DATA-ANALYSIS AND SUBJECT REPRESENTATION IN EMPOWERING COMPOSITION RESEARCH

Data analysis and representation are important political acts in the r esearch process. The types of data roe select far study, the analysis we draw, and our textual and graphic representations of data all contr ibute to the ways in which the people involved in our research are pos itioned as subjects and the degree of individual and collective agency that can be constructed through the research process itself It is bec ause of the potential effects of our research on others that we need t o demystify the research we do through laying bare our epistemological positions and opening our methods and methodologies to public critici sm. Further, in the case of empowering research, it is important to in clude the research participants in the development of our research pro jects. This necessitates explorations into postmodern conceptions of s ubjectivity, knowledge formation, collaboration, and resistance as the y relate to empirical research as well as redefining notions of validi ty and reliability.