Qualitative Longitudinal Research: Summary of a two day conference

On Monday (8th June) and Tuesday (9th June) I attended, and contributed to Professor Bren Neale‘s retirement conference and what an event it was! On Monday, I presented alongside some excellent speakers about my methodological strategy for conducting qualitative secondary analysis on two of the Tmescapes datasets and here is a picture of me presenting:

Others speakers included Bren herself, Nick Emmel, Sarah Irwin, Susie Weller, Ruth Patrick and Joanna Bornat. Between us we reflected on the methodological, theoretical, ethical and conceptual affordances, and challenges, of conducting qualitative longitudinal research (QLR). What struck me on the day, was the great flexibility that QLR offers social researchers in terms of developing and testing out more innovative methods and in developing a really rich understanding of how time is constituted in our lives as they unfold. QLR is certainly no simple task, yet it can uncover really powerful understandings about the micro dynamics…