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Posted Thu, 25 Jan 2018 18:00:36
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BNIM 5-day Training Intensive: two tutors, five days, for six trainees
*For the last two decades, 5-Day Training Intensives have been held about
three times per year in London and, occasionally by request, elsewhere, and
pretty much keep to the same format.*
*For the dates of future intensives, and other BNIM matters, please
contact **[log in to unmask]* <[log in to unmask]>
*!**FORTY-FIFTH (21st Anniversary 1997-2018)**!*
*SPRING 2018 (late April)*
*Five-Day Training Intensive*
*in the*
*Biographic-Narrative-Interpretive Method*
*BNIM*
*Narrative Interview and Case-Interpretation*
*5 days for 6 people:*
*2018 Thursday-Friday, **April 19th and 20th*
*and then **Monday to Wednesday** April 23rd, 24th, and 25th*
*at*
*24a Princes Avenue, London N10 3LR*
*Muswell Hill, North London, United Kingdom*
Finding good methods for doing social research that are genuinely concerned
with *the macro-societal, the meso-institutional on the one hand and, on
the other, with subjectivity(ies) and ' inner worlds'* ….
… and *where you can shift focus on the spectrum and connections between
the two* …. is not easy.
One method of doing such psycho-societal research is biographical-narrative
interviewing, and one of the different methodologies of doing such
interviewing is *BNIM: the biographic-narrative interpretive method*.
The value of *open-narrative interviewing and insightful interpretation* is
widely recognised, but rather than having to invent the wheel for
themselves, many people welcome *a systematic textbook-backed,
tutor-backed, on-line supported, practical immersion into principles and
procedures-for-practice* that have been shown over two decades and many
countries to generate constantly high-quality work.
*The BNIM 5-day Intensive Training*
For over twenty years in the UK and in Ireland, as well as in Auckland
(New Zealand), Ljubljana (Slovenia), New York (USA), Sydney (Australia),
Wagga-Wagga (Australia) , Grand Canaries (Spain), Coimbra (Portugal) we
have been running 5-day (and other) BNIM intensive trainings designed for
PhD students and for postdoctoral researchers (both individuals and also
research teams) for use in various pure and applied fields. Comments
include:
*…such brilliant training and such hospitality and collegiality during the
week. I really, really appreciate it. I feel that I benefitted immensely
from the training.*
*I felt that the whole event was so well put together, there was so much
advice being given (and just the right amount) with lots of practical hints
as well.*
*It really made me confident about trusting my instincts with research and
with BNIM in general and about developing my own ideas about ‘what works’
in a practical sense while staying within the main parameters of the
method.*
*There was also a good level of theoretical discussion and given that we
have diverse research interests and are at different levels with projects,
I felt that the whole thing worked well* (Lisa Moran May 2014)
*Elvin – A richness beyond what I could imagine.*
*Ian - Your course (that I suggested one of our PhD students attend) was
one of the most enjoyable experiences (and intense!) I have had*
*Mark – I could go away and practice now. I liked the balance of how and
why. I really got my head round that and could explain it to someone else.*
*Sasha - thank you, for a wonderful training course. I learnt so much - and
it was a great experience for us all as a team, and in terms of all of our
intellectual and skills development.*
An excerpt from an email we received from one university may be suggestive:
*“… a number of the trainees who graduated this year got top awards in
their doctorate projects... BNIM and narrative projects were considered to
be of a particularly high standard by both internal and external examiners,
and were very well received. The course director was very impressed and has
told me that the standard of the research of those undertaking these
projects [using BNIM] has improved the standard of the whole cohort.”*
*Indicators of spread and success*
Already completed PhDs, clinical doctorates, and a few MA theses by
researchers using BNIM now number well over 90 and we know of at least
another 20 PhDs, clinical doctorates and post-doctoral research projects in
process. There may well be others. The trend is rising sharply*. 23* (three
per year) were submitted in the *eight* years between 2001 and 2009; but
*30* more (10 per year) were submitted just in the *three* years between
2009 and 2011. ???Who says qualitative researchers take no account of
numbers and can’t count? Well, OK, I haven’t checked the most recent
figures, but
In * 2014 and in 2015 and in 2016 one new BNIM output was published on
average every 10 days.*
A very few of the topics covered: the culture of motor bikers;
reintegration of returning Guatemalan refugees; identity in informal care;
men coping with sexual abuse; psychoanalytic study of breast cancer; love
and intimacy; motivation in occupational therapy; nurses’ and health
visitors’ learning and their professional practices; relationship
experiences in psychosis (such as those of, and with, hearing voices
people) and hospitalisation; migration; female aboriginal head teachers in
Australia; students on different types of degree and training programmes;
fishing practices in Uganda, treatment decisions around and experiences of
the elderly in hospitals; memories of wars, military occupations, and
massacres; midwife experiences; children in orphanages, intergenerational
transmission; the cultures of innovative organisations; motivations for new
entry into dairy-farming, the workings of debt in the everyday lives of
ordinary workers. *See free BNIM Bibliography for more detail.*
Increasing numbers of post-doctoral funded collective research projects use
BNIM (details in the *BNIM Short Guide and Detailed Manual*).
