Introduction - using qualitative research to understand observations - Qualitative Research

Library Trends, Spring, 1998 by Theresa M. Maylone

Introduction

In the early 1970s, John Berger created a television series for the British Broadcasting Corporation called "Ways of Seeing." Following the television series, Berger created a book, also called Ways of Seeing (Berger, 1974) which, like the television series, could be said to be "about" art and visual images. This issue of Library Trends is "about" qualitative research in the same ways that Berger's Ways of Seeing is "about" art; we are using a concept--in the one case, art, in the other, qualitative research--to investigate a "way of knowing," to understand and make sense of the phenomena we observe in our professional and academic settings. In Berger's words:

Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can

speak. But there is also another sense in which seeing comes before

words. It is the seeing which establishes our place in the surrounding

world; we explain that world with words, but can never undo the fact that

we are surrounded by it. The relation between what we see and what we

know is never settled. ... This seeing which comes before words, and can

never be quite covered by them, is not a question of mechanically

responding to stimuli. ... We never look at just one thing; we are always

looking at the relation between things and ourselves. Our vision is

continually active, continually moving, continually holding things in a

circle around itself, constituting what ,is present to us as we are. ...

And often dialogue is an attempt to verbalize this--an attempt to explain

how, whether metaphorically or literally, "you see things," and

an attempt to discover how "he sees things." (pp. 7-9)

Qualitative research, in the way that the following articles discuss it and provide examples of its practice, is also about ways of seeing. Starting with "interesting, curious or anomalous phenomena" which the researcher "observes, discovers, or stumbles across" (Marshall & Rossman, 1995,p. 16), the qualitative researcher sees (observes) these in the context of a natural (rather than experimental) setting. The goal of research, whatever its methodology, is understanding gained through a process of discovery. What is expressed in qualitative research is a process of discovery which asserts particular assumptions of how knowledge is perceived and acquired--a particular epistemology--particularly knowledge of complex human social interactions.

This collection of articles grew out of Library Research Seminar I, a unique and wonderful conference held in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1996. The conference was unique in that it required presentations to demonstrate, in the supportive context of research, the confluence of academicians and practitioners. And the conference was wonderful because it succeeded so well in demonstrating the value and power of research for all areas of the profession. Because there was no published proceeding of the conference, we (along with others who were excited by the quality of the presentations) sought an outlet for publication. The papers represented many research traditions but, because it is our particular interest the large number of presentations employing a qualitative methodology or issuing from a naturalistic approach struck us as a significant indicator of the growing prevalence of qualitative research in the library-related contexts of the seminar.

Not all the articles in this issue of Library Trends are exactly as presented at the Library Research Seminar I. When we approached authors for contributions, many felt they wanted to refine their papers--either because of direct responses received at the seminar or because of the influence of others' seminar papers on their initial perspective. Original papers have also been added to broaden the library-related context to include such themes as the teaching of qualitative research and a view of qualitative research from the perspective of journal editors.

In assembling the presentations that follow, we started from the assumption that one of the key responsibilities of the library profession is to facilitate the process of perceiving and acquiring knowledge in an environment of complex human social interaction. Academics and practitioners share the responsibility in the complementary roles that they play in professional practice. They also share the responsibility for research, particularly research that risks accepted norms by informing--and being informed by--research methods and traditions that cross the boundaries of narrowly defined academic disciplines.

There have been many recent and excellent discussions about research traditions and disciplinary foundations in library and information science (e.g., Bradley, 1993; Budd, 1995; Glazier & Powell, 1992; Mellon, 1990; Pierce, 1987; Sandstrom & Sandstrom, 1995). We trust that the articles that follow will add significance to these discussions and make contributions of their own.

In an instructive bibliographic essay,Jim Horn traces four frameworks that have provided the underpinnings of many qualitative studies: symbolic interactionism, phenomenological description, contructivist hermeneutics, and critical studies. The richness of these informing traditions is indicative of the fertility that qualitative approaches hold out to the rigorous, receptive, and creative researcher.