In any research project it is important to decide on a particular epistemology - or the systematised study of knowledge, from a particular theoretical orientation - which is then addressed empirically (Creswell, 1994; Holloway, 1997; Fawcett & Hearn, 2004). Whilst formulating my research aims and questions for this project, I considered several different approaches which I believed were appropriate to my research aims, including thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006), grounded theory (Glasser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990), as well as various phenomenological methods (e.g. Finlay’s (2009) relational phenomenology; Van Manen’s (1990) hermeneutic phenomenology; Aspers’ (2004) empirical phenomenology) amongst others. Before proceeding with an analysis of my chosen phenomenological approach, I will provide a brief summary of the aforementioned approaches and a rationale as to why I concluded to a phenomenological methodology.
Developed by Braun & Clarke (2006), thematic analysis is considered the simplest form of analysing and clustering large amounts of textual data into codes and themes (Boyatzis, 1998). Its simplicity stems from the fact that it lacks a particular theoretical underpinning, hence it can be applied to analysis of qualitative data without necessarily adhering to particular epistemology. This offers the method a particular ‘flexibility’ (Braun & Clarke, 2006, p. 78), which allows the data to be interpreted using either an essentialist or an interpretivist epistemological perspective. Although this flexibility can be proven very useful, I considered adopting a method with a clearer theoretical and epistemological standpoint: if one aims to understand emergent social processes, such as the
64 transnationalisation (Sassen, 1988; Vetrovec, 2001; Beck, 2002) and cosmopolitanisation of human experience under globalised conditions (Beck, 2002), an interpretivist epistemological standpoint is more appropriate. The focus of the current work is on understanding the lived experience of skilled migrants who have decided to settle in London and on exploring how they negotiate their identities in everyday life. I am particularly interested in exploring the meaning they attribute to their sociality patterns as well as the meaning the attribute to the multiple identities they negotiate in a global city context. My research aims to reflect a phenomenological standpoint, as I am focusing on how participants make sense of their lived experience (Van Manen, 1990; Holloway, 1997; Starks &
Trinidad, 2007), while negotiating transnational practices and cosmopolitan openness in their sociality patterns.
Looking for a method with a stronger epistemological standpoint than thematic analysis, I also considered Grounded Theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990; Charmaz, 2006). In both phenomenological and grounded theory approaches the focus of the study is the participants’
story, as it emerges from the data (Strauss & Trinidad, 2007). Considering my research aims (i.e.
examining patterns of sociality in the context of London; identifying how participants negotiate multiple identities in their everyday lives after settling in London), this approach was also relevant. In line with an interpretivist focus, grounded theory research places special emphasis on context; on how participants’ narratives are constructed as well as on the roles people adopt in this context (Holloway, 1997). Nevertheless, the goal of grounded theory is to discover the basic social processes underlying a phenomenon in a particular setting (Willig, 2001; Starks & Trinidad, 2007); hence the final goal is weighing more towards understanding the underlying structure rather than individual experiences in light of emerging social phenomena, such as transnational practices and the development of cosmopolitan attitudes. Revisiting the old structure-agency debate, I preferred the use of a method that focused more on the agency of social actors in constructing their realities (Fearfull, 2005), whilst also noting the social structures involved in such reality constructions (Aspers, 2004).
Irrespective of variations in grounded theory approaches, the shared aim in grounded theory is to discover a data-driven theory (Willing, 2001; Starks & Trinidad, 2007; Charmaz, 2009), by a thorough examination of the concepts utilised by participants to describe their experience (Holloway, 1997).
Although grounded theory does not begin with a hypothesis in the traditional positivist sense, the end goal is still the generation of a theory to be applied in a particular context; working hypotheses and propositions are an essential part of the process during data analysis (Holloway, 1997).
Furthermore, with the adoption of a specific coding schedule in some grounded theory approaches
65 (e.g. Strauss & Corbin, 1990), there is a risk for the researcher to be already inclined towards identifying patterns in the data on the basis of this schedule; this in turn adds a deductive twist to the analysis of social phenomena (Willig, 2001). Although more recent grounded theory approaches, such as the constructivist approach developed by Charmaz (2006; 2009), aimed at addressing this by focusing on the co-construction of meaning between participant and researcher, the emphasis on theory discovery alongside an over-involvement with the intersubjective element during the interview process frequently resorts to a highly relativist stance (Glaser, 2002): Charmaz advocates an active construction of the participant’s meaning as it emerges from the interview and foregoes the underlying, persistent social process that may have been internalised by the participants. An interpretivist stance, which allows for the multiple realities of participants to emerge from the research process (Charmaz, 2006) is not only desirable but very useful too. Nevertheless, the discovery of a common pattern of behaviours and social action is underestimated in the constructivist approach. In the context of this study, adopting such an approach may have proven problematic, as it would not allow for a systematic understanding of emerging social processes, such as those of trasnationalization and cosmopolitanisation. As shown further on, phenomenological approaches allow for more of both subjective experiences and interpretations to be discussed in light of what social actors have internalised as ‘common sense’ (Schutz, 1967; 1970), alongside with the capacity of – at least some – social actors to be more reflectively aware of emergent social processes.
Hence I would argue that, although the phenomenological and grounded theory approaches both begin with an emphasis on a data-driven, inductive approach, interpretative phenomenological approaches stay more inductive during data analysis, without resorting to a highly relativist stance.
The final goal of phenomenological methodologies is still to identify common structures of subjective experiences; however, they place extra emphasis on identifying meaning units in subjective accounts (Van Manen, 1990, Aspers, 2004; Finlay, 2009), before engaging with existing theoretical explanations in their interpretation (Aspers, 2004). Although I reached saturation after fifteen participants, I did not believe that I could actually argue for a theory that emerged from the data; I was rather more interested in understanding the subjective experience of participants, always in relation to my research aims and questions. Given that I was quite familiar with some strands of phenomenological research, I strongly believed that an interpretivist phenomenological approach was highly appropriate, as it had been widely used with small sample methodologies (Willig, 2001;
Smith & Osborn, 2007; Starks & Trinidad, 2007). There is an emphasis on language, meaning and context, without losing the focus on subjective accounts (Aspers 2004; Langbridge, 2007; Finlay, 2009), something that may happen with other qualitative methodologies, such as discourse analysis
66 (Willig, 2001). Furthermore, and in contrast to grounded theory, which also shares characteristics with phenomenology (Patton, 1990; Willig, 2001; Starks & Trinidad, 2007), there is no attempt to generate a theory which I find problematic when using a small-sample methodology.