Literature as Qualitative Inquiry

Brinkmann, Svend

doi:10.1177/1077800409332030

Cited by 40 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 16 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Despite these limitations, the general contribution of this study to the field of health research is a framework that can account for individuals' salutogenic experiences of health, can guide salutogenic informed questions, and allows us to problematize to who and whom such questions should be addressed. The choice to employ this framework on a professional author's autobiographical story is motivated by Brinkmann's (2009) claim of the author as a researcher of social practice. He argues that great authors distinguish themselves as studious observers of daily life and execute sophisticated methods that are capable of capturing experiences and underlying trends in society that reach beyond the subjective and personal domain of living.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Health as Experience: Exploring Health in Daily Life Drawing From the Work of Aaron Antonovsky and John Dewey

Maivorsdotter

Andersson

2020

Qual Health Res

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Research has pursued salutogenic and narrative approaches to deal with questions about how everyday settings are constitutive for different health practices. Healthy behavior is not a distinguishable action, but a chain of activities, often embedded in other social practices. In this article, we have endeavored to describe such a chain of activities guided by the salutogenic claim of exploring the good living argued by McCuaig and Quennerstedt. We use biographical material written by Karl Ove Knausgaard who has created a life story entitled My Struggle. The novel is selected upon an approach influenced by Brinkmann who stresses that literature can be seen as a qualitative social inquiry in which the novelist is an expert in transforming personal life experiences into common human expressions of life. The study illustrates how research with a broader notion of health can convey experiences of health, thereby complementing (and sometimes challenging) public health evidence.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Health as Experience: Exploring Health in Daily Life Drawing From the Work of Aaron Antonovsky and John Dewey

Maivorsdotter

Andersson

2020

Qual Health Res

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…238–251) were able to provide multifarious and potent accounts of social life through imaginative metaphors, vivid depictions, and elaborate wording and sentence structures, which bear meaning via their sound and rhythm. French novelist Michel Houellebecq has even been labeled a “literary sociologist” (Petersen & Jacobsen, , p. 100) and a “lyrical sociologist” (Brinkmann, , p. 1379), as he not only offers a convincing portrayal of Western neoliberal capitalist societies (Diken, ; Sweeney, ), but his literary practice allows him to inspect and disrupt the language of postmodernity itself (Harris & Harris, ). A new sociology of literature then, must approach literary fiction as a complex organism, which “provides in its own right a form of new and distinctive knowledge about society […], which no other source can give” (Hoggart, , p. 277).…”

Section: Conclusion and Future Prospectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

More than just a product: Strengthening literature in sociological analysis

Váňa

2020

Sociology Compass

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Contemporary sociology of literature is predominantly shaped by the research of literary production, which approaches literary works as black boxes and subordinates them to social interactions and institutions. Even sociologists who recognize usefulness of literature for its inner quality often look at literary texts as mere passive objects to be translated into sociological discourse. In proposing a new sociology of literature, I first briefly outline the history of sociological studies of literature; second, I introduce “the state of the art” in the sociology of literature; third, I explore the relationship between sociology and literature in more general terms; and lastly, I discuss approaches and ideas with the potential to become components of a new research program, which would be a powerful alternative to the mainstream paradigms in sociological studies of literature. Such a program would make it clear that sociology can greatly benefit from cooperation with literature when sociologists are sensitive to the subtleties and (especially aesthetic) specificities of literary works.

show abstract

“…Kafka's Metamorphosis (Longo, 2016), Peake's Titus Groan (McHoul, 1988)) or author (e.g. Houellebecq (Brinkmann, 2009)) as sociological evidence requires specific theoretical justification -fictional representations of the social world cannot be cited without special pleading.…”

Section: Disenchantment and The End Of Magical Thinkingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Taking story seriously

Bradby

2017

Soc Theory Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In narrative approaches to health and illness, a distinction between narrative and story has been lost or occluded. This paper considers how the terms narrative and story are defined and how they are used in practice in order to focus on rehearsed or 'worked up' stories, including fiction, rather than minimally defined narrative fragments. Story-written, spoken and shared-is a powerful way of contextualising health and illness in a wider landscape of human values and interests and, as a form of enchantment in the face of scientific rationalization, a human necessity. Some reasons why sociology, and particularly medical sociology, has avoided defining fictional stories as part of its material and its method are explored. The reasons why a sociology of health, illness and medicine might want to include fictionalised story are sketched. Complex moments of human experience, including sick physicians' experience of alienation from both themselves and their medical treatment necessitate metaphor-laden and sometimes fictionalised writing to represent the subjective contradictions. Story, including fictionalised story, represents a means of including imaginative elements of human life in sociological view. 'People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact it's the other way round' (Pratchett, 2005). 'Sociologists tell stories as if they weren't storytellers, and as if storytelling were a less rigorous and honest pursuit than theirs' (Game & Metcalfe, 1996).

show abstract

Literature as Qualitative Inquiry

Cited by 40 publications

References 16 publications

Health as Experience: Exploring Health in Daily Life Drawing From the Work of Aaron Antonovsky and John Dewey

Health as Experience: Exploring Health in Daily Life Drawing From the Work of Aaron Antonovsky and John Dewey

More than just a product: Strengthening literature in sociological analysis

Taking story seriously

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About