 3. Forms of conventionalism Part two Conceptions of science as social theory 4. Sociology and positivism 5. Marx and realism 6. Structure and structuralism Part 3 Meaning and ideology 7. The explantion and understanding of social action 8. Reification and realism 9. Values theory and reality

Social theory as science

Social Theory as Science

The Authority of the consumer

Preface Acknowledgements Introduction PART I: KEEPING THE MARKET AT BAY Consumer Sovereignty and the Integrity of Practice Scepticism, Authority and the Market Citizens, Consumers and the Environment Colonization by the Market: Walzer on Recognition Science and Recognition PART II: MAKING THE BEST OF THE MARKET Markets, Firms and Practices Consumer-Friendly Production or Producer-Friendly Consumption? Justifying the Market and its Limitation Notes References Index

Russell Keat

Papers

Social theory as science

Social Theory as Science

The Authority of the consumer

Social Theory as Science

Cultural Goods and the Limits of the Market