| Friday, April 20, 2007 |
| Research |
Laurel Richardson's life work through her research is impossible to summarize. When I asked her about her research and the things she has gained from it, she mentioned several important conclusions she drew:
"Again, you have my vita. The most important conclusions I draw from my work are: (1) Knowledge is culturally created and socially received. How can we create cultures and societies which nurture knowledge (and knowledge makers) who focus on ways to calm--yet change--the world, reduce strife, yet affirm difference, develop pathways which honor the walker upon the path. (2) The Personal is the Political. The division between writing about the self and writing about the society is a false and limiting one. (3) There are multiple ways of telling the story---poetry, narrative, statistic charts, music, dance...no reason to limit the telling mechanism, nor the teller. (4) Life is good. I'm having fun. "
The link to Ms. Richardson's curriculum vitae is found here: http://www.sociology.ohio-state.edu/lwr/cvitae.php. In particular, the list of research she has taken interest in, according to her website, include: Qualitative Methodology, Gender, Contemporary Theory, Feminist Theory, Interpretive Studies, Theory and Practice of Ethnographic Representation, Cultural Studies, Arts-Based Research. Her main focus, is of course, sociology, although she delves into other branches related to sociology, and some research into the arts that isn't based on sociology at all.
The conclusion she wrote about that most interested me was when she said that "The division between writing about the self and writing about the society is a false and limiting one." This is evident in her latest book, "Last Writes: A Daybook for a Dying Friend," in which she takes a very personal look into a social situation, and is able to draw conclusions which can be related to society as a whole, or other similar situations. (The concept, once again, of "The Personal Is Political")The ethics of this personal situation, as well as what can be learned about the situation as a whole, are all taken into account to relate to society on a much broader scale.
Another such example of her writing reflecting "the personal is political" is in her book "The New Other Woman" (http://www.amazon.com/New-Other-Woman-Laurel-Richardson/dp/0029268915) In this book, Ms. Richardson interviews individual cases of "other women" to give a picture of a much larger scale. Some of the facts she uses to relate these individual stories to a much larger scale. For example, in the first chapter of her book (p.1), Ms. Richardson lays out the facts: "In the 1980's, somewhere between 40 and 50% of men report having had affairs and for those with incomes above $60,000, the figure rises to 70%. Over 15% of husbands report having a series of affairs." The topic of her book definitely is the personal story of the "other woman," but the facts (or the political, if you will) stand behind her statements and conjoin the personal and the science behind it.
Laurel Richardson's work reflects her personal belief system that supports the self and the science; the personal is political. |
posted by J Mancini @ 3:47 PM  |
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