AESTHETIC FORMS OF DATA REPRESENTATION IN QUALITATIVE FAMILY THERAPY RESEARCH

Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, Jan 2005 by Piercy, Fred P, Benson, Kristen

If interpretive reality is socially constructed, how does the interpretive researcher tell good research from bad research? Inteipretivist researchers are beginning to use standards of validation that evaluate interpretive research in terms of pragmatic and moral concerns. Does the research support positive change? Is it catalytic, liberating, transformative? Does it empower? In Boal's (1979) and Fox's (1994) use of unscripted theater, for example, the representation itself is a form of intervention. So are many forms of participatory action research (Piercy & Thomas, 1998). Also, does the researcher follow a moral compass? Kvale (1996), for example, believes that beneficence should be the most basic guideline of interpretive research. Conquergood (1985) speaks of performance as a moral act. Similarly, referring to the field of music therapy, Bruscia (1998) calls for (among others) standards of personal and interpersonal integrity.

Interpretive researchers also ask whether the work resonates with the intended audience; is it compelling, powerful, and convincing (Osborne, 1990; Smith, 1984; van Manen, 1990)? That is, does it have verisimilitude, the appearance of being true or real? Finally, does it answer the "so what" question. That is, is it worth doing to begin with? According to Angen (2000), we have a moral obligation to research topics of practical value.

Richardson (2000a) states that these alternative forms have challenged disciplinary rules and boundaries on ethical, aesthetic, theoretical, and empirical grounds. Increasingly ethnographers want to write ethnography that is both scientific-in the sense of being true to the world known through the empirical senses-and literary-in the sense of expressing what one has learned through evocative writing techniques and forms. Richardson (2000a) suggests standards by which to judge the merit of interpretive ethnography. We believe that these standards are also applicable to other methods of data representation we discuss in this article. The important questions to ask are: (a) Does it make a substantive contribution?; (b) Does it have aesthetic merit?; (c) Does the author locate him/herself in the text?; (d) Does it have impact? (i.e., Does the work affect me emotionally? intellectually? Does it generate new questions? Does it move the audience to action?); and (e) Does the work seem credible? (i.e., Does it seem to capture lived reality?)

Similarly, Ellis (2000) asks whether the work is evocative. Does it engage both sides of the brain? Does it help the reader understand some social process or experience? Finally, does it employ the standards of good writing (i.e., Does it paint vivid pictures, sounds, smells, and feelings? Does it show versus tell? Does it create dramatic tension?)

Denzin (2000) maintains that qualitative interpretive writing about culture, beyond meeting aesthetic criteria, should be judged in terms of the critical, moral discourse it produces. That is, consistent with Denzin and Lincoln's (2000) seventh movement in the development of qualitative research: A text should be judged on its ability to point to a better world, one where democracy, empathy, and social justice prevail over oppression and marginalization.