Centre for Narrative Research, UEL
and
Centre for Language, Discourse, and
Communication, King’s College
Wednesday November 14th
5:30- 7:00 pm; 5:15 refreshments
Room G/8, Franklin-Wilkins Building, Waterloo Bridge Wing
Ruthellen Josselson*
Narrative Research and the Challenge of Accumulating Knowledge
Narrative research has produced an array of richly-detailed expositions of life as lived, wellinterpreted studies full of nuance and insight that befit the complexity of human lives. Narrative
researchers, situated differently, study different people, make highly contextualized interpretations and
theorize their understandings differently. We are then met with the problem of building a knowledge
base that can amalgamate the insight and understandings across researchers. This is a problem that has
yet to be taken up directly within narrative research.
This talk inquires into the necessity and possibilities of amalgamation of knowledge obtained
through narrative research. As narrative studies, with their accompanying interpretations, accumulate,
how do we “add them up?” What would a meta-analysis of narrative studies look like? The challenge that
confronts us is how assimilate narrative understanding at a conceptual level in a way that does not return
to a modernist frame, treating the various research reports as “facts” – but rather to treat them as situated
interpretations. Insights from anthropology suggest some approaches to dealing with these dilemmas.
Conversation is offered as a metaphor and context within which knowledge is to be understood.
Ruthellen Josselson, Ph.D., ABPP, is a professor of psychology at the Fielding Graduate University and was
formerly a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and visiting professor at Harvard University.
Author of numerous books and scholarly articles, she has co-edited 11 volumes of the series The Narrative
Study of Lives.
* Professor Josselson will also be holding an informal workshop for PhD students from 2:30-4. If you are interested
in attending, please contact Molly Andrews m.andrews@uel.ac.uk or Alexandra Georgakopoulou
Alexandra.georgakopoulou@kcl.ac.uk