Research guides practice and is superior to practice. The Interpretivist paradigm insists that one can be a researcher and a teacher at the same time. A researcher does not need to step back to achieve an objective understanding of the subject studied, because one can never be truly objective. Observation is always within a certain context. To the Postpositivist researcher or teacher, language is a transparent medium for communicating information about external reality, Willis said.
Language is a mirror of reality and is used to describe external reality.
Interpretivists, on the other hand, hold that language cannot and does not mirror reality. Meaning is socially created and carries a shared, socially-constructed view of the world. In other words, meaning is developed collaboratively. Meaning comes from context and groups decide what words mean. Meaning in language is created through reactions.