Objectivity and values in research

Abstract

Abstract The final chapter of this book suggests that, while it is important to recognize the sociality and interestedness of research, it is necessary to offset the frequent idea that objective knowledge is an unachievable goal. This idea may not just deprive desirable social causes of the credible knowledge that they require to pursue their claims. It may also encourage a conflation of political and epistemological agendas, which the chapter presents as harmful for public debate and science itself. The chapter equally argues that the more it is assumed that language-in-education research must be socially transformative, the more this may overshadow knowledge-focused types of research or dismiss such research as serving the status quo. It will be proposed that, in a research field that frequently highlights teachers’ unreasonableness, interpretive research may be crucial for expanding an understanding of, and empathy for, what teachers do.