9th UK JSWEC with 1st SW Research Conference

1. 1 9th UK JSWEC with 1st SW Research Conference Trafficking in facts: Exploring writing practices in social work Dr. Carolyn Taylor University of Salford

2. 2 1. Introduction Prevalence of interview data in SW research �Factist� perspective (Alasuutari, 1996): reality �out there�; ensuring reliability; narrow, pragmatic, commonsense view of �facts� (attitudes, behaviours, motives, what really happened) My aim - to expand repertoire of qualitative research methods & foci of research Texts - vital to/in SW practice & academia �Inertia of the text� (Smith, 1990) � receptacles for content Texts - �topic� not �resource�; focus not on reality (fact finding) but on �reality construction practices� (Gubrium & Holstein, 1997)

3. 3 Documents are: �social facts�, in that they are produced, shared & used in socially organized ways. They are not . . . transparent representations of organizational routines, decision-making processes or professional diagnoses. They construct particular kinds of representation with their own conventions . . We have to approach [them] for what they are & what they are used to accomplish. We should examine their place in organizational settings, the cultural values attached to them, their distinct types & forms. (Atkinson & Coffey, 2004: 58)

4. 4 Particular focus: reflective writing � one of many forms of professional writing taken for granted as a container of content, issues of form and function ignored (Taylor, in press) Trafficking in facts � collect, generate, use Identity work a key element in reflective writing � establishing who I am, what I know, what my relevancies are Simultaneously defining and being defined by an occupational identity

5. 5 2. Analysing identity Bashir: Did you (.) allow your friends, your close friends, to speak to Andrew Morton? Diana: Yes I did. Yes I did Bashir: Why Diana: I was (.) at the end of my tether (.) I was desperate (.) I think I was fed up with being (.) seen as someone who was a basket case (.) because I am very strong person (.) and I know that (.) causes complications (.) in the system (.) that I live in (1.0) ((smiles and purses lips)) Bashir: How would a book change that Diana: I dunno. ((raises eyebrows, looks away)) Maybe people have a better understanding (.) maybe there�s a lot of women out there who suffer (.) on the same level but in a different environment (.) who are unable to (.) stand up for themselves (.) because (.) their self-esteem is (.) cut into two. I dunno ((shakes head)) (Extract adapted from Potter, 2004: 208-9)

6. 6 2. Analysing identity: the discourse action model Discursive psychology � ethnomethodology, CA Identities as discursive products, �talked up� & negotiated in context of conversations & a/cs for specific interactional purposes No equivalence assumed between people�s a/cs & their internal experience & processes Talk and texts perform actions � e.g. blamings, justifications, management of personal accountability Rhetorical business of talk and text � versions constructed & positioned against actual/potential alternative a/cs & explanations.

7. 7 Preliminary Comments Different types of reflection-on-action (Sch�n, 1983) � new epistemology of practice part of longer reported a/c covering SW training, supervision, practice experience & postgraduate studies produced by Australian practitioner Critical career review

8. 8 �Boundary-work� articulated within studies of science Gieryn (1983: 781) emphasises the need to explore how �demarcation is routinely accomplished in practical, everyday settings�. E.g. science/not science; science/religion; science/technology; science/magic, myth

9. 9 Extract 1: Boundary-work & caring SW/not SW; good practice/poor practice Nursing: �hands on� physical care, of unskilled kind (�rubbing [wiping?] bums & cleaning mouths�); SW: meaningful engagement with patients � talking/listening; engaging with mind as well as body SW recognises family, context, environment Superiority of SW Contradictory elements � hosp. SWers; other versions of nursing & SW

10. 10 Trafficking in facts, performing care Caring as better way of knowing In opposition to medical model Caring not intrinsic to SW (or nursing etc.) Caring as process, to be performed in daily activities (incl. writing)

