Critical Narrative Inquiry: An Examination of a Methodological Approach

Abstract

While stories are a central focus in narrative inquiry to examine phenomena, storytelling deconstruct values, assumptions, and beliefs to challenge taken-for-granted meanings. The objective of this paper is to examine storytelling from the perspective of knowledge paradigms, methodology, quality criteria, and reflexivity. By recognizing the elements of stories sociality, temporality, and place, the scope of a qualitative narrative study is framed where factors are expressed, shaped, and enacted. Considerations of these elements can be linked with the critical paradigm and self-reflexivity for representing and designing narrative inquiry grounded in a set of ontological and epistemological assumptions. A significant contribution of this paper is to address a methodological approach in the form of narrative inquiry to better understand the meaning of stories as rooted expressions of participants’ lived experiences. The implications of this study are to bring critical lens to worldviews that would better inform policy.