Research Methods For Adult Educators In Africa

This book explores rationales for research methodologies embedded in African contexts. Issues discussed include: contexts for adult education research in Africa; philosophical and theoretical foundations of inquiry; philosophical perspectives and their implications for research; doing a literature review; getting started with a research proposal; quantitative research designs and carrying out surveys; summarising and analysing survey data; the nature of qualitative research; carrying out qualitative studies; combining qualitative and quantitative methods; research ethics; action research; feminist research approaches; and writing up and disseminating research.

This book identifies quantitative, qualitative and multi-method approaches, and is based upon existing research methods teaching in Africa. It is grounded in African adult education contexts and draws on material and experiences from research courses taught in African universities. It emphasises the importance of combining quantitative methods with qualitative research that is embedded in adult education contexts and that builds on indigenous knowledge. Examples of the contexts addressed in the book include: village communities, agriculture development workers, literacy and income generation projects, community policing strategies, brigades, vocational training centres, mass health awareness campaigns such as HIV/AIDS, work-based education and training, management development, needs analyses, and the training of adult education trainers.

This book presents key concepts, information and principles that should underlie the practice of adult education in African contexts. It assumes that adult educators should have a historical perspective on the current educational context, understand how the colonial experience has impacted on indigenous traditions and be aware of the philosophical underpinnings of adult education activities. The chapters introduce the foundations and history of adult education in Africa; philosophy and adult education; socio-cultural, political and economic environments; opportunities and access for adult learners; gender and development in adult education; adult education as a developing profession; information and communication technology; globalization and adult education; and policies and structures of lifelong learning

Beyond the undergraduate and graduate levels, education has traditionally ceased when students enter the workforce as professionals in their respective fields. However, recent trends in education have found that adult students beyond the traditional university age often benefit greatly from returning to further their education. Adult and Continuing Education: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications investigates some of the most promising trends in furthering education and professional development in a variety of settings and industries. With an extensive array of chapters on topics ranging from non-traditional students to online and distance education for adult learners, this multi-volume reference book will provide students, educators, and industry professionals with the tools necessary to make the most of their return to the classroom.

Author Bagele Chilisa has revised and updated her groundbreaking textbook to give a new generation of scholars a crucial foundation in indigenous methods, methodologies, and epistemologies. Addressing the increasing emphasis in the classroom and in the field to sensitize researchers and students to diverse perspectives--especially those of women, minority groups, former colonized societies, indigenous people, historically oppressed communities, and people with disabilities--the second edition of Indigenous Research Methodologies situates research in a larger, historical, cultural, and global context to make visible the specific methodologies that are commensurate with the transformative paradigm of social science research. Chapters cover the history of research methods, ethical conduct, colonial and postcolonial epistemologies, relational epistemologies, emergent and indigenous methodologies, Afrocentric research, feminist research, narrative frameworks, interviewing, and participatory methods. New to the second edition are three new chapters covering evaluation, mixed methods, and mixed methods evaluation. These chapters focusing on decolonizing, indigenizing, and integrating these methods and applications to enhance participation of indigenous peoples as knowers and foster collaborative relationships. Additional information on indigenous quantitative research reflects new developments in the field. New activities and web resources offer more depth and new ways for students to extend their knowledge. This textbook includes features such as key points, learning objectives, student exercises, chapter summaries, and suggested readings, making it an ideal textbook for graduate-level courses.

This book, Multidisciplinary Knowledge Production and Research Methods in Sub-Saharan Africa: Language, Literature and Religion, contributes to the polemical conversations about existing architectures of knowledge and research practices in postcolonial sub-Saharan Africa. It creates an academic platform for multi-interdisciplinary research that brings to the fore inspiring efforts to break away from long-standing disciplinary bordering thinking and practices in modern-day sub-Saharan Africa. This distinctive edited collection is a valuable resource for scholars, researchers and students of multi-interdisciplinary research across the globe. The volume also promotes wide-ranging research focused on how to address complexities which hamper the promise of multi-interdisciplinary research in contemporary sub-Saharan African contexts. It provides thought-provoking perspectives on academic conversations about the uniqueness of embracing multidisciplinary research. The traditional methods of interpretation are challenged by the radical emerging demand to shift from a mono-disciplinary thinking to a cross-disciplinary epistemic endeavour in order to successfully address unfolding problematic realities that demand the pursuit of novel heuristic terrains.

This comprehensive introduction to the study and practice of health and adult education provides the missing link for those seeking to better integrate their efforts in these two areas. Bringing together a distinguished interdisciplinary group of scholars and practitioners, the book speaks clearly to how teaching and learning insights can be used to improve health in clinical, higher education, and community settings. Along with a broad overview of concepts and strategies in the field, Adult Education and Health includes illustrative practical examples from a variety of contexts and a helpful glossary of key terms. It will be a useful resource for professionals and academics in many areas, including community health education, health policy, First Nations health, and the education of health professionals.

Practices of Citizenship in East Africa uses insights from philosophical pragmatism to explore how to strengthen citizenship within developing countries. Using a bottom-up approach, the book investigates the various everyday practices in which citizenship habits are formed and reformulated. In particular, the book reflects on the challenges of implementing the ideals of transformative and critical learning in the attempts to promote active citizenship. Drawing on extensive empirical research from rural Uganda and Tanzania and bringing forward the voices of African researchers and academics, the book highlights the importance of context in defining how habits and practices of citizenship are constructed and understood within communities. The book demonstrates how conceptualizations derived from philosophical pragmatism facilitate identification of the dynamics of incremental change in citizenship. It also provides a definition of learning as reformulation of habits, which helps to understand the difficulties in promoting change. This book will be of interest to scholars within the fields of development, governance, and educational philosophy. Practitioners and policy-makers working on inclusive citizenship and interventions to strengthen civil society will also find the concepts explored in this book useful to their work. The Open Access version of this book, available at https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9780429279171, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license