Transforming (Un)Just Institutions: A Reflection on Methodology

Abstract

Over the past 15 years, I have explored several pathways for understanding issues of equity, opportunity, and social justice in education, particularly in schools serving economically impoverished children and their families. What role can social justice research play in shedding needed light on the real obstacles that limit the opportunities and life chances of economically poor children and youth? In this chapter, I discuss how my own answer to this question has changed over the years and show how my preferred methodological lenses have shaped how I frame (as well as how I have reframed) social justice issues in my research projects. In recognizing that issues of opportunity, freedom, and choice are central to social justice research, I suggest that the capability approach with its emphasis on child well-being provides a valuable framework for helping social justice researchers to more fully flesh out what we mean by social justice and how it can be studied in field-based research. By revisiting studies that I have done as well as by portraying the work of my students and colleagues, I show how capability theory aids researchers in exploring questions and areas of social justice that are often overlooked in field-based projects and ought to garner greater attention in educational research, policy, and practice.