This dissertation documents a doctoral endeavor to explore both the potential of theatre as a means to enable students to practice vulnerability and the potential curricular impact of such a practice, using an in-depth narrative study of six theatre and drama for the young specialists. The researcher attempts to gain understanding and create a discourse on the vulnerability of the every-student as a curricular concern as well as make a connection to the potential of theatre as a means to practice navigating vulnerability. This not only involves a reconsideration of the term vulnerability to be seen as a path to strength, but also a reconsideration of educator responsibilities. The researcher sought stories of the everyday vulnerabilities that a student might encounter during school and specifically did not seek stories of vulnerabilities from extreme or exceptional traumatic events. While this study does not produce specific curriculum planning, it yields a better understanding of the concept of vulnerability, including the acknowledgment that practicing navigating vulnerability and practicing vulnerability can be accepted as useful terminology in educational pursuits. A key component of the research is the development of a Métissage Circle Theatre Script entitled “To Practice Vulnerability?” as a method of data analysis and research dissemination. It is the researcher’s intent that this script be available for readings by non-actors at school board meetings, parent-teacher meetings, teacher organizations, departments of education, theatre and drama organizations, theatre artist groups, and educational policy decision-makers. The script gently invites readers to begin to explore, ask questions, and discuss the educational possibilities, and provides a low-risk opportunity to navigate the vulnerability experienced when simply encountering the very subject of our own vulnerability. / Graduate / 0727 / 0465 / cclement@uvic.ca

Despite non-formal education being introduced into the international discourse on education policy in 1972, there has since been relatively little research devoted to exploring this concept and, in particular, to the experiences of educators who lead non-formal educational processes. This thesis documents a phenomenological inquiry into the educational beliefs held by leaders working in non-formal educational settings within Canada. The purpose of this inquiry was to determine the existence of a shared set of educational beliefs among leaders in non-formal educational settings. The research included an emergent qualitative inquiry design that drew on hermeneutic and phenomenological philosophies as well as critical theory. Research methods involved narrative inquiry, auto-ethnography, and photo-elicitation. Data elicited by this investigation revealed that participants subscribe to a shared set of educational beliefs, the essence of which involves the interaction and interchange between elements of praxis, service, and concern for the develop of whole beings.

Despite repeated calls internationally, nationally and provincially to place the development of ecoliteracy as a curricular priority, there continues to be a lack of attention provided towards this goal, in particular opportunities for direct contact with the natural world in terms of fostering ecoliteracy in student teachers (Tuncer, 2009; Davis, 2009, Gough, 2009, Beckford, 2008; Blanchet-Cohen & Elliot, 2011). Teachers play key roles in advancing environmental education efforts and the environmental literacy of future generations. Insufficient teacher preparation has been identified as one factor in the weakness of environmental education efforts and environmental education curriculum (Beckford, 2008; Lin, 2002; Knapp, 2000). Furthermore, adequate environmental education preparation of students in teacher-training programs is essential for helping future teachers design and implement effective environmental education curriculum (Cutter-Mackenzie and Smith, 2003; Mc Keown-Ice, 2000; Spork, 1992)..Future generations of students need to begin to perceive themselves, once again, in terms of being connected to a larger story which includes the more-than-human world. I argue that education needs to play an important role in that re-connection, and that teacher education, as a fertile place of in-betweenness, can represent an important step toward that goal. Using a combination narrative and phenomenological inquiry, I explore the storied insights of ten student teachers as they struggle to navigate the tensions, disruptions and opportunities that form the waters between their nature-self and their teacher-self. Along with a questioning of current conventional approaches to teaching ecoliteracy in schools, the Aboriginal concept of “heart knowledge” (Aluli-Meyer, 2008) is provided as a way of knowing which is congruent with the aims of an holistic ecoliteracy within teacher education. / Graduate / 0727 / 0530 / cfiller@uvic.ca

Spirituality is becoming an increasingly important dimension of Counselling Psychology. As multicultural communities become more inclusive and global, it is valuable for counsellors to become more familiar with the different types of spiritual experiences that individuals are having. By attending to such experiences, counsellors may address how current forms of spirituality encourage healing, growth, and development, thereby increasing our understanding of human potential. Furthermore, many cultures are emerging from a religious history that portrays a male god as supreme, and the predominant images of the Divine as masculine. This imbalance of the masculine and feminine in relation to spirituality has been associated with a profound disconnection from our bodies, the earth-body, and the split between spirit and matter. For this reason, relating to the Divine Feminine may hold an essential piece for many in to reconnect with earth, body, and soul. In this narrative inquiry, ten women are interviewed about their transpersonal experiences with the Divine Feminine. Their stories illuminate what the Divine Feminine is, the meaning attributed to Her, and the changes in their lives associated with their experiences. This study increases our understanding of the role that the Divine Feminine has in the lives of women, and represents some forms of spirituality emerging in the new global context. In turn, it widens our perspective on the therapeutic implications these and related phenomena could have on Counselling Psychology. The key findings of this research show that contemporary women are experiencing the Divine Feminine through: (a) Goddesses, (b) Shakti and Kundalini Shakti, (c) one’s Self (body, sexuality, women’s blood mysteries), (d) Nature and sacred plant medicine, (e) Mother, and (f) Spirit guides, visions, and past life experiences. This inquiry raises the awareness of the powerful healing, deep insight, and growth enhancing shifts that are attributed the Divine Feminine. The intention is that these stories will inspire counsellors to inquire into their clients’ transpersonal experiences with the Divine Feminine, as these experiences contain potent life-affirming and growth-enhancing resources. / Graduate / 0318 / 0453 / DawnRabey@live.ca

