Essentials of Critical Participatory Action Research

by Michelle Fine, María Elena Torre

Overview

The brief, practical texts in the Essentials of Qualitative Methods series introduce social science and psychology researchers to key approaches to qualitative methods, offering exciting opportunities to gather in-depth qualitative data and to develop rich and useful findings.

In this book, Michelle Fine and Maria Elena Torre provide an introduction to critical participatory action research, an approach that reveals the everyday stories of struggle and survival of the persons being studied, combats social injustice, and leverages social science research for action. Critical participatory action research challenges the narrow ways in which research has traditionally been conducted, and elevates the voices and perspectives of formerly marginalized groups.

About the Essentials of Qualitative Methods book series: Even for experienced researchers, selecting and correctly applying the right method can be challenging. In this groundbreaking series, leading experts in qualitative methods provide clear, crisp, and comprehensive descriptions of their approach, including its methodological integrity, and its benefits and limitations. Each book includes numerous examples to enable readers to quickly and thoroughly grasp how to leverage these valuable methods.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781433834615
Publisher:	American Psychological Association
Publication date:	07/06/2021
Series:	Essentials of Qualitative Methods Series
Pages:	118
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Michelle Fine, PhD, is a Distinguished Professor of Critical Psychology, Women's Studies, American Studies and Urban Education at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). Her primary research interest is the study of social injustice: when injustice appears as fair or deserved, when it is resisted, and how it is negotiated by those who pay the most serious price for social inequities. She studies these issues in public high schools, prisons, and with youth in urban communities, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. Dr. Fine is a founding faculty member of the Public Science Project, which produces critical scholarship for use in social policy debates and organizing movements for educational equity and human rights. Dr. Fine has been a visiting scholar at the University of New Zealand in Auckland and a Fulbright scholar at the Institute for Arab Studies at Haifa University. She and her colleagues have provided expert testimony in more than a dozen groundbreaking legal victories focused on gender, race, and class equity in education. Among other awards, Dr. Fine has received the 2013 American Psychological Association Award for Distinguished Contributions to Research in Public Policy, the 2012 Henry A. Murray Award from the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Division 8 of the American Psychological Association, the 2010 Social Justice and Higher Education Award from the College and Community Fellowship for her work in prison, and the 2011 Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award for her mentoring legacy over the past 25 years.

María Elena Torre, PhD, is the founding director of The Public Science Project. For the last 15 years, she has been engaged in critical participatory action research projects nationally and internationally with schools, prisons, and community-based organizations seeking to further social justice. Her work introduced the concept of 'participatory contact zones' to collaborative research, and she continues to be interested in how democratic methodologies, radical inclusion, and notions of solidarity impact scientific inquiry. Before becoming director of The Public Science Project, Dr. Torre was Chair of Education Studies at Eugene Lang College, The New School for Liberal Arts. She is a coauthor of Echoes of Brown: Youth Documenting and Performing the Legacy of Brown v. Board of Education and Changing Minds: The Impact of College on a Maximum Security Prison. Her writing can also be found in volumes such as the Handbook of Qualitative Research in Psychology (American Psychological Association), Participatory Action Research Approaches and Methods: Connecting People, Participation, and Place (Routledge), the Handbook of Action Research (SAGE), and in journals such as Feminism and Psychology, the Journal of Social Issues, Qualitative Inquiry, and the Journal of Critical Psychology. Dr. Torre was a recipient of the American Psychological Association Division 35 Adolescent Girls Task Force Emerging Scientist and the National Academy of Education/Spencer Foundation Fellowship in Social Justice & Social Development in Educational Studies, and is on the national board of the National Latino/a Education Research and Policy Project and What Kids Can Do. 

Table of Contents

Series Foreword Clara E. Hill Sarah Knox ix

1 Critical Participatory Action Research: Conceptual Foundations 3

Why CPAR? Critical Elements 6

Where Collective Wisdom Grows: Participatory Contact Zones 8

Situating CPAR in the Qualitative Traditions 10

Critical Epistemological Roots: Widening Our Understanding of Expertise 11

Disciplinary Elders: Historical Roots in Community-Based Inquiry 13

Crafting and Performing Public-Facing Scholarship for Action, Transformation, and Provocation 18

2 Participatory Design 21

Assembling a Diverse Community of Coresearchers 22

Designing Mirrors and Windows 26

Images of Opening Sessions 27

Methodological Release Points: Strategies for Unleashing Collective Wisdom 32

A Cautionary Note on Privilege in the Contact Zone 35

Building an Ethical Research Collective: Ethics and Institutional Review Boards 38

3 Participatory Knowledge Production 41

Piloting: Accountability to and Feedback From the Community 42

Finalizing the Instrument: A Qualitative Participatory National Survey? 46

Cascading Research Questions: Evolving Inquiries in the Participatory Contact Zone 47

Growing a Sample of Radical Inclusivity and Structural Intersectionality 50

Inquiry Marinating in Communities of Care, Concern, and Action 52

4 Participatory Analysis Moving Toward Action 53

Slicing the Data 54

Steps of Participatory Analysis: Culling the Database, Macro Review, and Then Coding 54

Coding: The Stones and Analysis 58

Creating a Codebook 59

Bending Analysis Toward Action 64

5 Vibrant Variations and Grounding Questions 69

Grounding Questions for Critical Participatory Inquiry 71

Participatory Research as a Tool of Struggle and Solidarity in Contentious Times 76

Challenges and Joys 76

6 Methodological Integrity 79

Fidelity and Diversity 80

To Be of Use: Action, Transformation, and Provocation 80

CPAR Touchstones for Integrity and Accountability 81

Evaluating CPAR: How Do You Know Whether It Is Good Enough? 82

7 Writing Process and Research Products 87

Epilogue: Critical PAR in Crisis: An Epistemic Offering Toward Solidarity 93

References 97

Index 105

About the Authors 113

About the Series Editors 117

Editorial Reviews

Excellent! This outstanding book illustrates how to engage in critical participatory research WITH, not ON, marginalized groups interested in challenging oppression. Rooted in the activist call of, “No research on us, without us,” Michelle Fine and María Elena Torre masterfully demonstrate how to tap into collective wisdom as they collaborate in research with diverse oppressed groups in an empowering, emancipatory, and ethical manner. Essentials of Critical Participatory Action Research is a must-read for researchers, social scientists, educators, and trainees who endorse a commitment to social justice.

Lillian Comas-Díaz

Essentials of Critical Participatory Action Research is an engaging text for scholar-activists who are interested in conducting qualitative research with and for communities that have been historically disenfranchised, erased, or pathologized in traditional research. The authors, with their vast knowledge of conducting critical qualitative research with marginalized communities, guide the reader in considering alternative and affirming methods and analyses, as well as nontraditional venues for disseminating their work. What I appreciate most about the text is its consistent integrations of intersectional analyses—reminding readers to acknowledge their own privilege while being vigilant for the inequitable power dynamics that are far too typical among “experts” conducting the research and “subjects” who need to be studied or saved.

Kevin L. Nadal

Excellent! This outstanding book illustrates how to engage in critical participatory research WITH, not ON, marginalized groups interested in challenging oppression. Rooted in the activist call of, “No research on us, without us,” Michelle Fine and María Elena Torre masterfully demonstrate how to tap into collective wisdom as they collaborate in research with diverse oppressed groups in an empowering, emancipatory, and ethical manner. Essentials of Critical Participatory Action Research is a must-read for researchers, social scientists, educators, and trainees who endorse a commitment to social justice.

Lillian Comas-Díaz