Methodological Challenges of Narrative Inquiry

Narrative inquiry is a qualitative research design which involves studying human experiences by telling stories about them. In particular, the researcher writes stories out of the information that he/she has gathered (Maul, 2015). In addition, the researcher is encouraged to tell his/her own autobiographical story and tie it to the stories of research subjects. In the narrative inquiry, the most common method of data collection is the interview (Maul, 2015). Chagnon’s (1983) participant-observation study of an isolated South American tribe appears to be (at least in part) a good example of narrative inquiry. After all, this study masterfully intertwines a large number of stories about the studied tribe in general, its particular members, and the author’s adventures and misadventures during the course of the fieldwork.   

However, there is every reason to believe that the narrative inquiry is subject to the introduction of many unintentional and intentional biases, which may be severe. After all, storytelling seems to always involve an introduction of fictional details (if not plot twists) into an otherwise true narrative. In addition, stories, and even faithfully recorded narrative transcripts, run a high risk of providing a description of unique individuals in unique circumstances, making the results of such a study ungeneralizable.

Also, narrative transcripts, even if being a faithful reproduction of the words of informants, can contain fictional elements, sometimes of extreme magnitude. For example, in her study of traditional male transvestites of India, known as hijras, who have a feminine gender identity, one of Nanda’s (1999) informants provided her with an extensive biographical narrative in which he described in great detail how his feelings of being a girl trapped in a boy’s body, started and gradually crystallized from early childhood onward. However, another hijra, who knew this informant for many years, privately told Nanda (1999) that his whole narrative was a fabrication. Instead, his real biography consisted of growing up like an average boy, who became an average man, who married and had children; and only at mid adulthood became transgendered and left his former life behind. Thus, while this disputed biographical narrative may be useful for understanding the collective values and gender identity of India’s hijras; its lack of biographical credibility makes it fairly useless for exploring how the personal values and gender identity of individual hijras develop from their childhood onward; which was, unfortunately, one of Nanda’s (1999) main research questions.   

References

Chagnon, N. A. (1983). Yanomamo: The fierce people (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Maul, J. (2015). Qualitative core designs: Sampling and evaluation of qualitative research. In Grand Canyon University (Ed.), GCU doctoral research: Foundations and theories. Retrieved from http://www.gcumedia.com/digital-resources/grand-canyon-university/2015/gcu-doctoral-research_foundations-and-theories_ebook_1e.php

Nanda, S. (1999). Neither man nor woman: The hijras of India (2nd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company.