Post-Qualitative Methodology: From Portraiture to Componere

• In Event: 25.085 - Sheraton Roundtable One - Osgoode Ballroom
  In Roundtable Session: 25.085-1 - Complex Machines in Action: Assemblages, Circuitries, and Compositions

Abstract

Based on her years of research experiences, Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot (1997) pioneered the distinctive method, Portraiture, in social science inquiry. The field of fine art, in a word, creates experiences of aesthetic appreciation through a sense of synesthesia. Inspired by Lawrence-Lightfoot and her remarkable methodology, this article proposed a progression of portraiture, a methodological progression I call Componere. Literally meaning “to put together,” the Latin term Componere is the root of the English phrase, musical composition (Harper-Scott & Samson, 2009). Aspects including participants (featured musicians), data (folksongs) collection, data analysis (transcribing, notating and contemplating) and the final composition as part of the methodology will be discussed specifically in the article.

Author

• Mila Zhu, Dallas Independent School District