voice in research: introducing and problematising voice

NCRM is funded by the Economic and Social Research CouncilNCRM is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council1

Voice in Research: Introducing and

problematising voice Melanie Nind

University of Southampton

NCRM is funded by the Economic and Social Research CouncilNCRM is funded by the Economic and Social Research Council

My own engagement with voice• Voice as the focus of research• Hearing critical voices on the subject of voice• The researcher’s own voice

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Learning about voice

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Finding a voice

“If they don’t listen I shout, and when I shout they listen” (Clarke et al, 2011)

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Not finding a voiceChildren’s Centre: Mandy is sitting at the snack table with three other children and one adult who is passing drinks and food. Mandy’s key-worker approaches and helps a boy into a supported chair. Both adults focus on the boy and Mandy waits patiently, then reaches out to her key-worker, trying to take a cup she is holding. The key-worker responds by asking 'Do you want a drink Mandy?’, then leaves to fetch a tissue to wipe Mandy’s nose. The other staff member passes Mandy an empty cup. Mandy takes the cup, pulls it towards her to drink but is told in a simplified, clipped fashion: 'waiting Mandy, waiting’. The adult then holds the cup and takes Mandy’s hand in hers, nominally to help her pour milk from a jug, saying ‘Pouring, good girl’.

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The key-worker returns and the cup is taken from Mandy with no explanation. Her hands are held in a gentle restraint as the key-worker wipes her nose. Mandy is given more milk and drinks thirstily. She is then offered grapes one at a time, but the adult attention is on helping the neighbouring boy and talking to children nearby. With her attention divided, it takes some time for the adult to notice Mandy’s intentional signals for more (reaching out to take the bottle of a passing child, then banging her open hand on the table using a signal for “more” that she has been taught in this setting). After seven minutes at the snack table, Mandy’s key-worker returns, helps her down from her seat and offers her a choice of play activities using PECs cards. (Nind et al, 2010)

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Finding a collective voice

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Missing voices in research• Girls with SEBD (Lloyd & O’Regan, 2000)• Voice vs silence & marginalisation• ‘some voices are difficult to hear because of a lack of

conventional communication resources, a hesitant or inarticulate delivery and a marginalised social status’ (Corbett 1996)

• But participatory research methods can provide meaningful ways for girls to construct and better understand their own narratives (Clarke et al, 2011)

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Barely heard voices• Clough & Barton (1998: 129) write of the need

to ‘turn up the volume’ on some participants’ voices

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Rise in interest in voice• Especially children’s voices - legislative,

political, economic & theoretical reasons (Tangen, 2008)

• Following Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) ‘there has been a torrent of initiatives worldwide involving hearing children’s views in matters that concern them’ (Lewis & Porter, 2007: 223).

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The problem with voice• “voice has frequently been privileged because

it has been assumed that voice can speak the truth of consciousness and experience” (Mazzei & Jackson, 2009:1)

• Hence cries for giving voice, making voices heard etc; voice as retrievable, stable

• Need “to deconstruct the epistemological limits of voice” (Mazzei & Jackson, 2009:3)

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Giving voice• Is voice a gift?• Does voice, like power, need to be taken?

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A voice in what?• ‘a central question for researchers who invoke

the concept of voice… is “a voice in what?”’ (Swain and French, 1998: 41)

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The problem of speaking for others

1. Careful analysis of the impetus to speak - ‘the very decision to “move over” or retreat can occur only from a position of privilege’ (Alcoff, 1991-2: 24).

2. Interrogation of ‘the bearing of our location and context on what it is we are saying’ (p. 25).

3. Question to whom one is accountable - political/epistemological choice (p. 25).

4. ‘Need to analyze the probable or actual effects of the words on the discursive and material context’ (p. 26).

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The option of speaking with• Transformative approaches to student voice:

theoretical underpinnings, recalcitrant realities (Fielding, 2004) - not choice of adult silence or dominance - adults working in partnership, speaking with rather than for young people.

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Co-speaking • Whose voices does the academy allow?• Co-research, co-analysis, co-writing …• But painful – See McClimens (2007) ‘This is

my truth, tell me yours’

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The power of silence• Defence• Resistance• Speaking through silence

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The danger of essentialism• Naïve to seek out pure voices e.g. ‘pupil voice is

neither neutral nor “authentic”, but is produced by/within dominant discourses’ (Thomson and Gunter, 2006: 852)

• Simply ‘presenting their “exact words” as if they are transparent is a move that fails to consider how as researchers we are always already shaping those “exact words” through the unequal power relationships present and by our own exploitative research agendas and timelines’ (Mazzei and Jackson, 2009: 2),

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References• Alcoff, L. (1991-2) The problem of speaking for others, Cultural Critique, 20, 5-32.• Clarke, G., Boorman, G. & Nind, M. (2011) ‘If they don’t listen I shout, and when I

shout they listen’: hearing the voices of girls with behavioural, emotional and social difficulties, British Educational Research Journal, 37(5), 765-80.

• Corbett, J. (1998) ‘Voice’ in emancipatory research: imaginative listening, in: P. Clough & L. Barton (Eds) Articulating with difficulty: research voices in inclusive education (London, Paul Chapman).

• Fielding, M. (2004) Transformative approaches to student voice: theoretical underpinnings, recalcitrant realities, British Educational Research Journal, 30(2), 295-311.

• Jackson, A.Y. & Mazzei, L.A. (Eds) (2009) Voice in qualitative inquiry. Challenging conventional, interpretive, and critical conceptions in qualitative research, (London, Routledge).

• Lewis, A. & Porter, J (2007) Research and pupil voice, in: L. Florian (Ed.) The Sage handbook of special education (London, Sage)..

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• Lloyd, G. & O’Regan, A. (2000) ‘You have to learn to love yourself ‘cos no one else will.’ Young women with social, emotional or behavioural difficulties’ and the idea of the underclass, Gender and Education, 12(1), 39-52.

• McClimens, A. (2007) This is my truth, tell me yours, British Journal of Learning Disabilities, 36, 271–276.

• Nind, M., Flewitt, R. & Payler, J. (2010) The social experience of early childhood for children with learning disabilities: Inclusion, competence and agency, British Journal of Sociology of Education, 31(6), 653-70.

• Swain, J. & French S. (1998) A voice in what? Researching the lives and experiences of visually disabled people, in: P. Clough & L. Barton (Eds) Articulating with difficulty: research voices in inclusive education (London, Paul Chapman).

• Tangen, R. (2008) Listening to children’s voices in educational research: some theoretical and methodological problems, European Journal of Special Needs Education, 23(2), 157-66.

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• Thomson, P. & Gunter, H. (2006) From ‘consulting pupils’ to ‘pupils as researchers’: a situated case narrative, British Educational Research Journal, 32(6), 839-856.

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voice in research: introducing and problematising voice

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