Negotiating the Complexities of Qualitative Research in Higher Education: Essential Elements and Issues

Negotiating the Complexities of Qualitative Research in Higher Education illuminates the complex nature of qualitative research, while attending to issues of application. This text addresses the essentials of research through discussion of strategies, ethical issues, and challenges in higher education. In addition to walking through the methodological steps, this text considers the conceptual reasons behind qualitative research and explores how to conduct qualitative research that is rigorous, thoughtful, and theoretically coherent. Seasoned researchers Jones, Torres, and Arminio combine high-level theory with practical applications and examples, showing how research in higher education can produce improved learning outcomes for students, especially those who have been historically marginalized. This book will help students in higher education graduate programs to cultivate an appreciation for the complexity and ambiguity of the research and the ways to think through questions and tensions that emerge in the process.

New in This Edition:

• Emphasis on participant representation and researcher reflexivity and positionality
• Additional conceptual frameworks that ground qualitative work in higher education and analyze power to reveal structural inequities
• A wider array of approaches including Participatory Action Research, Critical Discourse Analysis, and visual methodologies and methods
• A new chapter on writing that covers getting started, writing as analysis, writing to capture complexity, and positioning oneself in writing
• Updated citations and content throughout to reflect the newest thinking and scholarship
• New end-of-chapter discussion questions and activities to bolster accessibility of theory and help instructors support students' work on their course research projects.

Susan R. Jones is Professor Emeritus, Department of Educational Studies at The Ohio State University, USA. Dr. Jones was the recipient of NCORE's 2021 Equity and Social Justice Award for Scholarship.

Vasti Torres is Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at Indiana University, USA.

Jan Arminio is Retired Professor and Director of the Higher Education Program at George Mason University, USA.