This document discusses the need for new directions in qualitative research methods. It argues that traditional qualitative research has become formulaic and fails to address important issues like reification of data and lack of consideration of concepts like temporality and materiality. The document then explores potential new directions, including personal reflection on one's research, developing method guides, and using creative and digital methods. It provides an example research project that maps across digital spaces and combines visual and semiotic analysis. Finally, it stresses that doctoral researchers should challenge assumptions, experiment with different knowledge generation techniques, and focus on methodology.

1. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
New Directions for Qualitative Research
Katrina Pritchard
ISBE DOCTORAL DAY 27/10/21
k.l.pritchard@swansea.ac.uk
@ProfKPritchard
katrinapritchard.wordpress.com

2. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
SESSION SUMMARY
• Why new directions?
• Going back to look forward:
• Personal reflection
• Method guides
• Methodological challenge
• Which way next: unpacking an example
• Implications for doctoral students

3. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
WHY
NEW DIRECTIONS?

4. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
WHY NEW DIRECTIONS?
• Conducting empirical research is essentially a process of
extraction followed by a process of abstraction
• We extract words, numbers, images (or whatever) then
through various methodological interventions we abstract
meaning
• Because our identity as researchers is so vested in this
abstraction of meaning (in short, our contribution),
empirical researchers tend towards reifying data as some
‘thing’ capable of meaning, as meaningful
• We are often complacent about these issues

5. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
NEW DIRECTIONS?
ACADEMIC
PERSPECTIVE
Tiring of the quantitative vs qualitative battle
fought in traditional terms
Formulaic qualitative studies (interview plus
generic thematic analysis)
Data reification and obsession with big data
(Markham, 2018)
Ontological/epistemological challenge of post-
qualitative thinking (St Pierre, 2019)
Recognising (and rejecting) the historic
research (Liu, 2020)
Reprioritising fundamental concepts such as
temporality and materiality

6. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
DO WE NEED NEW
DIRECTIONS?
A
RESEARCH CONTEXT
PERSPECTIVE
Ever expanding notions of entrepreneurial
Challenge of diversity
Digitalization of work and non-work
Multimodal life
Covid-19 pandemic
Authentic, sustainable and ethical business

7. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
DO WE NEED NEW DIRECTIONS?
Academic
Research
Context
Which
Direction
?

8. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
GOING BACK TO
LOOK FORWARD

9. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
GOING BACK TO LOOK FORWARD
HRM
•Ethnography
•Discourse analysis
Identity &
Diversity
•Interview studies
•Digital methods
•Visual methods
•Narrative analysis
Entrepreneurship
•Interview studies
•Digital methods
•Visual Methods
•Material and creative methods

10. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
GOING BACK TO LOOK FORWARD
HRM
•Ethnography
•Discourse analysis
Identity &
Diversity
•Interview studies
•Digital methods
•Visual methods
•Narrative analysis
Entrepreneurship
•Interview studies
•Digital methods
•Visual Methods
•Material & creative methods
Personal Reflection
Method Guides
Methodological
Challenge

11. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
PERSONAL REFLECTION
• Critically unpacking my own research journey and
experiences
• Making sense of knowledge production via qualitative
methods
• Examining the limitations of text

12. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
METHOD GUIDES
• Mapping out methodological implications of doing things
differently
• Unpacking issues traditionally associated with secondary data
and looking at digital data in new ways
• Thinking about visual methods for larger scale qualitative
research

13. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
METHODOLOGICAL CHALLENGE
• Challenging assumptions
about appropriate objects of
study
• Turning sociomateriality back
onto research practice
• Learning more about the
socio-historical production of
knowledge (self-challenge)
• Extending exploration of multi-
modal research

14. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
WHICH WAY NEXT?
UNPACKING AN
EXAMPLE

15. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
EXPLORING GENDERED CONSTRUCTIONS OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP
• Digital spaces seen as either representation of the entrepreneurial or site of
entrepreneurial activity – but how are these recursively intertwined? (Swan,
2017)
• How do digital spaces operate as sites of public pedagogy? (Stead and
Elliot, 2019)
• Existing research tends to impose a static frame onto digital spaces, to hold
them in place for analysis – what happens when you allow movement?
• Consider masculinity and femininity within same research study

16. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Search
Top Ten
Search
Related
Images
Agency
Categorisatio
n and Tags
Image Library Digital Space
Search Engine Digital Space
Texts &
Additiona
l Images
Online
Media
Use
Online Media Digital Spaces
START HERE

17. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
PROJECT OVERVIEW
Search
Top Ten
Search
Related
Images
Agency
Categorisatio
n and Tags
Image Library Digital Space
Search Engine Digital Space
Texts &
Additiona
l Images
Online
Media
Use
Online Media Digital Spaces
START HERE 1: MAP ACROSS
2: FOLLOW
3: UNPACK ADVICE
FINISH HERE!

18. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
MAPPING ACROSS: THE METHODS
Portrait
Analysis
(Davison, 2010)
Physical, Dress,
Interpersonal,
Spatial Codes
Combined Visual Analysis CVA (Pritchard, 2020)
Categorical Compositional Montage (what are these images of)
Thematic Compositional Analysis (how are these images constructed)
Semiotic Analysis (what might these images mean)
Specific Visual features:
Gaze (e.g. Martinez, 2020) and Gesture (e.g. Kendon, 2004)
Collecting digital data
Tracking and Trawling (Whiting and Pritchard, 2020)

19. © 2021 Katrina Pritchard. All rights reserved.
IMPLICATIONS FOR DOCTORAL RESEARCHERS
• Method matters!
• Make friends with ontology and epistemology
• Push the boundaries and play
• Unpack different ways of generating knowledges
• Attend methods events and read methodological papers
• Later: organise and write