ABSTRACT
The writing of research methodology puts researchers in a dilemma. A description that is too specific to one context makes it hard to generalize to other contexts, whereas too generalized a description makes it difficult to apply to any particular research context. In the paper entitled “Investigating washback in Japanese EFL classrooms: Problems of methodology” (Watanabe, 1996a), I argued for the importance of incorporating an ethnographic or qualitative approach to the research into washback, and described the process that I followed to investigate the washback effect in the context of the Japanese university entrance examination system (Watanabe, 1997b). Whereas the description of my 1996a paper was highly contextualized, the present chapter attempts to render the description usable in other contexts. In so doing, reference is made to the other chapters of this book where appropriate.
