This book is the first volume of a two-volume edition based on the International Society for Information Studies Summit Vienna 2015 on 'The Information Society at the Crossroads. Response and Responsibility of the Sciences of Information' (see summit.is4is.org).The book represents a trans-disciplinary endeavor of the leading experts in the field of information studies posing the question for a better society, in which social and technological innovations help make information key to the flourishing of humanity and dispense with the bleak view of the dark side of information society.It is aimed at readers that conduct research into any aspect of information, information society and information technology, who develop or implement social or technological applications. It is also for those who have an interest in participating in setting the goals for sciences of information and social applications of technological achievements and scientific results.

Disruptive and creative research methodologies proposed in this book are designed to dismantle neoliberal narratives deployed in tourism studies and wider social sciences. Progressing criticality in tourism studies, this volume showcases cutting-edge contributions ranging from reflexivity, subjectivities, and dreams; to messy emotions in auto-ethnographic accounts of fieldwork; 'motherhood capital' accessing Inuit communities; collective memory work; ethnodrama and creative non-fiction, amongst others. Disruption and creativity are the two ideas around which tourism geographers challenge and begin dismantling hegemonic ideologies in tourism studies. The chapters in this book provide a vantage point from where to disrupt first, before tourism geographers can engender progress and transformation within and outside of the field. In tourism studies in general, and tourism geography in particular, the years of the 2000s have witnessed an emphasis on qualitative methodological research, both in terms of the topics addressed and the types of methodological tools. In many ways, this legitimisation of qualitative work mirrors developments in other areas such as human geography, sociology and anthropology, in which this book is anchored. The authors debate in more depth how tourism studies offer multidimensional, multilogical and multi-emotional approaches to research design. The chapters were originally published as a special issue of the journal, Tourism Geographies.

Drawing on a rich variety of participatory action research methods including ethnographic observation, artefact collection, focus groups, and interviews, this volume explores the transformational potential of development programs which actively involve marginalized groups. Foregrounding the experiences of women migrant workers in Beirut, the text reveals how direct participation in NGO-led, community programs and education empowers women to create counter-cultural communities and spaces for learning and activism. The text ultimately combines aspects of critical pedagogy, spatial analysis, and Third World feminisms to propose a critical subaltern praxis for research, development, and teaching. It will appeal to scholars and researchers with interests in research methods in education, migration, equality and human rights and the anthropology of education.

Showcasing fuzzy set theory, this book highlights the enormous potential of fuzzy logic in helping to analyse the complexity of a wide range of socio-economic patterns and behaviour. The contributions to this volume explore the most up-to-date fuzzy-set methods for the measurement of socio-economic phenomena in a multidimensional and/or dynamic perspective. Thus far, fuzzy-set theory has primarily been utilised in the social sciences in the field of poverty measurement. These chapters examine the latest work in this area, while also exploring further applications including social exclusion, the labour market, educational mismatch, sustainability, quality of life and violence against women. The authors demonstrate that real-world situations are often characterised by imprecision, uncertainty and vagueness, which cannot be properly described by the classical set theory which uses a simple true-false binary logic. By contrast, fuzzy-set theory has been shown to be a powerful tool for describing the multidimensionality and complexity of social phenomena. This book will be of significant interest to economists, statisticians and sociologists utilising quantitative methods to explore socio-economic phenomena.

Narrative Portraits in Qualitative Research offers an analytical approach to qualitative data. Through narrative portraiture, research findings can be contextualised in broader social narratives without losing sight of the unique personal qualities of the research encounter. Drawing a parallel between the artistic work of a portrait maker in depicting a subject - sometimes an object - and the work of the researcher in exploring people's experiences, narrative portraiture invites a close-up into a person's narrated and embodied experience and argues that one of the main research findings in qualitative research is the person themselves; their circumstances, and their life story. The book proposes four approaches to narrative portraiture: (1) a systematic approach to narrative analysis, (2) the use of phronesis in narrative portraiture, (3) the concept of 'imagined portraits' as a collaborative approach between visual arts and social sciences, and (4) the use of 'performative portraits' both as an analytic tool and product for research communication. This book will help qualitative researchers create first-person narratives that will give a glimpse into the participants' lives in a way that is simultaneously deep, concise, and evocative. This book will be suitable for those interested in narrative methods and qualitative research in health care, education, and the social sciences.

