On Friday, February 3, from 12-1:30 PM, Dr. Yoosun Park (School of Social Policy & Practice, University of Pennsylvania) and Dr. Stéphanie Wahab (School of Social Work, Portland State University) presented CQ’s latest online seminar.
Watch the recording here.
Speakers: Yoosun Park (School of Social Policy & Practice, University of Pennsylvania), Stéphanie Wahab (School of Social Work, Portland State University)
Organizer: Rupaleem Bhuyan (Faculty of Social Work & CQ Fellow, University of Toronto)
Title: Like a “finger pointing at the moon”: How theory guides feminist, interpretive, and anti-colonial research
Abstract:
“Just as a finger pointing at the moon is not the moon itself…” Thich Nhat Hanh
In this spirit of the Buddhist teaching referenced above, in this seminar, Stéphanie Wahab and Yoosun Park consider methodologies of resistance through the use of feminist, interpretive, and anti-colonial theories in research. Informed by Foucault’s historical discourse analysis and Derrida’s textual analysis techniques, Dr. Park will present excerpts from the “Key Words in Social Work,” a critical discourse analysis project that examines what concepts like ‘culture’, ‘resilience’, and ‘trauma’ do in social work. Using a slow scholarship approach, Dr. Wahab will recount the year(s) she has spent theorizing with colleagues to conceptualize “the Braid that Binds Us,” a framework that attends to the impact of neoliberalism, criminalization, and professionalism on domestic violence work in the United States, and consequently shaped an entire research project. Both scholars will reflect on how theorizing drives the research questions they pursue and how resistance to neoliberalism within the academy shapes their choice of methods, multiple types of data collected and generated, and inductive and deductive analysis.
