Some Problems and Purposes of Narrative Analysis in Educational Research

The significance of narrative analysis for education research is discussed by reviewing general work on the nature of narrative and examining some of the ways in which narratives vary, especially between cultural groups, by reviewing some of the uses of narratives in classroom activities and classroom-related research, and, finally, by reposing the question of discontinuities between spoken and written forms of narrative. Two narrative studies are discussed which were conducted by the author in public schools in California and Chicago. These were concerned with the relation between oral discourse form, as assessed through narrative analysis, and access to literacy activities in typical urban classrooms. The paper draws on this research to suggest further contributions that narrative analysis can make to educational research by clarifying (a) the nature of cultural difference seen as language difference, (b) the role of syntactic, lexical, and intonational options in the structuring of narrative forms, and (c) how cultural (here, narrative) differences do and do not affect aspects of classroom learning.