General methodological approach

In this section I will explicate my understanding of how the combination of discourse analysis and narrative analysis provide a productive overarching framework for the analyses in this project.

4.2.1 Discourse analysis

Discourse analysis is not a unified method with defined procedures, but must be perceived as a collection of several, diverse analytical approaches. The understanding of language as what constitutes our social world and identity is however a unifying point of departure for these approaches. Despite the diversity, there are some approaches to discourse analysis that can be identified as individual strands with distinct conceptions of analytical aims and objectives.

Three such strands can in particular be singled out, namely; “Critical Discourse Analysis”,

“Discourse theory” and “Discourse psychology” (Torfing, 1999; Howarth, 2000; Wetherell, Taylor and Yates, 2001; Philips and Jørgensen, 2002; Howarth and Torfing, 2005). The

analyses in this thesis are inspired by the two latter approaches. None of these are explicit about concrete analytical procedures, but provide a constructive interpretive repertoire and framework (Wetherell, Taylor and Yates, 2001; Philips and Jørgensen, 2002; Howarth and Torfing, 2005).

I first and foremost draw on “Discourse theory’s” poststructuralist conception of all social practises and systems of meaning as discursive. The analytical aim for the “Discourse theory” - approach is to study and illuminate how meaning, groups and identities are

established by the way signifiers are defined and fixed (Torfing, 1999; Howarth, 2000; Philips and Jørgensen, 2002; Howarth and Torfing, 2005). My conception of subject positions and my identification of these, in addition to the emphasis on negotiation as significant in the construction of identity, draw on this approach. In addition, discourse theory emphasises the political and public elements of discourse, which also is paramount in my approach to teacher identity in this thesis (Torfing, 1999; Howarth, 2000; Howarth and Torfing, 2005). This first approach to discourse analysis is combined with elements from “Discourse psychology”. The aim for the studies in this thesis is to explore how identity is constructed in the narrating process. The interpretive framework “Discourse psychology” offers is adequate for my research for three reasons. Firstly, this approach claims that psychological phenomena, such as identity, must be seen as social activities and not as deeper “essences” behind/beyond language. This is very much in keeping with the conception of identity construction that underwrites this thesis. Secondly, the main aim for analysis within a “Discourse psychology”- approach, is to conduct studies of how discursively produced recourses is used as language constitutes and negotiates meaning and subjectivity. This includes an emphasis on narratives as paramount in the construction of self and identity, which is highly relevant for my project (Gergen, 2001; Hollway, 2001; Philips and Jørgensen, 2002). Thirdly, this approach provides an interpretive repertoire to identify processes of positioning and how this generates certain identities (Davies and Harre, 2001).

4.2.2 Narrative analysis and analysis of narrative

The two approaches to discourse analysis presented above, gives a sound and productive interpretive framework for the investigation of how public narratives use discursively

produced resources to position teachers within certain identities. As narrative analysis has the potential to better grasp the more temporal and thematic elements in the narrative processes, I decided to draw on elements from narrative analysis in addition to the previously presented approaches to discourse analysis.

Currently “narrative analysis” within educational research include a broad and diverse selection of theoretical perspectives, traditions and analytical approaches. In a review article Rogan and de Kock (2005) has organised a series of approaches to narrative analysis within three main clusters; a) the performative methods cluster with focus on the construction of narratives in for example interviews, b) the structural methods cluster that focus on details in text, such as for example how words are used and the “… exploration of the concrete,

technical aspects of the language of the narratives” (Rogan and de Kock, 2005, p. 635) and finally the c) literary methods cluster with emphasis on figurative language, plots, and themes of the texts. Analytical approaches in this third cluster are less detailed than the previous category and are thus more concerned with whole text analysis (Rogan and de Kock, 2005).

My studies can be categorised within this latter cluster of approaches, as my aim is to identify how plots and temporal and thematic elements in public narratives position teachers within certain identities. The identification of such overarching narrative elements has therefore been central in my analyses.

Polkinghorne (1995) distinguishes between two basic modes of narrative inquiry. The first is called ‘Analysis of narratives’ and is convenient when the material consists of several narrative accounts. The researcher investigates these narrative accounts in order to “…locate common themes or conceptual manifestations…” (Polkinghorne, 1995, p.13) across the selected accounts. According to Polkinghorne, the identified concepts can be generated from theory, former research or the analysed material itself. The second mode of narrative inquiry Polkinghorne describe is called ‘Narrative analyses’. Within this approach, the researcher organise elements from the material into a narrative account that can take form of a plot or other modes of “…explanation that is retrospective, having linked past events together to account for how a final outcome might have come about” (Polkinghorne, 1995, p.16). The point here is to link narrative statements to each other in such a way that they construct a reasonable whole.

I draw on both these approaches in my analyses. In the two first readings of the material, where the intention was to identify narrative resources, I was inspired by an

‘Analysis of narrative’- approach. Subject positions and identity constructions were generated from narrative accounts from the three sources of material, with the intention to search for tendencies across the material.

In the third reading, where the aim was to investigate how the narrative editing techniques (positioning, plots and counter-narratives) positioned teachers within certain

mode. Each set of material was read separately and organised as narrative accounts (such as plots and counter-narratives) by themes, temporality, sequences and contingence that was identified in the texts. The more detailed descriptions of how this was done will be further outlined in the following section where all the analytical readings will be described more in detail.