The Documentary Method – Meta-theoretical and Methodological

of Collective Attitudes

In this study, schools take centre stage; schools are the research subject. The aim is the reconstruction of collective attitudinal patterns in schools with reference to the above-mentioned epistemological interests. This study focuses on schools as its meso level.Therefore all social-scientific methods used must be appropriate to this research subject. Collective attitudinal patterns in schools can only be ascertained and recon- structed in this way. Group discussions and the documentary method are the most suit-

able methods of research and evaluation in this empirical endeavour. When combined these two methods are able to take the investigation and reconstruction of collective attitudinal patterns into account, which structure both thought and behaviour.1

Since the 1980s Bohnsack and Mangold significantly advanced the documentary method and established it as an important social-science research method. As is often the case in qualitative social research, the reconstructive method was developed in the context of concrete research projects.2 _{The reason for this is that the subject of}

research and the epistemological interest on the one hand and the investigation and evaluation on the other hand are inseparably linked in a circular way (subject orien- tation).3 _{Meta-theoretically speaking, the documentary method first and foremost}

draws on Mannheim’s sociology of science, culture and knowledge.4 _{With regards to}

meta-theoretical development and practical research implementations Bohnsack et al. refer to phenomenological sociology, Garfinkl’s ethno-methodology and the research tradition of the Chicago School.

The documentary method aims to reconstruct collectively shared realms of expe- rience. This means that it focuses on the collective. These realms of experience are themselves always already constructs, as reality is at all times pre-constructed by man. “Through different constructs of everyday reality man structures and interprets this world in advance. Mental objects like this determine behaviour, define goals of behaviour and prescribe the means for reaching these goals – in short: They help human beings to live within and come to terms with their natural and socio-cultural environment.”5_The

researcher’s task is to reconstruct these constructs (second degree constructs).6 _All

constructs of reality have already been symbolically structured and are not immediately obvious. With reference to Garfinkel’s ethno-methodology Bohnsack does not believe an immediate understanding between the research subject and the researcher to be possible, as they usually inhabit different realms of experience. “Garfinkel remarks that in our day-to-day verbal communications verbal utterances are indexical, that is to say

1 Cf. Bohnsack 9₂₀₁₄

2 Cf. Bohnsack 1983; Cf. Bohnsack 1989; Cf. Bohnsack 9_{2014, 33–35.}

3 Cf. Lamnek 5_{2010, 23–25. In contrast to quantitative research Lamnek quotes the principle of}

flexibility, which ensures subject orientation. “To the explorative or qualitative researcher it is vital to develop and focus his research process in such a way that his/her question, the nav- igation of his/her enquiry, data, analytical relations and interpretations, grow out of empirical

social life and are rooted within it.” Lamnek 5_{2010, 23}

4 Cf. Mannheim 1964; Mannheim 1980.

5 Bohnsack 9_{2014, 22.}

6 The documentary method must be understood as the reconstruction of reconstructions as it reflects its own research activity, justifies this methodologically and is able to ‘reconstruct those procedures or methods of interpretation and reflection, which can equally be applied to the every day lives of the research subject and the every day lives of the researcher them-

selves.’ (Bohnsack 9_{2014, 27) Consequently, ‘the cognitive-logical difference between every-}

day interpretations and scientific interpretations, in the sense that the latter is fundamentally

superior to the former, can no longer be maintained.” Bohnsack 9_{2014, 28. This insight has}

consequences for the “bracketing of validity”. Mannheim 1980, 88; cf. also Bohnsack 9₂₀₁₄

65–67, 191–204. Consequently the documentary method does not claim to subject findings to interpretative evaluation, but to reconstruct the modus operandi of knowledge, that is to say how a particular group addresses certain issues and problems.

