Crystallization

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When I first proposed a conference presentation about crystallizing an academic, I did some analysis of the scientific process of crystallization. In scientific terms, creating crystals can occur in several ways, and can be done through heating and cooling super-saturated liquids. It’s the process of solidification from a liquid state into a hardened, crystalline state that fascinated me, and is reminiscent of fractalization or kaleidoscopic actions that mesmerize my imagination. So it is with this in mind that I apply this metaphor to the creation of a PhD scholar, as I shift my abilities to conduct research from a fluid, uncertain, and unstable state to one that is more solid, fractional, and metamorphic.

Beautiful Chemistry: Crystallization from Beauty of Science on Vimeo.

Crystallization in qualitative research can be both a conceptual framework and a methodology, as Laura Ellingson (2009) explores in her book Engaging in Crystallization in Qualitative Research: An Introduction (2009). This concept and methodology emerged from Laurel Richardson’s (1994, 2000b) essay on Writing as.a Method of Inquiry. Crystallization in qualitative research is considerate of both the etic and emic viewpoints (etic = outsider; emic = insider). Crystallized representations should demonstrate and model effective application of logogens and imagens inherent in dual coding (logogens = representation in words and verbal communication; imagens = non-verbal, images, iconographic representations). Crystallization representations integrate the media triangle in text, production, and audience considerations within and with a given context.

The scholar draws freely on his or her productions from literary, artistic, and scientific genres, often breaking the boundaries of each of those as well. In these productions, the scholar might have different “takes” on the same topic, what I think of as a postmodernist deconstruction of triangulation … In postmodernist mixed-genre texts, we do not triangulate, we crystallize … I propose that the central image for “validity” for postmodern tests is not the triangle = a rigid, fixed, two-dimensional object. Rather, the central imaginary is the crystal, which combines symmetry and substance with an infinite variety of shapes, substances, transmutations, multidimensionalities, and angles of approach … Crystallization provides us with a deepened, complex, thoroughly partial, understanding of the topic. Paradoxically, we know more and doubt what we know. Ingeniously, we know there is always more to know.

Richardson, 2000b, p. 934 (original emphasis)

Ellingson (2009) identifies characteristics and principles of crystallization.

Characteristics include:

  • deep, thick descriptions and complex interpretations of a phenomenon
  • ways of knowing representative along a continuum, reflecting contrasting ways of knowing
  • contains more than one genre or media e.g. poetry, narrative, video, painting, music
  • high degree of reflexivity in research design, data collection and analysis, and representation
  • favours knowledge that is partial, situated, multiple, embodied and political (Ellingson, 2009, p. 10)

Principles include:

  1. achieving depth of description through multiple forms of representation, various means of organization, a variety of analysis strategies; examines patterns and exceptions; examines manifestations of power
  2. multiple ways of knowing as if viewing an object through a crystal; reflecting externalities, refracting within themselves, casting off in different directions in different colours; engaging in at least two different forms to construct themes or evocative moments; liberates, excites, and demands new forms or research
  3. includes interweaving, blending data and ways of presenting data to the world; recognizes the slipperiness of categories and the migrations of boundaries
  4. high degrees of researcher reflexivity; examining positionality of the researcher’s self; textual reflexivity; integrity and consciousness are evidenced; subjectivity becomes an opportunity
  5. celebrates knowledge as partial; partiality becomes complimentary; acknowledge bias and power; honouring participants perspectives; critical stance to research design, data, and representation

Crystallization combines multiple forms of analysis and multiple genres of representation into a coherent text or series of related texts, building a reich and openly partial account of a phenomenon that problematizes its own construction, highlights researchers’ vulnerabilities and positionality, makes claims about socially constructed meanings, and reveals the indeterminacy of knowledge claims even as it makes them.

Ellingson, 2009, p. 4

Crystallization, as a research concept and methodology holds potential but not without inherent costs. These include:

  • researches should have capacity and fluency in multiple genres and forms of data analysis
  • expertise and range of skills is required
  • decisions required to determine depth or breadth of data, analysis, representation – takes time and space
  • multi-genre texts can appear inconsistent and self-contradictory – not conducive to formal, conventional journal publications
  • researchers need to set aside notions of rightness, beliefs of correctness of particular genres or methods
  • requires cognitive and emotional capacity – can be mentally invigorating or similarly wearying and frustrating

Ellingson (2009) identifies both integrative and dendritic forms and processes when conducting research. These forms and processes are not binary, selecting one over the other, but adapted and applied to suit the research circumstances and contexts.

