Building the analytical approach

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“Situational analyses can deeply situate the research individually, collectively, social organizationally and institutionally, temporally, geographically, materially, culturally, symbolically, visually, and discursively” (Clarke 2003:554). Clarke cites Fosket⁴² that parallels Geertz’ ‘thick description’ in claiming that the outcomes of situational analyses should be ‘thick analyses’. Clarke states that this form of analysis is moving from an original grounded theory approach that moves from open coding to theoretical sampling. Where the original grounded theory approach sees social processes as a root metaphor, a situational analysis supplements this original root metaphor of social processes with “an ecological root metaphor of social worlds/arenas/negotiations as an alternative conceptual infrastructure that also allows situational analyses at the meso-levels, new social organizational/institutional and discursive sitings, as well as individual level analyses” (Clarke 2003:558).

4.1.1 Inspiration from situational analysis

Clarke’s situational analysis operates with three different types of mapping – situational mapping, social worlds/arenas mapping and positional maps. I have used adapted versions of the situational and the social worlds/arenas mapping as a tool to ‘open up’ the data and stimulate the analytical thinking towards the data. Clarke’s recipe for additional positional mapping in order to identify

“major positions taken and not taken, in the data vis-à-vis particular discursive axes of variation an difference, concern and controversy found in the situation of concern” (ibid:560) has been the inspiration to use the different forms of mappings in an interpretation of changing positions among the social actors, as will be unfolded below.

After the long periods of fieldwork and my deep integration in the participatory researcher role, I have found it crucial to apply this analytical tool that could guide the step from coding of the data through the use of different forms of mappings that could produce new perspectives on the data, to what Clarke calls the ‘sites of silence’ in the data – to locate what ‘seems present but unarticulated’.

After the first two phases of fieldwork – the longer that covered the spring and summer phases of the program and the shorter that covered the fall phase – the analytical work with the data consisted mainly in producing the transcriptions of the ethnographic interviews and working with reading and coding the material. After the return from the follow-up study with interviews with staff and youth, the systematic and analytical work with the data that will be presented now took place. Here I will

42Fosket, Jennifer Ruth. 2002. “Breast Cancer Risk and the Politics of Prevention: Analysis of a Clinical Trial.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, San Francisco.

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briefly present the two main mappings that I made – situational mapping and mapping of social arenas.

4.1.2 Situational mapping

The first is situational maps to lay out ‘the major human, nonhuman, discursive, and other elements in the research situation of concern and provoke analyses of relations among them. Clarke notes that these maps are intended to capture and discuss the messy complexities of the situation in their dense relations and permutations – and that this can be used to intentionally work against what Clarke calls the usual simplifications of scientific work in particularly postmodern ways (ibid:559).

The categories situational maps suggests through which to order the data are: Individual human elements/actors; collective human actors; discursive constructions of individual and/or collective human actors; political/economic elements; temporal elements; major issues/debates (usually contested); other kinds of elements; non-human element actors/actants; implicated silent actors/actants; key events in situations; discursive construction of non-human actants; sociocultural – symbolic elements; spatial elements; related discourses (historical, narrative, and/or visual). Clarke sketches a process of working with this mapping beginning with a ‘messy’ version, as a kind of brain storming, followed by a process of ordering.

I have used this in drawing situational maps from ‘messy’ to ‘ordered working versions’ with the research aim and research questions as guiding tool. These mappings and the memos they resulted in:

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Photo: The messy situational map⁴³

Photo: The ordered situational map

43 Local place and institutional names have been removed from all mappings shown here.

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Memos about the relations in the maps were made over a longer period and helped decide what stories to tell, but also helped me reflect on evaluating the methodology and researcher positioning.

Examples of theorizing that emerged through this form of mapping – the pedagogy-learning relationships as it relates to changing roles of staff as well as youth; the silent actors – the possible significance of those youth who I did not talk to, who didn’t approach me during work or who might even have avoided me.

