Newsgroups: bit.listserv.qualrs-l
Date:         Thu, 13 Aug 1992 12:07:41 EDT
              <QUALRS-L@UGA.BITNET>
From:         jude <JGOETZ@UGA.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: Social Organization of Qualitative Researchers
              13 Aug 1992 11:30:52 EDT from <lbb@DUKGERI.GERI.DUKE.EDU>

On Thu, 13 Aug 1992 11:30:52 EDT Lucille B. Bearon said:

>I am interested in learning more about the social organization
>of qualitative researchers in the US.  Do you know of any
>studies which have been done on this topic?

I don't know of any studies as such.  There is relevant material in
some articles on qualitative research, on the history of areas like
the anthropology of education, and on related topics (for
example, Eisner and Peshkin's introduction to "Qualitative Inquiry
in Education:  The Continuing Debate," 1990).
One reason for this may be that those people who do qualitative
research don't always label what they are doing qualitative.
For example, some of the alternative labels used are naturalistic
research, interpretive research, phenomenological research,
and ethnography--and this doesn't exhaust the list.

>For example, are we
>mostly isolated researchers, perhaps the token qualitative researcher
>in our department, university, or applied setting?  Are there
>organized coalitions of people bound together by their methodological
>preferences--such as professional organizations of qualitative
>researchers, or sections or caucuses within organizations?  I know
>that my major professional organization, The Gerontological Society
>of America, has a "Qualitative Interest Group".  Are there universities
>where qualitative research is institutionalized in formal programs in
>qualitative methods (more than 2 courses), a department of qualitative
>studies, a center for qualitative studies, etc?  Besides the journals
>mentioned recently on this E-mail, and the E-mail network itself, what
>other vehicles for communication exist--e.g., newsletters or regular
>columns in newsletters?
>I would appreciate any information you care to send.

Those are good questions.  Bruce Fraser at Boston University and I
have been talking about a history of qualitative research, but I
hadn't thought to frame it as a history of qualitative researchers.
At the University of Georgia, qualitative researchers from all
across the university have been organized since the mid-1980s as
QUIG, the Qualitative Interest Group.  QUIG sponsors this
discussion group and an annual conference.  It supports an
expanding, interdisciplinary program of courses and contributes
to such departmental efforts as the summer workshop in
qualitative research run by the sociology department.  QUIG
also runs activities throughout the year for its local faculty;
this year a student group was organized (you guessed it, SQUIG).

On the national and international level, many organizations
support qualitative research in the human sciences.  Some are
special interest groups of larger organizations, like the
Qualitative Research SIG of the American Educational Research
Association.  Others are independent groups whose members
do mostly--but not exclusively--qualitative research:  the
Council on Anthropology and Education (CAE) and the Society for
the Study of Symbolic Interactionism (SSSI), for example.
The CAE and the SSSI both support quarterly journals:
"Anthropology and Education Quarterly" and "Symbolic
Interaction"  The SSSI has a newsletter too, but the CAE
uses as an equivalent a column in the "Anthropology
Newsletter"  a monthly publication of the American
Anthropological Association.  In summary, a variety of vehicles
exist to support and foster qualitative research.  Maybe if
we pool all our knowledge about these, we can compose a
QUALRS-L Directory of Qualitative Resources.  Luci, would
you be willing to collect such information if we all tried to
supply it? jude

>My E-mail address is LBB@dukgeri.geri.duke.edu.
>Thanks
>Luci Bearon, VA Medical Center, Durham, NC

*************************************************************
* Judith Preissle-Goetz                                     *
* Professor of Anthropology and Education                   *
* Social Science Education              Voice: 404-542-6489 *
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* University of Georgia                  BITNET: JGOETZ@UGA *
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