Narrative Portraits in Qualitative Research offers an analytical approach to qualitative data. Through narrative portraiture, research findings can be contextualised in broader social narratives without losing sight of the unique personal qualities of the research encounter. Drawing a parallel between the artistic work of a portrait maker in depicting a subject - sometimes an object - and the work of the researcher in exploring people's experiences, narrative portraiture invites a close-up into a person's narrated and embodied experience and argues that one of the main research findings in qualitative research is the person themselves; their circumstances, and their life story. The book proposes four approaches to narrative portraiture: (1) a systematic approach to narrative analysis, (2) the use of phronesis in narrative portraiture, (3) the concept of 'imagined portraits' as a collaborative approach between visual arts and social sciences, and (4) the use of 'performative portraits' both as an analytic tool and product for research communication. This book will help qualitative researchers create first-person narratives that will give a glimpse into the participants' lives in a way that is simultaneously deep, concise, and evocative. This book will be suitable for those interested in narrative methods and qualitative research in health care, education, and the social sciences.

Exploring the mechanisms underlying performance comparisons, Performance Comparison and Organizational Service Provision investigates how such assessments shape hospitals' service provision and medical professionals' work. With a focus on U.S. health care, this study outlines how medical quality was defined and compared in the hospital sector from the late 19th century to the present. Developing a novel theoretical framework to investigate performance comparisons, several different forms of internal and external performance assessments are contrasted throughout this period. The transformative effects of these comparisons on hospitals' relationships to patients, insurers, regulators, and staff are analyzed and their ramifications for current hospital care are explored. Drawing on this analysis, the book examines the controversial nature of these measures and the struggles among hospital managers, patients, physicians, and policy makers to determine hospital quality. Affording a deeper understanding of how performance comparisons influence organizational service provision, the book will be of interest to researchers in a broad range of fields including organization studies, accountability and evaluation, health care, and policy research as well as practitioners in hospital care and management.

Research doesn't exist in a bubble but co-exists with a multitude of other tasks and commitments, yet there is more need for people to save time than ever before. Brilliantly attuned to the demands placed on researchers, this book considers how students, academics and professionals alike can save time and stress without compromising the quality of their research or its outcomes. This third edition: - is fully revised with new chapters on research and evaluation ethics, creative methods of collecting data and how research can make a positive difference; - includes illustrative case studies throughout the book, and each chapter concludes with exercises, discussion questions and a debate topic; - is accompanied by a fully updated companion website. This supportive book is designed for any student or practitioner who wants to know how to do research on top of their main job, and still have a life.

This book explores how, why and when hermeneutic phenomenology can be used as a methodology in health and social research. Providing actual examples of doing robust hermeneutic phenomenology and a focus on praxis, the book demonstrates how philosophical or theoretical notions can inform, enrich and enhance our research projects. The chapters offer examples of many different research designs and interpretive decisions in order to illustrate the unbounded and creative nature of this type of inquiry, whilst also demonstrating the trustworthiness of the scientific processes adopted. The chapter authors invite the reader on a unique journey that highlights how they made individual and tailored decisions throughout their projects, emphasising the challenges and joys they encountered. This book is a valuable resource for all students and academics who wish to explore the meaningfulness of human lived experiences across the multitude of phenomena in health and social care.

