ABSTRACT
Qualitative methods often employ an inductive logic, as Ronald Berger and Laura Lorenz point out in Chapter 1, which begins not with deductive propositions or hypotheses but “with observations about the empirical world that may reveal experiences or issues not previously anticipated.” One concept or methodological orientation that increasingly finds its way into such work comes under the rubric of bricolage. The term bricolage translates literally from French as “tinkering” or “jack of all trades,” but in the context of a variety of fields—including the arts, humanities, social and behavioral sciences, education, health sciences, and information technology—it is analogous to a craftsperson who creatively blends or brings together a diverse range of available materials to produce a work of art or object of practical utility (Denzin and Lincoln 2011; Lévi-Strauss 1966). 2 In terms of qualitative inquiry, it bears similarity to mixed methods or to the combining of methods across multiple methodological traditions and scholarly disciplines in order to reveal greater nuance and complexity than could otherwise be garnered from any single approach. However, bricolage has the added connotation of spontaneity, improvisation, and creativity—even “wildness” (Lévi-Strauss 1966)—in the process of conducting research (Kincheloe, McLaren, and Steinberg 2011; Markham 2005; Nagington, Luker, and Walshe 2013; Rogers, M. 2012). Some scholars describe bricolage as a way to combine theoretical and empirical elements that do not always fit together well (Hammersly 1999), while others view the end-product as a quilt or collage that is created through the assemblage of different elements (Denzin and Lincoln 1999). According to Norman Denzin and Yvonna Lincoln (2011:4), a bricoleur “uses the aesthetic and material tools of his or her craft” to develop and take advantage of “whatever strategies, methods, and empirical materials are at hand.”