4.1.3 Social worlds/arenas mapping

The second is social worlds/arenas maps to lay out the collective actors and arena(s) of commitment within which they engage in ongoing negotiations. The purpose of these maps are to offer

“mesolevel interpretations of the situation, engaging collective action, and its social organizational and institutional and discursive dimensions”(ibid:560). An important aspect in this is to approach this mapping with a postmodern assumption of fluid negotiations as central to the social processes – with Clarke’s formulation, these mappings portray postmodern possibilities. The goal of this mapping according to Clarke is to make ‘collective sociological sense’ of the situation and to answer questions like who is participating in the arena, why and how – the purpose is to identify patterns of collective commitment.

Photo: A version of the social worlds/arena(s) map

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The memos and analytical theorizing that emerged from this process helped visualize 3 central worlds/arenas that here are sketched together with some specific perspectives and questions related to them:

I: A world/arena about youth’s roles and identities as a continuum between job-trainees and as agents of change/activists

The continuum found covers a relation between two different aspects of the roles and identities that youth construct. The first is the job trainee socialization and role practice which both covers a range of externally legitimized and relatively non-negotiable elements (e.g. the skill of being on-time, of communicating absence etc.) and the different ways youth choose to identify with roles around this.

The other is the socialization towards becoming an agent of change in one’s own life - and maybe also a social justice/food justice activist in the wider community – which covers a range of what one could call internally legitimized (through the way group dynamics are a central part of these) program elements with a more negotiable character that invites youth to different forms of reflection, expression and storytelling.

II: A world/arena about staff’s roles as situationally reflective and dynamically constructed

The implications of the changes in staff roles throughout the trajectory of program from the initial role as being bosses/employers that hire the youth in different positions – with the authority to fire them as well – to developing roles that more can be characterized as being mentors and partners and friends.

III: A world/arena about storytelling as a central pedagogical pull in youth identity construction This arena is constructed by an interpretation of the interplay between pedagogy and learning and identity formation as a complex of different forms of storytelling that permeates both pedagogical intentions and youth agency in a way that is drawing from a multitude of factors in the program – with relation building, self-reflection and collective feed-back as central mechanisms.

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4.1.4 Discovering theoretical positions and conflicts in the data

This process of systematically approaching the data and making different types of mapping as well as a further scrutinizing and interpretation of the worlds/arenas sketched above led to a formulation of three main analytical clusters/categories⁴⁴ that will be presented in the following three subchapters:

1) A reconceptualization of the youth learning in the program through analyzing and theorizing youth perspectives identified in two main overlapping patterns in the data: a) youth learning as changing but integrated perspectives and b) youth learning as ‘triggered’ through reflection, self-expression and storytelling. The changing but integrated perspectives-pattern is founded in an analysis of how youth’s reflections throughout the different program phases show a change from an initial skills-oriented - ‘instrumental’ learning to an increase in expressions of surprise related to experiencing an ‘emancipatory’ learning founded in major changes in self-confidence and self-image as well as related to emerging identities as agents of change in families and local communities. The other pattern covers the communicative aspect of learning formulated in the emic term of ‘finding one’s voice’ as informed by a complex of different self-reflective and self-expressive practices and storytelling.

2) A reconceptualization of the main characteristics of the pedagogical design and management of the professional roles. Here an analysis of staff’s perspective through the ‘pedagogical paradox’

(Løvlie 2008, Von Oettingen 2001) shows the social construction of empowerment as a process of changing positionings;

3) A reconceptualization of the whole program pedagogy-learning dialectic is attempted in an additional analysis of the youth perspective above that draws on further data from the round of follow-up interviews conducted with a smaller group of youth. In this analysis the preliminary perspectives on storytelling above is expanded through a narrative analytical approach that interprets the relation between pedagogy and learning as narrative performance (Riessman 1993).

44 These clusters/categories cover the research sub-questions B and C that circle around the youth and staff perspectives in relation to the overall research question. The analysis and discussion relating to answering research sub-question A will be performed as a meta-analysis drawing on the outcome of question B and C.

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