How can excellence in the teaching of research methods be encouraged and ensured? This question has become increasingly important following the adoption of research methodology as a core part of many postgraduate and undergraduate courses. There has, however, been little discussion about the aims and methods of teaching the subject. In this volume; a number of authors from a variety of countries and disciplines employ their knowledge and experience towards the development of a 'pedagogical culture' in research methods. Their aim is to establish the extent of common concerns and challenges and to demonstrate ways in which these are being met. Intended to provide both a stimulus and source materials for the development of a more substantial and systematic literature in the field, the book will be of great interest to all those teaching research methods courses within social science disciplines.

The A to Z of Creative Writing Methods is an alphabetical collection of essays to prompt consideration of method within creative writing research and practice. Almost sixty contributors from a range of writing traditions and across multiple forms and genre are represented in this volume: from poets, essayists, novelists and performance writers, to graphic novelists, illustrators, and those engaged in multi-media writing or writing-related arts activism. Contributors bring to this collection their distinct and diverse literary and cultural contexts, defining, expanding and enacting the methods they describe, and providing new possibilities for creative writing practice. Accessible and provocative, A to Z of Creative Writing Methods lays bare new developments and directions in the field, making it an invaluable resource for the teachers, research students and scholar-practitioners in the field of creative writing studies.

Reimagining Narrative Therapy Through Practice Stories and Autoethnography takes a new pedagogical approach to teaching and learning in contemporary narrative therapy, based in autoethnography and storytelling. The individual client stories aim to paint each therapeutic meeting in such detail that the reader will come to feel as though they actually know the two or more people in the room. This approach moves beyond the standard narrative practice of teaching by transcripts and steps into teaching narrative therapy through autoethnography. The intention of these 'teaching tales' is to offer the reader an opportunity to enter into the very 'heart and soul' of narrative therapy practice, much like reading a novel has you enter into the lives of the characters that inhabit it. This work has been used by the authors in MA and PhD level classrooms, workshops, week-long intensive courses, and conferences around the world, where it has received commendations from both newcomer and veteran narrative therapists. The aim of this book is to introduce narrative therapy and the value of integrating autoethnographic methods to students and new clinicians. It can also serve as a useful tool for advanced teachers of narrative practices. In addition, it will appeal to established clinicians who are curious about narrative therapy (who may be looking to add it to their practice), as well as students and scholars of autoethnography and qualitative inquiry and methods.

Postdisciplinary Knowledge is the first book to articulate postdisciplinarity in philosophical, theoretical and methodological terms, helping to establish it as an important intellectual movement of the twenty-first century. It formulates what postdisciplinarity is, and how it can be implemented in research practice. The diverse chapters present a rich collection of highly creative thought-provoking essays and methodological insights. Written by a number of pioneering intellectuals with a range of backgrounds and research foci, these chapters cover a broad spectrum of areas demonstrating alternative ways of producing knowledge. Essays are interspersed with dialogue, encouraging a comprehensive and engaging discussion on this emerging movement. Not limited to a specific field or discipline, this will be of great interest to upper-level students and researchers in a wide range of subject areas, including: tourism, sociology, education, psychology, physiotherapy, fine arts, architecture and design, as well as those with a general interest in epistemology and methodology.

"The mission of Research Methodology in Strategy and Management is "to provide a forum for critique, commentary, and discussion about key methodology issues in the strategic management field" because "strategic management relies on an array of complex methods drawn from various allied disciplines to examine how managers attempt to lead their firms toward success." This tenth volume was commissioned following the Academy of Management Global Conference in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2013. Reflecting a diversity of Africa-born authors in the mainland and diaspora, as well as non-Africans whose research focus on Africa, it offers a collection of high impact research that makes a major contribution in advancing management education and knowledge in Africa."