Integrated crystallization is described by Ellingson (2009) as a text that integrates multiple genres. The metaphor of a quilt is used to combine unique works and representations together in both a woven and/or patched formation. This is further described as a feminist metaphor since both quilting and research draw on the:

“work of a larger community that passes down styles, norms, terminology, and traditions: learning the craft through apprenticeship with an emphasis on tacit, “hands on” knowledge; endless numbers of decisions in design and procedure; improvising out of necessity and out of a desire for innovation; and products that conceal as much as they reveal”.

(Ellingson, 2009, p. 98).

Research work that is woven contains different and contrasting genres in a single text. Guidelines include

  • break the paper into “coherent, relatively self-contained, intelligible pieces” (p. 104);
  • think carefully about transitions and breaking points, providing hints of the story to come;
  • too many chunks or transitions risk reader frustration, alienation and disorientation so bracketing your familiarity with the data and theory may be necessary;
  • “let the work unfold as a story” by stepping back from the work to consider the path readers will take;
  • value and provide the ‘head up’ or helping hand to readers to “help them follow your line of reasoning” (p. 106) with numbering, internal previews, or summary sentences.

Research work that is patched contains pieces that function semi-autonomously and stand alone as coherent individual texts. This is imagined as a sampler quilt where each square brings out unique patterns, colours, shapes and structure, but are merged together with separating bands of fabric that complement, harmonize or contrast the neighbouring representations. Ellingson provides cautions and insights to support a patched crystallization approach:

  • provide orientation to the text, for the complete work and for individual pieces within the work; orient your readers with a purpose statement;
  • clearly identify “connections in the content or lesson of each successive piece in a patched text” (p. 112), but disconnections can also be applied with care not to mislead readers;
  • attempt to write with unique stylistic voices for each piece, giving a different flavour and feel; placing each patch into a productive tension and contrast “ways in which truths manifest in disparate genres” (p. 112);
  • recommending that you include a debrief and make visible your thinking of how each piece fits together and thus contributes to the whole (story, quilt, publication piece), as “yet another facet of the crystal through which readers may encounter the text” (p. 113).
  • patched texts are freer to apply multiple genres that don’t fit neatly or tightly together (as woven texts should).

Dendritic crystallization is representative of ice crystals or tree branches, and describe a process of continual branching into patterns that are both predicted and unpredictable. This form of crystallization “embodies choice, possibilities, and imagination, moving beyond surface dualities” (p. 126) in an “ongoing and dispersed process of making meaning through multiple epistemologies and genres, constituted in a series of separate but related representations based on a data set” (p. 126). Three characteristics that differentiate dendritic from integrated crystallization include:

  • “conscious engagement with an ongoing (re)creative process,
  • responsiveness to the research contexts, and
  • development of distinct, often asymmetrical branches” (p. 127).

Ellingson provides some sage advice when ethically applying crystallization in qualitative research:

  • reflect, reflect again, then reflect some more; ask yourself insightful questions (as shared on pg 41)
  • resist making simple or easy categorizations; advocates for “working the hyphens” (Fine, 1994)
  • conduct member checking; enable participants to ‘speak back’
  • share your research process to help demystify the messy research work
  • “remember that no innocent position exists’ (Haraway, 1988); present the research and the people in all their complexities; make manifest the implicit and explicit “intersections of power and privilege” (Ellingson, 2009, p. 44)
  • continually work with and represent others; don’t withdraw from marginalized others; uphold your responsibility to do meaningful work (Ellingson, 2009, p. 45)

References

Ellingson, L. L. (2009). Engaging crystallization in qualitative research: An introduction. Sage Publications Inc.

Ellingson, L. L. (2014). “The truth must dazzle gradually”: Enriching relationship research using a crystallization framework. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 31(4), 442–450. https://doi.org/10.1177/0265407514523553

Image Attribution: Photo by Jason D on Unsplash