Re: december reading

From: Judy Diamondstone (diamonju@rci.rutgers.edu)
Date: Sat Dec 11 1999 - 08:24:52 PST


Eva, on the nub yet again. thanks to everyone here - Judy

At 10:12 AM 12/11/99 +0100, you wrote:
>At 12.15 -0500 99-12-10, Stanton Wortham wrote:
>>First, let's be clear that I did not do this interview myself.
>
>Yes. That was perfectly clear. It was also perfectly clear that the
>interview took place in the mid-80s, and that the transcripts were
>"generously made available to me" by another researcher.
>
>My choice of words in asking for compassion was probably not the most
>effective, if you read it as meaning you should have formed a compassionate
>relationship with the IRL Margaret, which is evidently out of question
>under the circumstances. What I tried to mean was that it should be
>acknowledged somewhere in the text that, in the first place, the interview
>subject is not a liar who just makes up her story of institutionalisation:
>I assume there is some truth in it, that she DID go to a Catholic boarding
>school between age five and age ten. Etc. And in the second place that a
>child of that age will hardly have much of a say against the adults in a
>case like this. Again, she is telling the truth, and this could be
>acknowledged.
>
>Your emphasis on the interactional positioning puts the referential aspect
>of the narrative in question more than is necessary.
>
>>But the
>>point does nonetheless raise an interesting question about the position
>>of the researcher
>
>It does. Again compassion may not have been the best word for the job, but
>I was struck by the parallel between the interactional positioning of the
>reading, analyzing, arguing authorial "I" of the text -- which is a very
>distanced persona -- and the interactional positioning of the interviewer
>which is explicitly described as distanced, even when "the interviewer
>could have appropriately responded in the storytelling event with
>sympathy". This similarity, too, I would like to see acknowledged in the
>name of fairness.
>
>>and as someone interested in exploring positioning
>>I can't very well sidestep this.
>
>I agree.
>
>>But I'm not willing to give up the
>>analytic rigor that the paper begins to provide for this sort of
>>analysis.
>
>I understand that.
>
>>Too much narrative analysis is sympathetic and unconvincing.
>
>I am listening.
>
>>So the question is whether we can do systematic and empirically
>>plausible research that also shows compassion for and perhaps even forms
>>relationships with subjects (though in this case of course I couldn't
>>form a relationship because I do not even know this woman's real name).
>
>OK, as I said, this forming of a relationship with the IRL Margaret was not
>what I asked for.
>
>>I guess I would like to know more about whether people are asking me to
>>change the tone a bit by inserting sympathetic sentences here and there,
>>or whether they think that a fundamentally different sort of approach to
>>the problem is necessary.
>
>Well, that choice is for you to make.
>
>regards
>Eva
>
>
>

Judith Diamondstone (732) 932-7496 Ext. 352
Graduate School of Education
Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey
10 Seminary Place
New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1183



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