Participatory Case Study Work shows academic co-researchers how to adapt and implement their methods so that data collection and analysis is authentically participatory. At the heart of this text is advocating a participatory approach to case study work, with co-construction as a catalyst for shared understanding and action in advancing ageing studies. Whilst case study research has a relatively long tradition in the canon of research methodologies, little attention has so far been paid to the importance and value of participatory case study work. This is surprising as its egalitarian and democratic value-base naturally lends itself to the co-production and co-creation of personal and collective theory drawn directly from lived experience. The book brings together over 15 years' worth of participatory case study work in ageing studies in which the editors have been actively involved as either front-line researchers or as supervisors to PhD and MPhil studies adopting the methodology, and from where each of the contributors is selected. Real-life case examples are shared in the main chapters of the book and they provide direction as to how learning can be applied to other settings. The chapters also contain key references and recommended reading. This volume will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students as well as postdoctoral researchers interested in fields such as research methods, qualitative methods, ageing studies and mental health studies.

This book is devoted to the reintroduction of the remarkable approach to sociological inquiry developed by Harvey Sacks. Sacks's original analyses - concerned with the lived detail of action and language-in-interaction, discoverable in members' actual activities - demonstrated a means of doing sociology that had previously seemed impossible. In so doing, Sacks provided for highly technical, detailed, yet stunningly simple solutions to some of the most trenchant troubles for the social sciences relating to language, culture, meaning, knowledge, action, and social organisation. In this original collection, scholars working in a range of different fields, including sociology, human geography, communication and media studies, social psychology, and linguistics, outline the ways in which their work has been inspired, influenced, and shaped by Sacks's approach, as well as how their current research is taking Sacks's legacy forward in new directions. As such, the collection is intended to provide both an introduction to, and critical exploration of, the work of Harvey Sacks and its continued relevance for the analysis of contemporary society.

This book introduces the notion of culinary capital to investigate socialisation and school mealtime experiences in an academy school based in the UK. Drawing on interviews collated from children, teachers and staff within the school, the text sheds light on food insecurity in society and schools as being major issue in educational policy. The book examines schools as a microcosm for society with school food space being the playground for socialisation. It shows how forms of culinary capital can be extended in the school dining hall where social space is negotiated with notions of inclusion and exclusion during mealtime. The book uses gender, class and race to understand the school dining hall as a space where culinary capital can be exchanged and learnt. Thorough research accompanied by ethnographic visuals, field notes and observations, it also explores the sensory impact of school gardens. As such the book will be of interest to students, teachers, school leaders, educators and policy makers in the fields of Education, Sociology, Social Policy and Food Studies.

With a triadic perspective, this autoethnographic narrative explores the temporal, situated nature of interactions between the author as an adoptee with her adult adopted children as well as those between herself and her birth father and mother. The epiphanic adoptive family narratives that are foregrounded seek to deepen and challenge understanding of how kinship affinities are experienced. The autoethnographic narratives are written in a critical, evocative style which is valuable for two reasons. Firstly, the processes of reflexive self-introspection, self-observation and dialogue with relational others have established a critical connection between recognising and responding to kinship affinities and personal growth. Secondly, lying at the intersection of the self and other this narrative contributes to deepening insights around epistemic in/justice in adoptive kinship. This book will be of interest to educators and scholars of adoption in offering an insider perspective on unique family relationships as well as how the author undertakes critical evocative autoethnography. Adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth parents will also find the narratives in Part II of this book of particular interest in informing an understanding of kin relationships and how these may be subject to change over time.

This newly revised and updated second edition of the Research Handbook on International Law and Terrorism provides a comprehensive overview of international counter-terrorism law and practice from the perspectives of human rights, the law of armed conflict, the law on use of force, and international criminal law. Brand new and revised chapters provide critical commentary on the law from leading scholars and practitioners in the field. Major controversies in the global legal response to terrorism are examined, including up-to-date analyses of the war on terror, drone strikes and targeted killings, torture and rendition, indefinite detention, military trials, and UN Security Council measures and sanctions. New topics for this edition are assessed, focusing on foreign terrorist fighters, the nexus between organized crime and terrorism, and the prevention of violent extremism. Exploring developments from before and after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the Research Handbook also includes new analysis of contemporary threats such as Islamic State, and discusses the law of regional organizations and selected national practice. International law scholars and practitioners, as well as government and United Nations legal advisers, will find this an invaluable reference on a complex area of legal inquiry. It will also prove a critical read for academics and students in international relations, terrorism studies, security studies, war studies, and human rights.

