Teaching Qalitative Methodologies as Praxis: Five Tales from South Korea

Abstract

Informed by Patti Lather’s notion of ‘research as praxis,’ the purpose of this article is to provide the meaning of teaching qualitative research in South Korea wherein whose academic culture has been highly influenced, if not dominated, by the West. In this respect, the authors conceptualize the experiences of teaching qualitative research to undergraduate and graduate students in South Korea. For this study, we employed a critical incident technique that summarizes and describes the data in a useful manner, while at the same time sacrificing as little as possible of their comprehensiveness, specificity, and validity. Three authors have collected stories, experiences, and reflections on teaching qualitative methodologies, and then categorized their reflections of these experiences. The stories the authors tell entail five themes as follows; teaching qualitative research as (a) dangerous practice, (b) painful practice, (c) horrifying practice, (d) educative practice, and (e) brave practice. Each practice, as a metaphor, illuminate the meanings of the practices of teaching qualitative research in South Korea. The authors conclude the article with questions to provoke Korean researchers to rethink and reflect on their practices of teaching and conducting qualitative research in the Korean context and beyond. In doing so, the authors intend to contribute to the international discourse of teaching qualitative research which embraces various experiences and interpretations within different contexts.