Methodology, the Western, and myself: the West/non-West binary in a non-Western educational researcher's pursuit for a PhD
Edited book (chapter)
Chapter Title | Methodology, the Western, and myself: the West/non-West binary in a non-Western educational researcher's pursuit for a PhD |
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Book Chapter Category | Edited book (chapter) |
ERA Publisher ID | 3137 |
3415 | |
Book Title | Beyond binaries in education research |
Authors | |
Author | Saito, Akihiro |
Editors | Midgley, Warren, Tyler, Mark A., Danaher, Patrick Alan and Mander, Alison |
Page Range | 17-26 |
Series | Routledge Research in Education |
Chapter Number | 2 |
Number of Pages | 10 |
Year | 2011 |
Publisher | Routledge |
Taylor & Francis | |
Place of Publication | New York, USA |
ISBN | 9780415885126 |
Web Address (URL) | http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415885126/ |
Abstract | Contemporary educational research, as other social science disciplines, is embedded in Western intellectual traditions. Such is a reiterated motif in non-Western academia as well as cross-cultural research. Where methods and methodologies as invented in one geographical place are deemed as foreign, there arises a suspicion: 'Are those foreign methods and methodologies valid in our local context?' Although this question appears to posit a valuable thought-provoking vantage point for a non-Western researcher, there seems to lurk a dualism that perpetuates the binary relationship of West versus Non-West. This chapter depicts how the author as a non-Western educational researcher sought to reconcile this binary through an ongoing dialogue with his inner self as a non-Westerner about the identity formation of himself, of the founders of methods and methodologies, and of non-Western academia. The chapter is structured through four stages. First, I lay a backdrop to the chapter in which I retrospect on my experience that gave rise to and guided my reflection on the binary. Second, I tell a narrative of the nation to which I (am purported to) belong so as to restore historicity that recontextualises the binary. Third, I seek to unfix the subject positions that conform to the binary discourse in the context of performance and performativity. Fourth, I identify the way a dualism operates behind the suspicion. I argue the validity of methodologies cannot be dismissed on the mere basis of the dualism undergirded in the use of essentialist categories revolving around the discourse of binary: the foreign as other versus the local as self. Such a methodological distrust seems to be valuable, but in reality it is circular and limiting. It fails to be reflexive about its own dichotomous assumptions. |
Keywords | education research; education; research; binary opposites; West; non-West |
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020 | 369999. Other creative arts and writing not elsewhere classified |
390203. Sociology of education | |
500319. Poststructuralism | |
470212. Multicultural, intercultural and cross-cultural studies | |
500206. History and philosophy of the social sciences | |
Public Notes | Files associated with this item cannot be displayed due to copyright restrictions. |
Byline Affiliations | Faculty of Education |
https://research.usq.edu.au/item/9zzy0/methodology-the-western-and-myself-the-west-non-west-binary-in-a-non-western-educational-researcher-s-pursuit-for-a-phd
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