Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to further examine ‘place-reflexivity’ as a methodological tool for engaging in site-seeing in qualitative research. Qualitative research often involves a site or field. Yet, the ‘where’ of qualitative research has often been overlooked in methodological discussions. This approach is akin to sightseeing where sites are a backdrop rather than foregrounded. We draw on scholarship that conceptualizes site, place, field, and context from sociological, geographical and anthropological disciplines, as well as on concepts of third space as they apply to qualitative inquiry. We offer an argument for the fuller inclusion, and expanded treatment of sites including tools to assist qualitative researchers with this type of thinking.
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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Raji Swaminathan
Raji Swaminathan is Professor in the Department of Educational Policy & Community Studies in the School of Education at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She has authored three books on qualitative research methods. Her research is in the areas of urban schools, creative pedagogies and school leadership within qualitative research.
Thalia M. Mulvihill
Thalia M. Mulvihill, Professor of Higher Education and Assistant Provost at Ball State University. She directed two doctoral programs, and graduate certificates in Qualitative Research and University Teaching. She coedits The Teacher Educator, authored five qualitative research books, and the recipient of numerous outstanding teaching, research, and mentoring awards.