A13- 14 - GONZALEZ JHOBELY - QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

1. Universidad de las Fuerzas Armadas ESPE
Unidad de Educación a Distancia
QUALITATIVE RESEARCH IN EDUCATION
THEME 13 – 14 : NARRATIVE
RESEARCH AND FEMINIST
RESEARCH
ACTIVITY 13 - 14
NAME: GONZALEZ ARZA JHOBELY
PATRICIA
TEACHER: MADRID GONZALEZ
SILVANA MARICELA

2. TITLE OF THE
RESEARCH:
Knowing feminism: the significance
of higher education to women’s
narratives of ‘becoming feminist’.
RESEARCH QUESTION:
How does higher education
influence university women in order
to develop in them an identity or
ideas of becoming feminist?

3. OBJECTIVE OF THE
RESEARCH
 The objective of the narrative research is :
Discover or explore how
women develop a feminist
consciousness and how it
enables women to define
politics identification and
participation by themselves
through higher education.

4. DATA COLLECTION METHODS
 In this research to collect data they use
a narrative interviews of twenty five
feminist women aged between twenty
and thirty- five and living in Uk and
incorporated photo – elicitation
methods.
 During the interviews the women were
asked to tell their story of becoming
feminist and to share images that were
significant to it.
 The women were recruited online
through social media, feminist blogs and
email lists, as well as a range of other
general interest groups.

5. REVELANT FINDINGS
1. Of the women interviewed , it can be found that
one had a basic degree, 14 had or were in their
final year of an undergraduate degree, one had a
postgraduate diploma, 6 had a master’s degree and
3 were studying for a PhD.
• All of these women were studying non-STEM
subjects at British universities :
 Science
 Technology
 Engineering
 Mathematics
Their subjects included:
 English
 Literature
 History
 Sociology
 Media
Studies subjects that offered opportunities to
engage with academic feminist thought.
2. The interviews highlighted different markers of
politicization.
Many of the women discussed the importance of
their engagement with academic feminist thought
for offering them the tools to reflect on their
understanding and experience of feminism.
3.The interviewees mention that the inclination,
instinct or feeling of feminists developed through
their education, through their studies they
provided a greater understanding of the term and
began a refine its meaning, in the same way it is
reported that education, offered a language to
fully articulate her feelings about the world and
recognize them as feminist.

6. 6.Gabriele Griffin (1998):questioned the narrative
of feminism’s progress and achievement within the
academy, arguing that it masks the more uneven,
insecure and ambiguous place that feminism
occupies within academia.
Indeed, this is still reflected today in the
institutional instability of gender studies in a
disciplinary bound context, where is contends with
the twin challenges of the marginalization of
intersectional studies and their categorization as a
special interest subject.
4. Academic feminism marked a shift in the feminist
identities of women.
They reflect on and reinterpret a feminism that was
knowable to them as inclination, instinct or feeling.
5. This affective commitment to feminism is
consolidated through formal education, resulting in
greater awareness and understanding.

7. The feminist identity of the interviewees:
 Lisa mentioned that her feminist identity developed as a
consequence of her experience of family life.
She considers that her women's home made her more prone to
feminism. However, it was her studies that facilitated an active
engagement with feminist ideas while she began searching for
feminist books, which further intensified her interest.
• Elizabeth mentioned that she almost always identify herself as
a feminist, even in quite young woman, she thinks it was just a
kind of instinct and tell us that it felt like: "Of course I'm a
feminist, everyone is a feminist“.
Since she started to focus a little more on it with her studies at
the university, it definitely helped her understand a lot more what
she means when she says that she is a feminist.
 Emma mentioned that her feminist identity developed when
did she go to university and she was looking at feminism in
movies and theater and then she began to realize that she
was in complete agreement with everything that feminism
involved.

8. CONCLUSIONS:
 For the women interviewed in this narrative research, it focuses on the fact that participation
in various forms of feminist activism was an important part of becoming a feminist.
 According to the accounts of the interviewees, becoming feminists or identifying their pre-
university feminist identities are the key to developing ideas of what feminism really means.
 Narrative methods, can offer a means of exploring the numerous and intersecting ways that
political identities are formed, understood and articulated. Such methods highlight the
processes of politicization that can´t be measured solely by participation in particular
practices. Indeed, they offer a means of understanding why and how an individual might
come to participate in these forms of political activism that are often taken as a marker of a
political identity.
 Interviews suggest that entering higher education offers opportunities to participate in
recognized forms of activism, such as marches. However, they also revealed the multiple
ways through which a feminist consciousness can develop.
 Feminist thought created a space for some women to reflect and renegotiate their feminist
identities.
 Lisa, Elizabeth and Emma illustrate how changes in political identity can occur through entry
into an academic community that validates feminist ideas.