Knocking on Doors: On Constructing Culture

Abstract

This reflective piece employs a layered text format and uses data from a pilot study on parents’ conceptualizations of parental involvement in schools to think theoretically about such issues as access, voice, and representation in interpretive research. As the researcher engages with the process of selecting participants for her research, a different kind of understanding of cultural access emerges. Access is eventually understood as not being solely a methodological tool for theoretical sampling purposes but an ontological framework that shapes the inquiry process from beginning to end. This researcher eventually adopts a narrative ontology that necessitates the participants’ active involvement in interpreting the meanings that the participants’ stories have on their lives.

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