Example methodology dissertation topic 6:

Epistemological research within the classroom: a rejoinder.

Hamlyn posits that epistemology is concerned with ‘the nature of knowledge, its possibility, scope and general basis’ (1995, p. 242). In applying such concepts to pedagogical issues and wider educational research, Pring (2002) furthers that epistemology is, resultantly, a concept upon which individual researchers can adopt different (but logical) positions. This dissertation debates the theoretical research viewpoints of epistemology with interpretivism and non-interpretivism and in so doing furthers existing academic debate such as that advanced by Crotty (1998, p. 8) that reality ‘comes into existence in and out of our engagement with the realities of our world’, rather than existing independently of peoples’ own thinking.

Suggested initial topic reading:

• Crotty, M. (1998) Foundations of social research. London: SAGE.
• Hamlyn, D.W. (1995). ‘History of epistemology’, in, Honderich, T, Oxford companion to philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 242.
• Pring, R. (2002). ‘The ‘false dualism’ of educational research’, Journal of Philosophy of Education, vol. 34(2), pp. 247-260.