11. 11 Passing as a professional: An RGN has to perform in ways to pass (and I mean that in both senses) as an RGN. To hold on to that identity , she must go on passing for a nurse, an RGN, or she risks having her identity questioned, or at worst, being struck off . . . but what constitutes the identity to be passed, and the criteria or marks that will pass, are themselves contested, to be figured and reconfigured locally and specifically. (Latimer, 1999: 187)

12. 12 Extract 2: Boundaries, heroes & villains Registrar � villain - unthinking, not caring Nurse-journaller � heroine - challenges, reflects on practice, changes things, engages patient, ultimately �knows best� Traffics in facts to produce �the� (not �a�) version of events Obscures voice of others

13. 13 Figuring identity A professional identity is distinguished by certain characteristics, such as a degree of intelligence, altruism, or intuition, or a manner of conduct. Critically, professionals have knowledge and skills which others do not have, but which have to be acquired through educational and other practices, But it is not enough to have these things, they must be performed and displayed, continuously. (Latimer, 1999: 188-9)

14. 14 The performative aspects of talk (written and spoken), talk-in-action The rhetorical business of talk and text A way of exploring identity not as �the individual�s personal and private cognitive structure but discourse about the self� (Gergen, 2001: 247)

15. 15 Narratives . . . should not be read through to the life beyond but read reflexively as part of, as moves in, and as constituting the lives they are ostensibly �about�. (Edwards, 1997: 271)

16. 16 Concluding comments nature & purpose of SW research? provide underpinning substantive knowledge for practice? To identify what works? Pragmatic orientation sidesteps debates re methodologies & methods Institutional ethnography � analysing & making sense of professional practice Using ethnomethodology, conversation analysis etc to analyse talk & text To explore how practice is accomplished in its everyday routines To promote a reflexive understanding of the intricacies and ambiguities of practising as a social worker

17. 17 Trafficking in facts Personnel trafficked in . . . facts � they collected them, generated them, and used them in consequential ways. (Zimmerman, 1969: 354)

18. 18 A �factist� perspective: Reality - Clear-cut division between the world or reality �out there� and the claims made about it; language is a vehicle for communicating facts Reliability � a key issue is the truthfulness of the information or the honesty/trustworthiness of the informant i.e. not erroneous or misleading facts or dishonest people Pragmatic or common-sense notion of the truth and reality � researchers want to find out about actual behaviour, attitudes, motives or what really happened Narrow conception of worthwhile �facts� or data � it only makes use of subjects� statements that are believed to be the truth (Alasuutari, 1996)

19. 19 The four-step procedure for doing qualitative research: Obtain statements by interview or by observation in a natural setting. Look for broad similarities between the statements. If there are similarities which occur frequently, take these statements at face value, that is, as accurate accounts of what is really going on. Construct a generalised version of participants� accounts of what is going on, and present this as one�s own analytic conclusions. (Gilbert and Mulkay, 1984: 5)

20. 20 Example of a �factist� approach The three most popular aspects of being looked were improved material circumstances, individual member of staff and social workers, and the family environment offered by some foster carers. The three most unpopular features were homesickness and missing family and friends, the rules and structure of some residential units and foster homes, and the attitudes of staff in residential units, which were perceived as disparaging. (Skuse and Ward, 2005: 138).

21. 21 What is lost by a factist approach: It can nevertheless be said that to apply only the factist perspective to qualitative data is to underutilize it. In the richness of language the qualitative data include a lot of information, which also reveals things beyond the material itself. A great deal of it remains unused if language is thematized as a mere (and inaccurate) means of describing reality, as a mere lens. (Alasuutari, 1996, p. 62).

22. 22 Versions of the facts Social activities - repository of multiple meanings; descriptions - social, occasioned, indexical: The possibility of variation in & between versions of events built into fabric of every day life . . . Accounts constructed from a range of descriptive possibilities, & intimately tied to context in which they are produced & the functions they perform (Wooffitt, 2005: 16, 18).