Bridges to the Future: The Contributions of Qualitative Research to the Sociology of Education

Abstract

This article considers how qualitative research, conducted from an interpretive perspective, has enhanced knowledge of four substantive topics in the sociology of education: educational inequality, socialization and identity formation, school organization, and educational policy. In each area, qualitative studies have generated contextualized, process-sensitive knowledge and have introduced new voices, perspectives, and themes into traditional understanding. This research may enable the sociology of education to meet four additional challenges: generating theoretically rich examinations of schools as organizations; addressing issues of culture and education; developing broader social analyses of schooling and society; and incorporating perspectives on learning as situated, sociocultural activity into the study of schools as contexts for teaching and learning. Two aspects of the qualitative research tradition pose particular dilemmas and opportunities for sociology of education. First, qualitative research brings the sociology of education closer to the worlds of policy and practice, which may mute its critical voice. Second, since the sociology of education has been informed by qualitative research conducted from interdisciplinary vantage points and by researchers who do not identify themselves as sociologists, the boundaries of the field are permeable and fluid.