Svend Brinkmann 
Qualitative Inquiry in Everyday Life 
Working with Everyday Life Materials

This book is a ′survival guide′ for students and researchers who would like to conduct a qualitative study with limited resources. Brinkmann shows how everyday life materials such as books, television, the internet, the media and everyday conversations and interactions can help us to understand larger social issues.

As living human beings in cultural worlds, we are constantly surrounded by ′data′ that call for analysis, and as we cope with the different situations and episodes of our lives, we are engaged in understanding and interpreting the world as a form of qualitative inquiry. The book helps its reader develop a disciplined and analytic awareness informed by theory, and shows how less can be more in qualitative research. Each chapter introduces theoretical tools to think with, and demonstrates how they can be put to use in working concretely with everyday life materials.

Table of Content

Introduction: Making Less More

PART ONE

Qualitative Research and Everyday Life

The Epistemology of Working with Everyday Life Materials

The Ethics of Working with Everyday Life Materials

PART TWO

Self Observation

Conversations

Media Materials

Movies, Images and Television

Books of Fiction

Conclusions: On Quality

About the author

Svend Brinkmann is professor of psychology in the Department of Communication and Psychology at the University of Aalborg, Denmark, where he serves as co-director of the Center for Qualitative Studies with Lene Tanggaard. His research is particularly concerned with philosophical, moral, and methodological issues in psychology and other human and social sciences. He is author and co-author of numerous articles and books, including John Dewey: Science for a Changing World, Qualitative Inquiry in Everyday Life, and Qualitative Interviewing.