Critical communicative methodology

Research methodology based on intersubjective dialogue and an egalitarian relationship between the research team and those being researched (Gomez & Latorre, 2005).Current societies are characterized for using dialogue in different domains, seeing it as necessary for social progress and for avoiding different social conflicts (Castells 1996; Flecha, Gómez & Puigvert, 2003; Habermas, 2000). Critical communicative methodology is characterized for its dialogic orientation in different aspects of the research (Gomez & Flecha, 2004).

Introduction

The critical communicative methodology is based on the direct participation of people whose reality is being studied throughout the whole research process, so that research becomes the result of the plurality of voices (Gómez et al., 2006; Flecha & Gomez 2004). In other words, the subject of research is directly included in the research itself, providing its interpretations, experiences and opinions enriching the research. The definition states that when using the critical communicative methodology, the researcher leaves their position of power and become well disposed to accept the best arguments, overcoming the division between researcher- subject and person researched- object, avoiding exclusion. Specifically, Julio Vargas Clavería and Jesús Gómez Alonso (2003), in their article named Why Romà do not like mainstream schools: Voices of a people without territory; argue that educational researchers have long ignored the Romani people and that this lack of attention has contributed to the persistence of educational inequity of the Romà community, proposing therefore a new approach to romaní educational research based on intersubjective dialogue, and the emergence of an egalitarian relationship between the researcher and the researched individuals.

This methodology has been used in international research projects such as Workaló (2001–2004); which is a Research and Technological Development (RTD) that forms part of the Fifth European Union Framework Programme; or INCLUD-ED (2006–2011), which is an Integrated Project of the Sixth Framework Programme. The main results of the Workaló project as well as different proposals with the objective of defining strategies for the inclusion of cultural minorities focusing on the Romani Community; were presented on 29 September 2004 in the Workaló Conference in Brussels. More recently, the results of the INCLUD-ED project, were disseminated across Europe, on 18 November 2009, in a Conference at the European Parliament, in Brussels, as well.

In addition, the critical communicative methodology was introduced in the First International Congress of Quality Inquiry (May 2005) celebrated in the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign in May, 2010.