they are merely indicators and clues to meaning. Meaning is not ‘automatically’ linked to utterance. As a listener I always have to make interpretations in order to get at the true meaning.”7 _{People’s inner constructs find expression in the indexical content of the}

utterance. They are documents of, or clues to underlying patterns of meaning. Through critical engagement with phenomenological sociology “‘methodological individualism’ […] is brought to a head” in Garfinkel’s ethno-methodology – sociality “as inter-subjec- tivity needs to first be established situationally each time.”8 _{According to Bohnsack,}

ethno-methodology is right to point out that the nature of utterances is indexical and right to emphasise the limitations of immediate understanding, as this would only be possible if there was a shared horizon of experiences. Nonetheless, Bohnsack refers to ethno-methodology as “a ‘bisected’ sociology of knowledge, because ethno-method- ologists do not answer the question of how an adequate methodological approach to ‘the indexical nature’ of extrinsic, milieu-specific reality can be found.”9 _Bohnsack

finds such a methodological approach in Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge, which distinguishes between subjunctive and communicative experiences. Bohnsack adopts this distinction in his documentary method. People who are connected with one another through shared collective experiences and have thus developed sociality based on sub- junctive experiences, “understand each other immediately. They do not have to interpret each other first” (intuitive understanding). However, others, who do not inhabit the same realm of experiences, “have a ‘communicative’ relationship based on reciprocal inter- pretation”10 _{(documentary interpretation). This is the type of relationship the researcher}

has to her/his research subjects. Consequently, methodically controlled understanding of the other is an essential part of interpretative social research.

In addition to his distinction between intuitive understanding and documentary interpretation, Mannheim also differentiates between the immanent11 _{and the docu-}

mentary meaning of behaviour. When attention is given to documentary meaning, behaviour is understood to attest to an attitude, which structures behaviour. In order to get to this documentary meaning of behaviour the modus operandi, the developmental process of the behaviour, needs to be looked at as the collective or individual habitus expressed within it. Documentary interpretation focuses on this documentary meaning. Its sequence-analytical procedure particularly aims to reconstruct the structuring attitu- dinal patterns of behaviour through their developmental processes (‘modus operandi’), rather than by means of the speculative intentions of its development.12

As already demonstrated, a subjunctive realm of experience, based on shared expe- riences and practices, is the foundation for a collective habitus.13 _{People who share a}

7 Bohnsack 9_{2014, 21.}

8 Bohnsack 9_{2014, 59.}

9 Bohnsack 9_{2014, 60. [italicised as in the original]}

10 Bohnsack 9_{2014, 61.}

11 He further divides immanent meaning into intentional expressive meaning (not empirically ascertainable) and objective meaning, including general significance of behaviours.

12 Consequently documentary interpretation “marks a shift from what- to how-questions” Bohn-

sack 9_{2014, 65). Sequence-analytical interpretation of behaviour is at the heart of this; how}

people deal with problems and issues is testament to collectively shared experience. 13 Being based on “the sociology of knowledge’s analysis in practice” the documentary method

subjunctive realm of experience – e. g. gender, age or social background – have sub- junctive “atheoretical knowledge”,14 _{which they themselves cannot explicate; nor do}

they have to in practice. This knowledge is intuitive. It shapes and structures experience. This knowledge is also contextual. In this context, Mannheim talks about existentiality (‘Seinsverbundenheit’) and site-dependency (‘Standortverbundenheit’).15 _{“Every piece}

of knowledge and every form of meaning making is rooted in historical and social context”.16 _{Subjunctive realms of experience can be reconstructed if individuals inhabit}

a common realm of experience or if they come together in a group and enter into a dis- cussion close to everyday life. In this case, “the group is not the social space for forma- tion, but for articulation and objectification […] of collective stratification of experience (‘Erlebnisschichtung’)”. It is not a space of emergence, but of representation and “thus only an ‘epiphenomenon’ for the analysis of milieu-specific realms of experience. Yet it offers a valid empirical approach to articulating such contexts for meaning.”17 _The

relationships group members have to each other within their social network need to be reconstructed, as these parallel or approximate the day-to-day communication of the group and act as testaments to the shared layers of experience.18

The practical approaches this research undertakes, reflectmethodological consid- erations regarding the documentary method. Based on these considerations practical approaches to the documentary method are exemplified in this study, initially in an abstract way and then by using concrete examples.19