Critical for Whom? Theoretical and Methodological Dilemmas in Critical Approaches to Language Research

• In Event: Humanizing Research: Decolonizing Research With Youth and Communities

Abstract

In this paper, the author investigates the need for a theoretical and a practical way of understanding how moral sources are conceptualized in critical studies, the impact on those affected by the research and implications of adopted moral compasses. Using examples from her research with young African American and Latina/children, the author addresses the question: “Critical for whom?” Working through this question allows her to investigate theoretical and methodological dilemmas associated with critical approaches to language and literacy research. In doing so, the author takes on the challenge of formulating an analytical approach to research and praxis that can accommodate both the power of the discursive social field as well as the moral impulse to take a stand—bringing critical discourse analysis and conversational narrative analysis together to establish critical narrative analysis (CNA).
In terms of praxis, this paper offers immediate implications for researchers of language and literacy interested in models of humanization. One way of envisioning praxis through research is an engagement in culture circles– in which individuals engage simultaneously with the word and the world. Freire (1970) proposed the development of a critical meta-awareness, which allows people to engage in social action to solve problems and address issues they identify in their own narratives. This meta-awareness allows people to have a relationship of appropriation (as opposed to colonization) with language (Chouliaraki & Fairclough, 1999) and thus applies critical analysis to identify, problematize, take a stand, and engage in social action to change their situations. Working from several years engaging young Latina/o and African American children in culture circles about language, this paper offers examples how researchers can use CNA with young people to come to understand—and act to change—dominant views about their heritage ways with words.

References
Chouliaraki, L., & Fairclough, N. (1999). Discourse in late modernity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum.

Author

• Mariana Souto-Manning, Teachers College, Columbia University