The purpose of this research was to inquire into the phenomenon of beginning teacher attrition, and more specifically, beginning physical education teacher attrition and retention. Utilizing the methodology of narrative inquiry, I first studied my own autobiographical stories that brought me to teaching. I then wove these stories into the current research around beginning teacher attrition and from this weaving, I began to look at beginning teacher attrition as a problem of identity shifting and shaping. This framing allowed me to narratively inquire into two beginning physical education teachers experiences. Looking at their experiences through this lens enabled me to become attentive to the experiences that sustained them as beginning teachers. Their sustaining experiences resonated closely with the stories that had brought them to teaching and the stories that had created their imagined stories of who they would be as teachers.

Woolum Bellum KODE (Koorie Open Door Education) School is located at Morwell in the Latrobe Valley of Victoria. The school is unique in that its curriculum is centred on the Gunnai/Kurnai language and culture of the traditional owners. The aim of this thesis is to describe and tell the history of Woolum Bellum School. My research questions are: 1. what led to the establishment of the Woolum Bellum KODE School? What are the critical success factors of the school attaining autonomy within the Victorian State Education system? The story of Woolum Bellum and its journey is important in the context of sharing knowledge. It exemplifies how a school like Woolum Bellum can be autonomous and how it presents a challenge as it comes to terms with what works and why. As a community we can assess the overall success of the school in terms of outcomes for the community. The benefits are seen in the generation of young people who attended the school over the past fifteen years. Their experience of schooling at Woolum Bellum as opposed to their experiences in the mainstream system amounts to significant successes. My ways of knowing have informed how I have used a method of research that respects my knowledge gifted from my Elders and Ancestors. My indigenous ways respected in using Dadirri as a methodology for narrative inquiry in research underpins and informs respect for honouring an indigenous paradigm; with tools within that paradigm to guide and shape my research. My cultural ways of knowing, my guidance in reciprocal and respectful relationships, talking together in circles, telling stories in conversations, and understanding community are at the core of these ways of knowing. My quilts crafted with multiple layers of knowledge offer the community a visual representation of the journey. They share the narrative and knowledge in conversations and in stories. They are relational and interrelated and they interpret the issues from my ways of knowing. This is a story I have shared with others already who believed in the possibilities for a Woolum Bellum School. Like me, they welcomed the challenges, the responsibilities that came with it to our community and Elders. And like me, the community held on to the dream that time and through listening, through learning and with knowledge, the possibility remains.

This thesis constructs and verifies a methodological practice of conversation groups and grounded theory for examining and changing the dominant discourse that situates Indigenous Australian tertiary students in mainstream education. Within this research, not only was a rich shared discourse development on a conceptual level valuable and necessary in the telling of our stories but it offered us as co-researchers—Indigenous students and a non-Indigenous researcher—a means of revealing and working through understandings and mis-understandings. Using such a methodological approach also suggested future possibilities for effective Indigenous/non-Indigenous stakeholders’ working relationships in research, and possibly policy-making in Australian institutions generally. As a methodological and communicative tool for opening up a dialogic space, the use of conversation groups for developing effective communicative relationships held promise for highlighting the experiences of Indigenous students who themselves, then negotiated the position for theoretically and pragmatically directing individual and collective decisions and actions. Inviting Indigenous students into this space provided an environment for the development of an Indigenous standpoint, which is not merely an Indigenous opinion but requires an engagement with the questions and issues affecting Indigenous students as interdependent individuals. Such a standpoint does not happen automatically and needs opportunities to grow and mature. I found that conversation groups involving the Indigenous students and me working together as co-researchers provided this opportunity. With Indigenous students’ narratives of success chosen as the research topic, productively communicating views became a verification of the research methodology used and an enactment of their right to be heard, both highlighting voice and representation issues. The research methodology we used and the ensuing discourse development became an entwined interplay, where each served to reinforce the other. The Indigenous students and I were practising the research approach of conversation groups while developing a conceptualised discourse on being successful. This transdisciplinary approach in co-research, encompassing Indigenous and Western research approaches, allowed for experiential and theoretical engagement with questions of cultural authority, representation, power and agency by Indigenous students and me as a non-Indigenous researcher. Central to the Indigenous students’ stories were notions of “place” as created, negotiated and manipulated by successful Indigenous students as they move between and within fluid subjectivities or stances in relationships, time and space. A broader view was taken of how intersections, layers and parallels are negotiated by the Indigenous students within and between multitudes of places in the blurring of living in two worlds: Black and White.

