The Possibilities of Metaphor Inquiry: A Study of a Policy Dispute Over Reallocating Educational Funds

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Thursday 8:00 am Four Seasons Ballroom 1
  In Roundtable Session: Troubling What Is Taken for Granted in Qualitative Inquiry (Table 7)

Abstract

The tent under which qualitative research is conducted is becoming increasingly dynamic. Because the various paradigms play an important role in the framing of research studies, and in this instance a policy study, it is important to closely examine the decisions and choices that govern the methodologies and by extension the methods of analysis. In this paper we critically explore how our choice of metaphor inquiry framed us as we framed the study and its contributions to the outcomes. We discuss the possibility of it providing ‘answers’ to the questions and challenges we face as educators working in neo liberal contexts that are informing the policies and subsequent dispute in one state over the reallocating of educational funds.

Authors

• Anne E. Martin, Georgia State University

• Janice B. Fournillier, Georgia State University