This dissertation documents a doctoral endeavor to explore both the potential of theatre as a means to enable students to practice vulnerability and the potential curricular impact of such a practice, using an in-depth narrative study of six theatre and drama for the young specialists. The researcher attempts to gain understanding and create a discourse on the vulnerability of the every-student as a curricular concern as well as make a connection to the potential of theatre as a means to practice navigating vulnerability. This not only involves a reconsideration of the term vulnerability to be seen as a path to strength, but also a reconsideration of educator responsibilities. The researcher sought stories of the everyday vulnerabilities that a student might encounter during school and specifically did not seek stories of vulnerabilities from extreme or exceptional traumatic events. While this study does not produce specific curriculum planning, it yields a better understanding of the concept of vulnerability, including the acknowledgment that practicing navigating vulnerability and practicing vulnerability can be accepted as useful terminology in educational pursuits. A key component of the research is the development of a Métissage Circle Theatre Script entitled “To Practice Vulnerability?” as a method of data analysis and research dissemination. It is the researcher’s intent that this script be available for readings by non-actors at school board meetings, parent-teacher meetings, teacher organizations, departments of education, theatre and drama organizations, theatre artist groups, and educational policy decision-makers. The script gently invites readers to begin to explore, ask questions, and discuss the educational possibilities, and provides a low-risk opportunity to navigate the vulnerability experienced when simply encountering the very subject of our own vulnerability. / Graduate / 0727 / 0465 / cclement@uvic.ca

To live HIV positive and age into older adulthood is a new phenomenon. Research is helping to identify how the body is biologically impacted by the complex convergence of the virus, antiretroviral drug treatment, and aging. And yet there is more. One has to live in their body. Believing that stories of living with illness hold meaning, we also need to understand the lived experience of persons aging with HIV. When we engage and listen to stories of everyday lived experience, we are afforded a way to gain insight into particulars of aging with HIV, and this in turn generates understanding and compassion that can connect and teach all of humanity about the broader experience of life. The intent of this dissertation is to present the narrative inquiry I have undertaken over a five year period. I begin with an introduction to the phenomenon of aging with HIV and then present four manuscripts, two that highlight research findings related to metaphors and themes within stories, and two that focus on the interview process and narrative practice. In a concluding chapter I weave together my emergent understanding of what it means to age with HIV, narrative inquiry, and discuss implications of the findings that may take nursing and nursing care forward. In the first manuscript I address tensions that arose and troubled my narrative interviewing approach. Tensions arose when a) presence was tempered by performance, b) power by equality, c) leading by following, d) insider by outsider, e) being non-influential by social influences, and f) trust tempered by responsibility. These tensions, which I refer to as a dynamic process of breathing in the mud, can act as catalysts that ignite clarity and advance narrative interviewing. In the second manuscript I explore metaphors within the stories of 5 adults’ experiences of aging with HIV. Metaphors reveal a complex struggle of living in-between tensions of uncertainty and hope, of facing death and living in the moment, and of hurt amidst joys of evolving identity. The overarching metaphor of “shadows and sunshine” reveals that to age with HIV is to survive and live in a fragile state, balancing multiple shadows such as stigma and side effects with joyful experiences of support and belonging. In the third manuscript I present results of a narrative analysis exploring HIV and aging stories of five adults, age 55-62, who have lived with HIV for 13-24 years. In analyzing the co-constructed stories, six common storylines were identified: the illness embodied, the journey of sense making of, intimacy with death and loss, ongoing secrets and stigma, evolving identity, and living in connection. These findings illustrate the vitalness of telling one’s illness story, as sense making happens in the telling and supports one to adapt. The final manuscript is a call to action and emphasizes cultivating a narrative sensibility in nursing practice. I offer the mnemonic STORIED to help nurses weave together essential elements of a narrative practice approach: Subjective, Tell/Listen, Openness, Reflection, Invite/Intention, Engage, and Document. / Graduate / 0569 / rosanne.beuthin@shaw.ca

