thinking about methodology
The following are some thoughts about research methodology, and the type of approach which I will aim to achieve in this project.
Elspeth Graham, in advising students developing research designs, warns of the illusion of the ‘list’ of different types of geography, of different approaches and methodologies - a situation in which the researcher might:
suppose themselves to be in some methodological supermarket where they can browse the shelves and pick [methods] according whatever catches their eye (Graham, 2005: 15).
A critical approach to methodology is essential in order to avoid the normativities attached to methodology discourse - normativities represented by the ‘rules’ attached to research methods, stating that an accurate knowledge of reality will only be gained if research is carried out in a particular way. In recognising that research not only describes but produces reality, I hope to succeed in implementing a reflective methodology which pays full attention to processes as well as endpoints.
John Law develops this idea well in discussing the differences between novels and academic writing, noting that the pleasure of reading a good novel lies in well-crafted writing while the same is not so often true of academic texts. Law suggests that we tend to read novels for the act of reading itself, to take pleasure in the process, whereas we tend to read academic texts “for the destination, where it will take us” (2004: 11) - drawing a broader distinction between the value of novels and academic writing as reflected in the distinction between means and ends. While some academic writing can contain the textures of good fiction, the actual written style tends to be subordinate to the academic aims (or ends). Law asks,
What difference would it make if we were instead to apply the criteria that we usually apply to novels (or even more to poetry) to academic writing? … we would need to imagine representation in a different way … [because] the textures along the way cannot be dissociated from whatever is being made (2004: 11-12).
I hope that my methodology succeed in engaging with these ideas, and avoid producing text which serves simply as a means to an end, rather than having some value as a process in itself.
