© 2002 by Oxford University Press
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Exploring Differences in Perspectives on Microanalysis of Classroom Discourse: Contributions and Concerns
1 University of California, Santa Barbara
In the past four decades, a rich body of traditions has developed, providing those researching language from an applied linguistics framework opportunities to select approaches that best address their particular questions. This can also be viewed as problematic. How can we understand what difference these differences in approaches make to the development of knowledge about language and other social phenomena?
The importance of these articles can be seen in the critical discourse they stimulate. They are part of a growing body of work making visible theory–method relationships and how differences in these relationships are consequential for what can be, and is known, within a particular field. The articles focus on a common set questions permitting readers to read contrastively across articles with differing goals, data sets and analytic traditions. We view each of the articles, and the collection itself, as a telling case (Mitchell 1984) that helps us to understand the theoretical perspectives, objects of study, analytic practices, and applications of these three traditions, thus enabling an understanding of what can and cannot be studied through each. The issue is not which is best, but what each contributes and what could not be known without that particular perspective.
Revised December 2001.
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