Anglophone universities involved include Auckland (NZ), Belfast, Birkbeck
College, Birmingham, Central Lancashire, Charles Sturt (Australia), Dublin
(Ireland) , de Montfort, East Anglia, East London, Essex, Exeter, National
University of Ireland (Galway), Idaho (USA), Indiana (USA), Kings College
London, Leeds, Leicester, Manchester, Massey (New Zealand),), Middlesex,
Oxford, Oxford Brookes, Plymouth, Sussex, Queens University Belfast.
*Assumptions and uses of BNIM*
BNIM assumes that “narrative” expresses both conscious concerns and
unconscious cultural, societal, institutional and individual
presuppositions and processes. Integrally psycho-societal, BNIM interprets
discourse and interview expression to support research into the lived
experience and reflexivity of individuals and collectives, situated
subjectivity, facilitating an integrative understanding both the ‘inner’
and the ‘outer’ worlds of ‘historically-evolving
persons-in-historically-evolving
situations’, and particularly the expectedly surprising *interactivity* of
inner and outer world dynamics.
It *especially* serves researchers who want to think psycho-societally and
who need a tool that supports understanding spanning macro-sociological,
meso-institutional *and* psychological dynamics and structures, and these
treated not statically or separately but as situated, affected *and
active* historically
and biographically.
For some examples of BNIM case studies, some in areas with which you might
well be concerned, see maybe the European Union 7-country SOSTRIS
project *Biography
and social exclusion in Europe: experiences and life-journeys* (2002:
Bristol, Policy Press). A multitude of other books, articles, reports etc.
are listed in the (available on request) Bibliography A of the *BNIM Short
Guide (and Detailed Manual) *
BNIM research provides an innovative base for psycho-societally-grounded
policy review and for better policy, and similarly for professional
practice and the upgrading of existing theory and case-description
practices.
When you do the course, you automatically become a member of the
*<Biographic-narrative-BNIM> email
list* where news, questions and discussion circulate. Innovative and
advanced methodology can be lonely without a secure base and contact with
like-minded people working in the same way as you.
The course, the textbook, a free *BNIM Quick Sketch* (with Bibliography),
the constantly updated *BNIM Short Guide* *and Detailed Manual** , *and the
dedicated email list (currently around 450 strong) all offer you initial
and ongoing support in using part or all of the *BNIM tool-kit* in your own
work and for liaising with others.
*Summary of the 5-day BNIM-intensive*
Designed for PhD students and professional researchers, the course provides
a thorough training in doing BNIM biographic narrative interviews, together
with ‘hands-on experience’ of following BNIM interpretation procedures.
Students develop a sense of how their own research projects might use such
aspects and components.
With two tutors (Tom Wengraf and Deborah Rodriguez) , we ensure close
coaching and support for the intensive work that is needed for you to fully
acquire both the understanding of principles and also the practical
capacity for proceeding with the systematic procedures involved in BNIM –
usable both for BNIM but also for other types of narrative interviewing and
interpretation.
You will be expected to have looked at chapters 6 and 12 of Tom’s
textbook, *Qualitative
research interviewing: biographic narrative and semi-structured method* (2001:
Sage Publications). *Before the course starts*, you are expected to have
studied some bits and scanned others of the most recent version of the *BNIM
Short Guide and Detailed Manual* which will be sent to your email address.
Your previous *preparing-by-reading* means that most of your time can be
spent on clarification and practical exercises during the 5 days,
*learning-by-doing-and-discussing* *and then rectifying your practice.*
It is in no way required, but please consider preparing for the 5-day
training by a very short preparatory 15-minute BNIM interview two-to-four
weeks before the training starts. A base-line lived experience for working
and learning more efficiently. An ounce of preliminary practice (first
stab) is worth 2.3 kilos of excessive preliminary reading!
