Biographies in talk: A narrative-discursive research approach

Stephanie Taylor; Karen Littleton

doi:10.18778/1733-8077.2.1.03

Authors

Stephanie Taylor Open University, UK
Karen Littleton Open University, UK

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/1733-8077.2.1.03

Keywords:

narrative-discursive, discursive resources, identity trouble, creative identities, novice identities

Abstract

This paper demonstrates the contribution a synthetic narrativediscursive approach can make to understanding biographical work within a research interview. Our focus is on biographical work as part of the ongoing, interactive process through which identities are taken up. This is of particular interest for people who, for example, are entering a new career and can be seen as “novices” in the sense that they are constructing and claiming a new identity. Following a discussion of the theoretical and methodological background in narrative, discourse analytic and discursive work in social psychology (e.g. Bruner, 1990; Edley, 2001; Potter and Wetherell, 1987; Wetherell, 1998), the paper presents an analysis of biographical talk from an interview study with postgraduate Art and Design students. Our interest is in their identity work, including biographical work, as novices in their fields. The analysis illustrates the approach and the key analytic concepts of, first, shared discursive resources, such as interpretative repertoires (e.g. Edley, 2001) and canonical narratives (e.g. Bruner, 1991), and, secondly, troubled identities (e.g. Wetherell and Edley, 1998; Taylor, 2005a) . It shows how speakers’ biographical accounts are shaped and constrained by the meanings which prevail within the larger society. For our participants, these include established understandings of the nature and origins of an artistic or creative identity, and the biographical trajectory associated with it. The particular focus of our approach is on how, in a speaker’s reflexive work to construct a biographical narrative, the versions produced in previous tellings become a constraint and a source of continuity.

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Author Biographies

Stephanie Taylor, Open University, UK

Stephanie Taylor (PhD) is a Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Social Sciences at the Open University, UK. Her teaching publications are in the area of research methods, particularly qualitative data analysis, and critical social psychology. Her recent research has focused on the importance of placerelated identities in contemporary societies in which it is usual for people to change residence and break the connections of origin, family and childhood that conventionally linked us to where we live. She is currently working with Karen Littleton on a new project, Creative Journeys, which looks at the identity work of novices in creative and artistic fields.

Karen Littleton, Open University, UK

Karen Littleton (PhD) is a Senior Lecturer in the Educational Dialogue Research Unit at the Open University, UK. Her research interests concern the psychology of education and she has co-edited Learning with computers (1999) with Paul Light; Rethinking collaborative learning (2000) with Richard Joiner, Dorothy Faulkner and Dorothy Miell; Learning to collaborate, collaborating to learn with Dorothy Miell and Dorothy Faulkner (2004) and Creative Collaborations (2004) with Dorothy Miell. She is the co-author, with Paul Light, of Social processes in children’s learning (1999). From 1994–99 she was senior scientist in the European Science Foundation’s ‘Learning in Humans and Machines’ programme. She is currently the lead editor for the international book series Advances in Learning and Instruction.

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