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The course is designed as a sequence of 3 two-day blocks to allow sufficient time for in-depth reading and reflection. Overall, the course provides 6 extensive seminars, each covering a key topic on qualitative research methods in social sciences. The meetings are in the form of participatory seminars that comprise class presentations, directed discussions and practical workshops. In addition to an appreciative and/or critical review of extant literature on qualitative research methods, the seminars seek to encourage constructive dialogue aimed at helping students to tackle research questions in a qualitative fashion, which builds on and extends contemporary knowledge.

Given the aforementioned learning objectives, the course is designed with a heavy reading load. Reading the materials beforehand and participating actively in class assignments and dialogues are essential for getting a firm grasp of the course content. For each seminar, students should read the assigned articles or books, and be prepared to answer questions and discuss any other issues pertaining to the assigned reading material. Furthermore, for select seminars, students will be expected to prepare a take-home assignment that will be discussed in the next class.

Conversation Starters

In preparation for the designated sessions (#2-6), each student should prepare and distribute prior to each session a one page “conversation starter” that synthesizes the assigned readings and integrates personal insights thereof. The conversation starters are also an opportunity for students to position themselves in relation to the assigned readings and to raise issues and questions which can spark a debate related to the readings. The conversation starters should be posted in the course student forum in Learn by the end of weekend prior to the residency. The conversation starters are mandatory.

Coding Exercise

The coding exercise involves the analysis of primary and/or secondary data with NVivo (or qualitative analysis software of your choice). Further information about the coding exercise will be provided in the class.

Please see the Course content

This session introduces students to ethnographic methodology as well as to specific issues and topics related to the process of data collection. After introducing the basic principles and practices of ethnography, the session focuses on the process of planning fieldwork, including considerations related to consent and confidentiality, and to the difficulties of gaining access to organizations to do fieldwork. The session also addresses the topic of researcher positionality in ethnographic fieldwork, and how different kinds of positioning influence the process of data collection. The second part of the day introduces students to the key ethnographic method of data collection: participant observation. The session includes lectures, class discussion and hands-on exercises in order to give students some experiences of doing fieldwork.

• Discuss the theories and methods that were presented in class and covered by the readings
• Design theoretically valid and methodologically rigorous qualitative studies
• Develop protocols for qualitative data collection
• Identify and assess data sources and data collection methods for qualitative studies
• Demonstrate understanding of qualitative data analysis techniques
• Interpret analytical results from qualitative studies
• Assess the quality of qualitative studie
• Articulate in writing a formal description of qualitative research design and analysis

• Selected topic to be investigated via qualitative research models (in brief)
• Significance of the selected topic (in brief)
•  Prior research on the selected topic (in brief)
•  Research question(s) to be answered based on the selected topic
• Theoretical lens to guide data collection and analysis (in details)
• Qualitative research strategy being adopted to answer the research question(s) (in details)
   - Protocols for data collection
   - Possible data source(s)
   - Proposed data analytical technique(s) to be utilized
•  Potential contributions to theory and practice (in brief)

All work must be original material that is produced individually. The paper is due two weeks following the last session of the course. Re-take exam, if necessary, will be administered about a month later.