ABSTRACT
In chapter 2, we raised the issue of paradigms as a way of highlighting philosophical positions on knowledge and knowledge production necessarily present when anyone undertakes a research project. Stating them in an explicit manner allows us to see the various implications of each. Questions of epistemology are at stake; namely, different ways of knowing and understanding, and the means of expressing them. We saw that it is often the case that either/or scenarios are constructed between each of the paradigmatic approaches—positivist, hermeneutic, critical, action-based—and this may lead to an overly rigid research perspective. Nevertheless, it is useful to list the issues at stake between the researcher and the researched in terms of subjectivity, objectivity, theory, and practice, etc. as a way of positioning the work being carried out. Theory is obviously a problematic word, which might refer to anything from any one individual’s subjective, personally based rationale, or intuitive feeling, to highly formalized general statements with a strong predictive power. Both extremes, as well as various forms in between them, are of relevance and use in education and in the research activities engaged in to understand its processes.