This thesis constructs and verifies a methodological practice of conversation groups and grounded theory for examining and changing the dominant discourse that situates Indigenous Australian tertiary students in mainstream education. Within this research, not only was a rich shared discourse development on a conceptual level valuable and necessary in the telling of our stories but it offered us as co-researchers—Indigenous students and a non-Indigenous researcher—a means of revealing and working through understandings and mis-understandings. Using such a methodological approach also suggested future possibilities for effective Indigenous/non-Indigenous stakeholders’ working relationships in research, and possibly policy-making in Australian institutions generally. As a methodological and communicative tool for opening up a dialogic space, the use of conversation groups for developing effective communicative relationships held promise for highlighting the experiences of Indigenous students who themselves, then negotiated the position for theoretically and pragmatically directing individual and collective decisions and actions. Inviting Indigenous students into this space provided an environment for the development of an Indigenous standpoint, which is not merely an Indigenous opinion but requires an engagement with the questions and issues affecting Indigenous students as interdependent individuals. Such a standpoint does not happen automatically and needs opportunities to grow and mature. I found that conversation groups involving the Indigenous students and me working together as co-researchers provided this opportunity. With Indigenous students’ narratives of success chosen as the research topic, productively communicating views became a verification of the research methodology used and an enactment of their right to be heard, both highlighting voice and representation issues. The research methodology we used and the ensuing discourse development became an entwined interplay, where each served to reinforce the other. The Indigenous students and I were practising the research approach of conversation groups while developing a conceptualised discourse on being successful. This transdisciplinary approach in co-research, encompassing Indigenous and Western research approaches, allowed for experiential and theoretical engagement with questions of cultural authority, representation, power and agency by Indigenous students and me as a non-Indigenous researcher. Central to the Indigenous students’ stories were notions of “place” as created, negotiated and manipulated by successful Indigenous students as they move between and within fluid subjectivities or stances in relationships, time and space. A broader view was taken of how intersections, layers and parallels are negotiated by the Indigenous students within and between multitudes of places in the blurring of living in two worlds: Black and White.

Professional treatment, mainly medical and psychological, dominates research and clinical practice concerning women and their recovery from depression. This thesis challenges the assumption that women cannot be 'experts' actively involved in their own recovery. This study explored the narratives of eighteen women in Aotearoa New Zealand whose lives had been seriously disrupted by depression. They had found ways other than, or in addition to, professional solutions that helped them to live undisrupted meaningful lives. The research used a narrative inquiry approach informed by authors from across the social sciences including Arthur Frank, Jerome Bruner and Rivka Tuval-Mashiach. The underpinning social constructionist understanding of depression is informed by the work of Jane Ussher and Janet Stoppard. The women whose individual narratives provide the core data for the study ranged in age from 32 to 70 years at the time they told their stories. Their lives had been disrupted by depression at different times during the last 50 years of the twentieth century. Five of the women met as a group with the researcher as the analysis began, and their ideas informed significant aspects of the conclusions. The women had all experienced major depressive disorder, although this was not always formally diagnosed. Their recovery had involved a range of responses from outside the professional mainstream including physical, mental, social and spiritual aspects. Each woman had sought and found a 'formula' that was 'right' for her. The narratives showed all the women talked of their experience with depression and recovery in an holistic and contextualised way. They all talked about 'chocolate' solutions which provided symptom relief, and 'deeper' and often more complex sets of solutions which enabled them to discover or re-discover meaningful ways to live. Meaning-making often involved growing spiritual or transpersonal awareness in the broadest sense. A surprising finding was that the patterns of recovery were not related to the severity of the depression at the worst time. Rather, it emerged that the ways the women talked about their recovery journeys mirrored their stories of the 'jolly good reasons' why they were depressed; the more complex and lengthy the story leading up to the worst times, the more complex the formulae required for recovery. The implications of the research for clinical practice and for policy makers are that depression and recovery need to be seen as gendered, contextualised, and holistic. Women need opportunities to discover and take advantage of a range of 'things' so that they can find their own 'right formula' for recovery. This formula may involve professional treatment including anti-depressant medication and psychological therapy, but it is likely to involve many other things as well. This study challenges the notion that recovery needs to be guided by a professional expert, and creates hope for women being able to learn from each other's experiences.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, March, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M A(Counselling Psychology))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references. Available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, June, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Delaware, 2007. / Principal faculty advisor: Katherine C. Grier, Winterthur Program in Early American Culture. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of History, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 57-63).