Method Meets Art

Ideal for courses in multiple disciplines, the third edition of this award-winning text has been revised and updated with new topics, examples, and guiding questions to introduce each chapter’s sections. Patricia Leavy presents a practical guide to the full range of arts-based research (ABR) genres—narrative inquiry, fiction-based research, poetry, music, dance, theatre, film, and visual art. Each genre-specific chapter is paired with an exemplary research article or online video link (at the companion website). Following a consistent format, chapters review how the technique was developed, explore its methodological variations and the kind of research questions it can address, and describe diverse sample studies. Checklists and practical advice help readers harness the power of these innovative techniques for their own studies or dissertations.

New to This Edition

• Covers additional ABR practices: concrete research poetry, musically enhanced narrative inquiry, community music projects, musical spoken word, scored transcripts, comics/graphic novels, wordless narrative research, and installation art.
• Discussions of research design, collaborative ABR, and ways to overcome common ABR challenges, plus tips for getting started.
• Numerous new research examples, including three new end-of-chapter exemplars.
• Increased attention to the impact of research, with a heightened focus on ethics, public scholarship, and issues of audience.

Pedagogical Features

• Checklists of issues to consider when deciding how to use a particular method.
• Discussion questions and activities for in-class use or assignment.
• Annotated lists of suggested readings and websites, including links to online performance pieces.
• Compelling research examples from multiple disciplines.
• Chapters follow a consistent format and can be read independently or in sequence; new guiding questions introduce sections within chapters.

Winner—2021 USA Best Book Awards, Art category