3. Severe Conflicts: Frustration-Deprivation
3.3. Research Analysis Modalities 1. Narrative as Social Construction
82 myth212. These qualitative realities of ‘knowing’ are not quantifiable in objective,
measurable properties, nor are they independent of the observer (researcher) and his or her instruments213. Narrative research methodology inhabits an inherent qualitative bent.
3.2.2. Interpretive-Critical Lens
For purposes of narrowing the meaning of qualitative research, the underlying epistemology of this study is what may be termed an ‘Interpretive-critical’ approach to knowledge generation. The positivist approach to objective knowing asserts that there is measurable theory that stands alone waiting to be discovered outside of the practical application that transpires in subjective human interaction. In opposition to this, the interpretive-critical stance is concerned with two essential elements of learning. Firstly, the word ‘interpretive’ connotes a semiotic interest in the meaning of signs, symbols and metaphor. Interpretive researchers presume that “…access to reality is only through social constructions such as language, consciousness and shared meanings”214. Anthropologist Clifford Geertz called this rise of narrative research the “interpretive turn” in social sciences.215 Secondly, the word ‘critical’ denotes a hermeneutical interest in the meaning of texts. As in the words of Michael Myers, “Critical researchers assume that social reality is historically constituted and that it is produced and reproduced by people.”216 These two concepts twinned together in this study have become the conduit through which the contextual narrative discourse surrounding the Matabeleland conflict was researched and analysed. The narrative (story) invites us to the table of
interpretation, and the discourse (the meaning attached to story) beckons us to critically unpack its ingredients.
3.3. Research Analysis Modalities
83 created through shared and accumulated knowledge”217. This study exposes the ‘storied’
scaffolding that under-girded the violence system constructed by the Zimbabwe government in its attempts to deal with the perceived threat of dissident rebellion in Matabeleland in the early 1980s. The implication here is that the violence system cannot stand without the props of a generative narrative discourse. This thinking cuts to the heart of the debate around language and meaning. Is meaning an essentialist concept, something that develops intuitively in the internal recesses of the human sub-conscious mind? Or is meaning a continuous external ‘work in progress’ constantly being reformed, re-configured and renewed through the social spheres of dialogue and human inter- connectivity? Which of these two essential parts of human knowing (internal or external) comes first? The cognitive-dominance school of thought would promulgate that meaning is birthed internally and then externalised when people attach words to it (building language around meaning), while the proponents of the language-dominance camp would posit just the opposite sequence of origin. That is, the language comes first and then out of the expressive-act meaning is produced (building meaning around language).218
Social constructionists maintain that there is a symbiotic relationship of inter- subjectivity between meaning and language. In other words, language generates meaning and meaning generates language and that both are pivotal to the creation of our social reality. However, when coming to the question of origins, social constructivists would quickly add that meaning does not come to fruition until it is given expression either verbally, in written form, or in performative action. Meaning is imbued with its essential order, its influence to transform people, and its power to change situations only after it has been articulated or acted out. Don Cupitt believes that stories (language) come first in making the world intelligible and memorable. In his words, “Works of art, then, do not function merely to supply outlets for in-built and already determinate natural feelings.
Their job is rather to produce our feelings, differentiate them and attach symbolic values to them”219. It is on this assumptive basis of generative-knowing and its linkages to
217 Lederach, J.P. 1995. Preparing for Peace – Conflict Transformation Across Cultures. New York:
Syracuse University Press, p. 10.
218 Forrester, M. 1996. Psychology of Language – A Critical Introduction. London / New Delhi: Sage Publications.
219 Cupitt, D. 1991. What is a Story? London: SCM Press Ltd, 18.
84 reality-formation that this study of the violence in Matabeleland was begun and narrative analysis became the operational choice for its research mode.
3.3.2. Narrative as Meaning, Form and Interaction
For purposes of this study narrative analysis has been defined as: “Analysis of a chronologically told story, with a focus on how elements are sequenced, why some elements are evaluated differently from others, how the past shapes perceptions of the present, how the present shapes perceptions of the past, and how both shape perceptions of the future”220. Expanding on this definition, this research embraced a three-prong approach to narrative dissection based on the functions of language as a whole. These three overall measurable segments of narrative are: content (semantics); structure
(syntax); and performance (discourses).221 Narrative content has to do with what story is being told. Story-telling can be accomplished in two ways: one is to describe past events chronologically, the other is to evaluate the meaning of those events and experiences in the lives of the protagonists. The structural dimension of narrative has to do with how the story is told, the manner it is put together and the form it is packaged in. The performance ideation has to do with why the story is being told and the responses it elicits in the
process. In the words of Elliot, performance is the “interactional and institutional contexts in which narratives are produced, recounted, and consumed”222.
The overall research aim of this project was to better understand the narratives surrounding the violence in the Matabeleland conflict: what did they mean, how were they formed, and why were they used? The specific questions emanating from this interrogation were:
1. What were the contents (meanings) of the narratives (both dominant and subjugated) that were created around the violence systems in Matabeleland between the years of 1980-1988?
2. How were these narrative discourses constructed (structured or formed)?
3. Why (performance) and how (interaction) were these narratives used and manipulated to accomplish certain ends?
220 http://www2.chass.ncsu.edu/garson/pa765/narrativ.htm 2006/03/20.
221 Elliot, 2005:38.
222 ibid.
85 As is clear from the above summation of the research questions and investigations, all three of these elements of narrative analysis (meaning, form and interaction) were woven into, and provide a cross-cutting function across the gamete of research methodology strategies. The below matrix gives clarity to this cross-sectional function of the three- prong analysis grid-system that has been under discussion:
Research Approaches:
Analysis Grid-System:
Literature Review
Document Analysis
Open Interviews 1.) Content (Meaning)
2.) Structure (Form)
3.) Performance (Interaction)
3.4. Research Approaches