Reimaging and Reconstructing Cross-Cultural Research Through Critical Personal Narratives: An Examination Into Fault Lines

• In Event: Are We There Yet? Building and Exploring Equity in Research-Community Partnerships of Varied Scales and Durations

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this paper is to explore the historical, political, and personal ways the cross-cultural experiences of the authors help us to interrogate the relations of power present in science education settings in our homes in the U.S. Using critical personal narratives (CPN) (Mutua & Swadener, 2004), we highlight two vignettes, from Author 1 and Author 2’s experiences, and discuss the ways our research impacted our conceptions of science and STEM education. Through this examination, we bring awareness to our consciousness about how our past cross-cultural studies have had lasting effects on our current work.

Theoretical Framework: Applying critical feminist theory: As the goal of this study through the use of CPN is to illustrate the impacts of our cross-culturalresearch in Africa on our current work in science and STEM education, we utilized critical feminist theories to guide our studies. Feminist theory, according to Dietz (2003), is [a] historically constituted, local and global, social and political movement with an emancipatory purpose and a normative content. It posits a subject (women), identifies a problem (the subjection and objectification of women through gendered relations), and expresses various aims …in the name of specific principles (e.g. equality, rights, liberty, autonomy, dignity, self-realization, recognition, respect, justice, freedom, p. 399). In our study, the problem was to explore the historical, political, and personal ways our cross-cultural experiences helped us to interrogate the relations of power present in science education settings back at home. The goal was not just to interpret/examine these power relations but to reshape and tip the scales of power towards equality.

Methodology: Using critical personal narratives (CPN): We interrogated our work and thoughts in the spirit of CPN (Mutua & Swadener, 2004). In their volume on decolonizing research, they ‘urged authors to explore the complexities, contradictions, and [im]possibilities of decolonizing research in essays or personal narratives’ (p. 16). We choose CPN as a methodology because it addresses issues of ‘power and knowledge in practice’ in the story form to ‘be accessible to a wider audience’ (Chapman, 2004, p. 72). CPN is intended for a public audience. Therefore, although personal understanding is involved, its purpose is political. Through the use of narratives, we lean on feminist scholars such as Spivak (1983).

Results: Due to the truncated nature of this proposal, we do not include the narratives but provide a description of the themes across the narratives. In the presentation, we will provide the full narratives.

Themes in shifting conceptions: A goal of our CPN analysis was to understand if there were commonalities in our experiences and to understand the way these experiences influenced our academic lives. We found three structural fault lines: (1) Formal conditions: the ways the research was constricted due to institutional and funders expectations and requirements, (2) Tensions around knowledge: a theoretical and methodological knowledge that is valued and the type of epistemological knowledge that is appreciated by the researchers, (3) Practical processes and dynamics: privileging product over process.

Authors

• Cassie Fay Quigley, University of Pittsburgh

• Ingrid Carter, Metropolitan State University of Denver