Norman K. Denzin - The Landscape of Qualitative Research: Theories and Issues Volume 1

Cover

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INTERNATIONAL ADVISORY BOARD

James A. Anderson
Communication, University of Utah

Robert Burgess
Sociology, University of Warwick

Arlene Kaplan Daniels
Sociology, Northwestern University

Michelle Fine
Social Psychology, CUNY-Graduate Center

Anton Kuzel
Family Medicine, Medical College of Virginia

Kenneth J. Gergen
Psychology, Swarthmore College

Henry Giroux
Education, Pennsylvania State University

Jaber F. Gubrium
Sociology, University of Florida

Meaghan Morris
Cultural Studies, Independent Scholar

David Silverman
Sociology, Goldsmith College, University of London

Robert E. Stake
Education, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

John Van Maanen
Sloan School, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

William Foote Whyte
Sociology, Cornell University

Harry Wolcott
Education and Anthropology, University of Oregon

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The
Landscape
of
Qualitative
Research

Theories and Issues

Norman K. Denzin
Yvonna S. Lincoln
Editors

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Copyright 1998 by Sage Publications, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

For information:

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Main entry under title:
The landscape of qualitative research: Theories and issues / edited
by Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-7619-1433-1 (pbk. : acid-free paper)
1. Social sciencesResearch. 2. Qualitative reasoning.
I. Denzin, Norman K. II. Lincoln, Yvonna S.
H62.L274 1998
300'.7'2dc21 98-8869

00 01 02 03 04 8 7 6 5 4

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For more than two decades, a quiet methodological revolution has been taking place in the social sciences. A blurring of disciplinary boundaries has occurred. The social sciences and humanities have drawn closer together in a mutual focus on an interpretive, qualitative approach to research and theory. Although these trends are not new, the extent to which the "qualitative revolution" has overtaken the social sciences and related professional fields has been nothing short of amazing.

Reflecting this revolution, a host of textbooks, journals, research monographs, and readers have been published in recent years. In 1994, we published the Handbook of Qualitative Research in an attempt to represent the field in its entirety, to take stock of how far it had come and how far it might yet go. Although it became abundantly clear that the "field" of qualitative research is defined primarily by tensions, contradictions, and hesitationsand that they exist in a less-than-unified arenawe believed that the handbook could be valuable for solidifying, interpreting, and organizing the field in spite of the essential differences that characterize it.