Process of analysis

Discourse analysis involves repeatedly going over the data, reading through the transcripts and documents and noting interesting features. This requires working through the data over long time periods, returning to them multiple times. As patterns emerge they should be noted but the researcher should carry on searching. Essential to this process is some form of coding which enables the data to be categorised into particular classifications. The key difference between discourse analysis and other data analyses is not this initial process of coding but the analytical concepts involved. As a discourse analyst I was looking for

patterns in the language in use, the nature of the language, interaction and society and the relationships between them (Wetherell et al, 2001). A visual representation of the stages of analysis is provided in appendix 5 and further detail of the process is provided below.

Analysis of the data was conducted throughout the research and data collection process as is often customary in qualitative approaches to research. Leaving the analysis until after the data collection is complete can limit the findings of research as it prevents the researcher from collecting new data to fill in any gaps that emerge from the analysis. It also turns the task of analysis into a daunting and somewhat overwhelming one. Early analysis allows the researcher to move between thinking about the data collected and developing strategies for the collection of new and potentially more rewarding data (Miles and Huberman, 1994). Analysis was ongoing throughout the research process.

Analysis started with the transcription of the interviews, group interviews and field notes in order to become familiar with the data. As Gee suggests (2014), in discourse analysis the transcript is a ‘theoretical entity’ (p136) forming part of the analysis. The interview and group interview data were transcribed verbatim to obtain a fully detailed account, as the research aims were to examine the discourses and how they shape identities and

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responses lose some of the meaning that the respondents are trying to express (Gibbs, 2007).

The process of hand coding followed the transcription. The transcripts were read and reread to identify patterns and commonalities in the data, identifying discursive constructions (Willig, 2013) in the text. I began the analysis by reading through all of the transcripts, highlighting words or phrases which appeared interesting or significant, or which appeared to be occurring more frequently. I was looking for how discursive objects were constructed within the texts, this included the interview transcripts as well as the documents collected and field notes. This did not involve simply looking for key words, but including both implicit and explicit references in the analysis.

I then created a table containing a column for each of the categories emerging. The

transcripts were read through several times and each time a recurring theme was identified it was highlighted and copied into the word document.

These categories were nuanced as the analysis progressed. Links were made between categories which led to the creation of overarching and subcategories highlighting particular discursive constructions. When a discourse analysis is performed, the researcher is working to unpick the text in an attempt to identify the discourse that is being taken for granted. There are many educational discourses which are taken for granted and accepted

uncritically as the norm (Atkins and Wallace, 2012). One example of this was discourses of support and the taken for granted assumptions that non-traditional students would need to be supported and that providing such support was unquestioningly positive and beneficial for the students. Support was highlighted frequently across all data sets, this became an overarching category with peer support, tutor support, formal support and informal support included as sub-categories.

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After identifying all sections of the text that add to the construction of the discursive object, I searched for differences in the constructions. This involved locating the different

‘discursive constructions of the object within wider discourses’ (Willig, 2013, p132). For example, when students talked about their use of support services within the college, they did so through differing discourses. Support was constructed positively as enabling the students to be successful and build a sense of belonging. However, at the same time, support was conceptualised as constraining. Students perceived that they couldn’t study HE in a university because of the lack of support they perceived they would receive. Thus, the object of support is constructed as both enabling and constraining within the same text.

Having identified how the discursive objects are being constructed and located them within wider discourses I considered the ‘subject positions’ that the discourse offers (Willig, 2013, p132). Discourses construct the subject and as a result they make available discursive locations from which the subject can speak. HE-in-FE students are positioned by the

discourses and the discourse analysis aims to explore how discursive constructions and the subject positions that they contain enable or constrain opportunities for action (Willig, 2013). In constructing a version of the world and positioning subjects within it, discourses limit what can be done and what can be said. Having considered the subject positions that discourses offer, the next stage of analysis involves examining how discursive constructions and subject positions enable or constrain ‘opportunities for action’ (p132). For example, widening participation discourses locate non-traditional students within a deficit discourse which locates students as having potential whilst simultaneously shaping their identity such that they don’t perceive that they fit in within HE. Practices become acceptable forms of behaviour within specific discourses, for example, HE-in-FE students seeking support is a legitimate form of behaviour within the widening participation discourse. These practices then reproduce the discourses that constitute them. The final stage of analysis considers subjectivity and its relationship with discourse. Discourses construct social realities and

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make possible ways of being in the world and ways of perceiving it. The final stage of analysis examines the consequences for individuals subjective experience of taking up the positions. This considers what can be thought, felt, and experienced from the subjective position. For example, being positioned within a deficit discourse of vulnerability may lead some HE-in-FE students to feel a sense of belonging within HE-in-FE, and to feel like an outsider within a university.

This section justifies the Foucauldian approach to discourse analysis used to analyse the data. It could be argued that this thesis doesn’t represent a true Foucauldian discourse analysis as it doesn’t engage in a conventional analysis of historical sources of text (Arribas- Ayallon and Walkerdine, 2013). Although considering a historical analysis of the

development of widening participation discourse would be interesting, it is beyond the scope of this thesis. Jansen (2008) argues that Foucauldian discourse analysis provides a direction towards research rather than a recipe or method to follow when conducting research. This thesis applies Foucault’s notion of discourse to analysing the data collected. The analysis has concentrated on how different versions of reality are constructed within the interview transcripts (texts) through discourses which are culturally and historically situated. In keeping with a Foucauldian approach, the analysis also considers how power operates in the relationship between discourses (Foucault, 1980) to marginalise and other HE-in-FE

students