Infusing ‘post’ thinking in qualitative training using material-performative pedagogies

Abstract

ABSTRACT The paper infuses post thinking in qualitative training by providing a concrete example of how students can learn to inquire through the posts in a graduate-level methods course. The paper begins by storying ‘the qualitative course’, outlining its structure and rationale. The qualitative course’s main post assignment (i.e. psychogeographic walk and performance) is then detailed and positioned as a material-performative pedagogy offering encounters that can transform students if they open themselves to the vulnerabilities and opportunities of inquiring on-the-move. Key next steps for the qualitative course are presented in terms of changing the name of the assignment, adding an object assignment, exposing students to the virtues of errant reading, inquiring as an act of creation and inquiring as epistemic witnessing. Implications for qualitative inquiry in sport, exercise, and health are offered that include attending to the relational ongoingness of existence, creating alternate understandings of understanding, and attuning to presences/absences. The paper concludes with thoughts on our collective response-ability to promote ontological pluralism. How we train the next generation of qualitative inquirers to play the ontological politics game has immense implications for presencing the manifold thoughts, concepts, and worlds that remain endarkened.