This innovative volume showcases the possibilities of autoethnography as a means of exploring the complexities of transnational identity construction for learners, teachers, and practitioners in English language teaching (ELT). // The book unpacks the dynamics of today's landscape of language education which sees practitioners and students with nuanced personal and professional histories inhabit liminal spaces as they traverse national, cultural, linguistic, ideological, and political borders, thereby impacting their identity construction and engagement with pedagogies and practices across different educational domains. The volume draws on solo and collaborative autoethnographies of transnational language practitioners to question such well-established ELT binaries such as 'center'/'periphery' and 'native'/non-native' and issues of identity-related concepts such as ideologies, discourses, agency, and self-reflexibility. In so doing, the book also underscores the unique affordances of autoethnography as a methodological tool for better understanding transnational identity construction in ELT and bringing to the fore key perspectives in emerging areas of study within applied linguistics. // This dynamic collection will appeal to students, scholars, and practitioners in English language teaching, applied linguistics, TESOL education, educational linguistics, and sociolinguistics.

Whether looking for guidance on the whole process, needing help with conducting a literature review or interpreting your quantitative and qualitative data, this accessible and empowering guide will take you through the dissertation process and provide all the information you need to make the most of your research project. This edition includes: - new discussions on critical analysis and the use of internet and social media research data - an expanded chapter on quantitative method and a new section on mixed methods research - case studies from a broader range of education and early childhood settings, both formal and informal - an extended range of types of data analysis discussed - updated references and recommended reading suggestions throughout, reflecting changes in legislation - a glossary of key terms - new end-of-chapter reflective tasks - a new companion website providing all checklists and templates in the book as downloadable resources as well as new mind mapping templates, a supervisor record form, sample ethics form, sample letters to research settings, a pre-submission final checklist, research proposal examples and guidance on setting out tables, figures, appendices and managing your endnotes and reference list Successful Dissertations is the essential guide for all undergraduate researchers starting a dissertation project in an Education department.

With numerous approaches to choose from, knowing where to start when doing qualitative data analysis (QDA) can be a challenge. This book gives you direction with an accessible and thorough introduction to nine different approaches to QDA, written by a multi-disciplinary team with years of experience teaching and analysing data using these methods. With a clear focus on the 'how to' of QDA, each chapter includes: *Step-by-step descriptions of how to apply each approach in your research *Online and in-text activities to help you practice your skills *Annotated reading lists so you can dig deeper into key topics *Case studies from a range of disciplines so you can see how each approach works in practice. The perfect companion on your journey through QDA, the book also offers a comprehensive introduction to the use of NVivo QDA software, helping both new and experienced researchers get to grips with the essentials.

This textbook guides the reader on how to undertake high-quality literature reviews, from traditional narrative to protocol-driven reviews. The guidance covers a broad range of purposes, disciplines and research paradigms. Whether the literature review is part of a research project, doctoral study, dissertation or a stand-alone study, the book offers approaches, methods, tools, tips and guidelines to produce more effective literature reviews in an efficient manner. The numerous examples are drawn from an array of subject areas, such as economics, healthcare, education, medicine, psychology, software engineering amongst others. This makes it worthwhile for a wide range of studies and for reviews into evidence-based interventions, policies, practices and treatments. There is attention given to presenting, reporting and publishing literature reviews. With the additional clarity brought about by explanatory tables and graphs, this textbook is a 'must-have' for all students, researchers, academics and practitioners at any stage of their project or career when engaging with literature. In addition, citizens, policymakers and practitioners will benefit from the guidance with better insight into how literature reviews could and should have been conducted.