Grounded Theory

The pre-study and the main study data collected by the researcher for the current study was analysed using the CGT approach. This section describes the rationale for using the approach. The Grounded theory methodology was first introduced by Glaser and Strauss (1967) drawing its philosophical roots from symbolic interactionism (Cho and Lee 2014; Priest et al. 2002). The Discovery of Grounded Theory offers a systematic rigorous procedure for innovative research theory. The methodology offers an innovative theory grounded in the empirical data without imposing preconceived ideas on the data. Grounded theory is not a name of a single, unified methodology (Dey 2004)⁵⁹ rather there are different interpretations formed from early versions of Glaser and Strauss’ Grounded theory namely Glaser (1978, 1992, 1998, 2001, 2003) Strauss (1987), Strauss and Corbin (1990, 1998) and Charmaz (2003,2006).

Grounded theory is suited for the exploration of the impact of education on women’s subjugation for several reasons. The primary reason behind the selection was that as an inductive methodology, it is ideally suited for exploring new phenomenon where there is little knowledge about the relationship in a relative area under investigation. Additionally, grounded theory emphasises on inductive strategies of theory development in contrast to logical

59 Ian Dey, “Grounded Theory”, in Qualitative Research Practice, ed. Clive Seale et al., (Sage, 2004), 80-93.

deduction from a priori assumption (Patton 2015, P 109) which is a conventional strategy for theory development. The grounded theory takes the researcher close to the empirical reality without any preconceived notions imposed on the data. As a result, the emergence of a theory is more grounded in an empirical world and embedded in an empirical reality. The grounded theory method aims at ‘build up theory’ rather than using existing theory to explain phenomenon under investigation (Patton 2015, p 110). In a conventional qualitative approach, existing theoretical understanding is imposed upon the empirical data which may be far from reality, whereas in ‘build up theory’ theoretical underpinning is abstracted from data to ensure relevance between the empirical world and pre-existing theory of a substantive area.

Grounded theory aims at building up theory, it enables data to speak for itself and lets the main concern emerge from the empirical data (Glaser 1998). According to Glaser, interpreted data is that “which is told by a trained professional whose job it is to make sure that others see the data his professional way, despite the fact that it alters the normal way of seeing it” (Glaser 1998, P 9). In this re-interpreted data, which was collected using expert interviews, the main concern is not how professionals assist their clients in solving their problem as it is central to the participants’ narration, but the “way of living” due to which women suffer and seek help from professional. This helped the researcher understand the cause of subjugation of women from various ethnic backgrounds and the changing form of subjugation due to a rise in female education. Thus, the final theory presented in the thesis does not centre on professional methods and approaches to bring women’s empowerment but the root cause of the problem in the form of Indian society’s “way of living”.

Grounded theory studies actions and processes rather than topics and structures studied by other qualitative researchers (Patton 2015, P 111). The current thesis studied the process and direction on women’s empowerment due to social change. Diffused knowledge later explains how a group of people process knowledge through cognitive discourse. The

interpretative data collected for the current thesis was conceptualised using rigorous comparative methods to develop conceptual categories, integrated for the emergence of a substantive grounded theory. A conceptual framework deduced from the empirical data takes the researcher close to patterns, norms, beliefs and attitudes of the people, so the findings are grounded in the empirical data (Patton 2015, P 110). The conceptual framework that emerged from the data has general implications far beyond the people under investigation and can easily be applied to others by using the constant comparative method (Glaser and Holton 2004). The theory has the basic social process of impact of female education on women’s empowerment and women’s victimization due to their education. The theory will not only be relevant to education policy makers in India but other international organizations such as the United Nations. Gender equality and education is one of UN’s Sustainable Development Goal and United Nation’s laid emphasises on women’s education to achieve women’s empowerment and gender equality especially in developing countries like India⁶⁰. Additionally, the benefits of the grounded theory are not limited to the substantive area of women’s studies but will be extendable to education, religion, media and cognitive research. The above- mentioned arguments established the rationale for the grounded theory as a well-suited method for the current thesis.

Based on the rationale mentioned above, the researcher chose grounded theory for the data analysis, yet the challenging task was to decide one among three different versions of the grounded theory. These three different versions of the grounded theory are: Classical Grounded Theory (Glaser 1978), Straussian Grounded Theory or Qualitative Data Analysis (Strauss and Corbin 1990) and Constructivist Grounded Theory (Charmaz 2003, 2006). The next

sub-60 For more information, please refer to http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/gender-equality/ for sustainable goal 5- Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. United Nations top priorities in India is women’s empowerment and women’s education. For more information, please refer to

http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=57232#.WigxRbaZOb8. Accessed December 6,2017.

section discusses the differences between these methodologies and the rationale for choosing the appropriate grounded theory.