*Programme (subject to revision) for 5-day intensives*
*Thursday and Friday - interviewing*
We start with a short introduction to the Biographic-narrative-interpretive
method, the history of its development, and to the principles behind its
practice. The point and timing of using open-ended biographic narrative
interviews rather than (only) the more conventional semi-structured and
attitude-and-argument focused ones is clarified. You get to see the value
of the 3 quite different sub-sessions. The bulk of the first two days is
then almost entirely devoted to learning the craft of BNIM interviewing
practice. This involves learning to ask narrative-pointed questions (both
open and also focused) and not inadvertently interrupting or deflecting the
interviewee. Apparently simple, it rapidly becomes clear that such a craft
requires repeated and carefully-(self)-monitored practice to be
successfully achieved. To do this you will interview other trainees and be
interviewed by them. Repeated short interview practice exercises and
discussion ensure such success is achieved before the end of the 2nd day.
*Monday to Wednesday – interpreting , and theorising from cases*
We outline the principles and you engage in the key practices of BNIM
interpretive work . We explain the importance of the twin interpretive
tracks of ‘living of the lived life’ and ‘telling of the told story’
analysis, and micro-analysis, and how you convert the raw transcript into
two series of processed data for each track. You learn the significance of
the future-blind chunk-by-chunk approach peculiar to BNIM by practice – by
doing parts of a narrative text analysis, a micro-analysis and biographical
data analysis. You see the value of bringing the separated tracks together
in an integrated ‘case account’ grounded in a synthesising history of the
case-evolution. Finally, on the basis of case-presentations, you practice
systematic case-comparison and the generalising *and* particularising
theorising towards which BNIM work is typically oriented.
The course ends with our looking again at how you might best use all or
part of the BNIM approach within your individual research projects, and,
given the existence of sceptical research and applied policy audiences, how
to defend your choice to use such an in-depth biographical research method
with a necessarily low-N sample, either on its own or as part of a
multi-method approach. We think about its use for evaluating existing
‘interventions in context’ and for designing new one…..
*15-minute practice BNIM interviews shortly before the 5 days, and shortly
afterwards + free feedback*
*Shortly before the course, *we recommend that you do a short 15 minute
BNIM interview, just to get a feel for the method. This is not evaluated
but, if you get it together to try it out, you learn a lot from it.
*After the course, post-course test and further support. *To help you avoid
unnecessary errors when you start to practice BNIM yourself, we continue
to *advise on your* *eventual design of an open-narrative question*(the
SQUIN) for your pilot interviews, and then – if you wish – *we give
feedback on your first transcript* and then on* its initial
data-processing *for subsequent interpretation.
*One month after the training, you submit your Test-Practice Interview for
feedback and support. *By your doing such a Test-Practice BNIM interview
in the month after the end of the Training, or thereabouts, you will find
that it consolidates your learning and you get tutorial feedback on what
you have done well and what you need next time to do (often subtly) in a
slight but significant different way.
It is very important for you that you do such a short Test-Practice
Interview (usually about 20 minutes) and send the Transcript and your
*Reflective
Notes for quick feedback.*
The BNIM Short Guide and Detailed Manuals (constantly updated) are very
powerful resources for post-course reference and clarification of questions
that arise in your post-course practice. They are free to all those who
follow a Training Intensive.
*Course Costs*
The tuition fees for the 5-day intensive training (including the important
post-course support mentioned above) are earlybird *£825 before March
1st 2018 (or £925 afterwards)**.*
[*Further Tutorial Feedback up to the level of the Case-Account* is also
now possible, normally for those who have completed the 5-day intensive]
Please note: there are only six places for the 5-day intensive, , and they
tend to go rather fast, so please don’t leave it too late to apply. Contact
me if you have any preliminary questions.
*CONTACT*
*For a free copy of the updated BNIM Quick Outline Sketch, for information
about the most recently updated version of the Electronic Package
containing the *
*BNIM Short Guide **bound with the BNIM Detailed Manuals and
Bibliography, plus free tuition*
*or for **all other inquiries about BNIM**,*
*please don’t hesitate to contact me at * [log in to unmask]
--
If interested in BNIM,the Biographical-Narrative Interpretive Method (BNIM)
approach to qualitative research interviewing, the following is
relevant.......
The next (45th) BNIM 5-day intensive course runs in London from Thursday
April 19 to Wednesday April 25, 2018.
A lot of material about BNIM is available from my page at RESEARCHGATE.
This now includes the *Quick Outline Sketch, *the *Short Guide, *and
the *Detailed
Manuals, and the BNIM Bibliography. *
Also several articles and papers.
Do feel free to consult and use the RESEARCHGATE facility.
Quite separately, I would be very pleased to receive and respond to any
comments or questions that you may have about those materials or more
generally about BNIM.
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