This thesis explores the professional knowledge of three choral music educators from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador. My primary research purpose was to explain what constitutes the professional knowledge of each of the research participants as revealed through their life stories; to illustrate how such professional knowledge has been shaped by experiences throughout each of the participants’ lives; and to understand how the participants’ experiences of developing as educators within the specific social, cultural, and political contexts of Newfoundland and Labrador have shaped their professional knowledge. Through this inquiry, three choral music educators engaged in a process of teacher development, as they discovered for themselves, through a narrative process of self-exploration, the meaning that could be made of the relationships between their life experiences and their knowledge of music teaching and learning. Data-gathering included a series of four in-depth interviews, which consisted of open-ended questions that engaged the participants in reconstructing their life experiences and articulating their professional knowledge within the context of developing as choral music educators. Choral rehearsal observations provided another source of data. These observations enhanced my understanding of the participants’ teaching practice, and assisted in my understanding of the relationships between the personal and the professional that they expressed in initial interviews. Analysis of the data is represented through narratives of the participants’ life stories and a thematic discussion of their professional knowledge as revealed through those stories. Each participant’s narrative and professional knowledge are presented in individual chapters, followed by a chapter that explores the resonances (Conle, 1996) amongst the participants’ narratives and my own personal-professional narrative. I propose that we begin to reconceptualize professional development in order to acknowledge the complexity and personal nature of professional knowledge, and I assert that the exploration of life stories is a meaningful form of professional development for music educators.

This autoethnography uses narrative inquiry within an anticolonial theoretical framework. As a White Italian male settler living on Turtle Island, I bring survivor experience to psychiatric definitions of “psychosis,” or what I call psychosic narrative, and to broader literatures for the purpose of decolonizing “mental” relations. Using reflexive critiques, including feminist antiracism, I question my own privileges as I consider the possibilities of Mad culture to disturb authorizations of practices like forced electroshock and drugging. Using journals, salient themes of experience are identified, including “delusion,” “psychosis,” “madness,” and “illness,” especially as they appear in texts about politics, culture, and theory. A temporally rigorous narrative approach to my readings allows for a self-reflexive writing on such themes in relation with antiracist anticolonial resistance. Thus a White psychiatric survivor resistance to psychiatry and its social (local) history is related to the problematic of global Western neoliberal heteropatriarchy in psychological institutional texts. Survivor testimonies bring critical madness and disability theories as they pertain to racialization and constructions of sex/uality and gender. Rather than present a comprehensive analysis, this narrative inquiry is generated from the process of research as it was experienced in order to represent and question its epistemological grounds.

Although interpersonal communication studies have focused on various aspects of interpersonal relationships, research on the player identity and gendered emotional manipulation in romantic relationships has received little attention. This narrative research inquiry was undertaken to explore perceptions of men and women related to the player identity and gendered emotional manipulation. This investigation used social construction as a theoretical perspective to understand three areas of investigation that include: the existence and relevance of the player identity, the player’s relation to emotionally manipulative behaviour, and the connection between socially constructed gender conventions and the player identity. Hesse-Biber’s (2006) feminist interviewing approach guided semi-structured interviews with six male and six female participants. Respondents reported the existence and relevance of the player identity in romantic relationships today, connecting this identity to emotionally manipulative behaviour, as well as relating this identity to traditional gender conventions. Finally, implications for men and women in romantic relationships today and future areas of research are discussed in light of these findings.

This narrative inquiry explores therapeutic relationships in the practice of recreation therapy. Narratives were generated in Recreation Therapy’s self-reflective case review process at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre—a process developed to support team engagement in reflections on their therapeutic relationships. In total, three self-reflective case reviews were explored, and for each case review, four layers of analysis occurred. The first two layers used narrative analysis to restory reflections of the case review leader (layer one) and then reflections within the recreation therapy team (layer two). The third and fourth layers used analysis of narrative to explore theoretical ideas from person-centred care emerging inductively in the text (layer three), and then to restory the previous narratives using a relational theory lens (layer four). Exploration revealed the self-reflective case review process also strengthens therapeutic relationships within the recreation therapy team. In the recreation therapists’ narratives we hear relational notions of connection, disconnection, reconnection, mutuality, mutual empathy, authenticity, vulnerability, and support. This study engaged recreation therapists in an act of critical pedagogy as they engaged in critical self-reflection by exploring across layers of narrative that story their therapeutic relationships. The self-reflective case review process creates opportunity for the recreation therapy team to recognize, identify and name their experiences within therapeutic relationships, and to find their voices in the medical context of a hospital setting. When engaging in self-reflective processes, recreation therapy moves further away from treating individuals as objects, shifting practice toward connection and mutuality in therapeutic relationships.