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Friends, this is our fourth lecture on research methods. In the first lecture, I talked about
the differences between quantitative and qualitative methodologies; and said that in sociology,
in general and in population studies in particular, there are some who believe in positivist and
they prefer quantitative methods. There are others who prefer phenomenological methodology
and they go for qualitative methods. Then I talked about primary and secondary data;
data which are collected by the researchers themselves are called primary data; and the
data which are collected by someone else may be or census or NSSO, these kinds of data
can be called secondary data. Then in the last lecture, I talked about certain
tools and techniques of data collection. I mean primary data, though the same methods
are used by others, when they are collecting data for themselves, and their data become
secondary for us. These methods are census, survey, focus group discussion, interviews
of key respondents, experimental method and anthropological method of field work.
Now, today I am going to introduce another tool of data collection, which also has a
different approach behind it, and that is participatory rural appraisal. A participatory
rural appraisal has been used more by development, experts, economist, anthropologist, political
scientists, sociologist, all those interested in studies of development at the village level,
in tribal communities, in less developed societies. But now, this idea participatory rural appraisal
PRA is being used in many other fields of research. Therefore, it becomes important
for students of population studies to get introduced to some basic ideas of participatory
appraisal. In this one hour time, I will try to present some basic material on origin,
nature, type of participatory rural appraisal methods, and if time permits, I can also discuss
a bit about some experiences of ours in using participatory rural appraisal.
Now, participatory rural appraisal there are 4 or 5 rather 5 major sources of PRA, 1 participatory
action research, this participatory action research means, action research done in the
field of development, environment, development, watershed programs, community development
with the help of participation of people. This kind of analysis has been more popular
in agro economic system analysis, in applied anthropology, in farming systems research
and rapid rural appraisal.
The basic works on PRA are by Robert Chambers, later on many other development theories have
picked up these techniques and improvised these techniques and now there are lots of
people. If you go on internet site, you find thousands of references to PRA and PRA has
been conducted in different settings, in different countries, in different areas, in different
subjects, by different types of experts. It is no more confined to study of agro economic
systems and it is not only confined to those specific tools developed by Robert Chambers.
But the idea; the basic philosophy behind PRA were that of Robert chambers.
In 1983, he wrote a book Rural Development Putting the Last First. Now the title of the
book itself shows that in this study, Chambers is stressing on the perspective of the most
downtrodden or most under privileged or the poor or the marginal sections of society.
To study rural devolvement, to conceptualize rural development, to develop strategies for
rural development you have to count the view points of those who are at the bottom of economic
development. Then in 1997, he wrote another book which
again became a basic book for practitioners of PRA. The title is Whose Reality Counts?
Putting the First Last, so here Robert Chambers is trying to say that so far, who were the
first actually in development research The first were the experts. Experts, researchers,
consultants, ward bank specialist and policy makers. And the understanding of rural development
or the understanding of society so far, has been the understanding of this experts and
planners. Robert chambers says that in order to promote
rural development which is integrated, holistic, sustainable, which promotes justice and which
is acceptable to people. You have to put the viewpoints of the people first and let experts
be in the position of facilitators. We will see some of these slides in which I am trying
to summarize these ideas of Robert chambers. In India, in 2002 Someshkumar wrote a book
Methods for Community Participation, in which drawing from the ideas of Robert chambers’
and others. He has presented a large number of tools and techniques of conducting PRA
exercises. Actually most of my slides today, are based on the reading of methods for community
participation of Someshkumar Neelamukherjee is another administrator in
India, who has written lots of books on participatory learning and action and it is she, who popularize
use of PRA among development administrators in the country. Those interested in details,
in technical aspects philosophy of PRA, can benefit a lot by reading Someshkumar’s book
Methods for Community Participation. And those who want to have a firsthand feel for the
experiences of conducting PRA, in diverse settings in India, Bangladesh would benefit
immensely from reading of Neelamukherjee’s books including participatory learning and
action on PRA.
Now, the history of PRA, why PRA, what makes PRA so popular or so attractive as compare
to say surveys or focus group discussions or other convincible anthropological methods
of field work. You know in 60s and 70s, there was a big disillusionment with questionnaire
surveys in the field of development. With their inadequacy, late results and inexactness
and this produced rapid rural appraisal. Now, I must explain what is the meaning of
inadequacy, late results and inexactness and what rapid rural appraisal. Now, surveys;
questionnaire surveys mean you take a sample developed a standardized questionnaire or
schedule go to the people fill them up then analyze them statistically, something which
we discussed last time. Now, the problem with this approach is as
some people say that a survey you get what you are actually looking for results of your
survey depend heavily on what your hypothesis is. It is like if you want to study trends
and fertility and your study of economic theory or your study of theory of fertility suggest,
that there is strong relationship between per capita income and fertility.
Then in your questionnaire; obviously, you will have questions more related to economic
background of your subjects and their fertility preferences and practices and the result will
be that yes there is a relationship between per capita income and fertility. What the
survey will tell you is only degree or strength of relationship or what is correlation coefficient
what is the slope of regression analysis, etcetera. But if in the starting in which
we study it is not income so much but religion, religious ideas or something else may be education
that affects fertility more, you would not get that from the study of your subjects using
questionnaire service. In questionnaire service your results are dependent on what questions
you have included in your survey. Then they are inadequate, from many perspective
they are inadequate, lack in sociology, we lack adequate measurements, we lack adequate
instruments of or tools of analysis of statistical data. Actually all statistical applications
are based on certain assumptions. When those assumptions are not satisfied, then the surveys
can give you misleading results also. And moreover, to conduct a large scale survey
is not always easy. You see the most important source of data in India on population trends
has been census, but you know how huge census operation is counting more than one billion
people of India is not a small task. There are several years of preparation, users conferences
then designing of questionnaire, tools and techniques, adding or deleting questions,
lot of discussion and lot of time of experts goes into it, then printing of questions,
then administration of the census operation with the help of lacks of primary school teachers
or anganwadi workers or other grass roots workers in villages and same in urban areas
then analysis. So, sometimes you see that many tables of
one census are not made available even ten years later, preparing for conducting census,
analyzing data, publication of results all these takes so much of time and so much of
resources, money and staff member are required that it becomes inconvenient. It is not possible
to have knowledge based on census, or even largest scale national service so frequently.
So, whenever you need some quick information, you want to run some program and you want
quick information you want to test some idea, so that on the basis of your observations
or results of observation of that idea you can suitably modify it and then take up it
for largest scale interventions. So, traditional techniques that way are not adequate and they
take lot of time. And that is why in NSSO I said that many types
of information are collected only at a gap of 5 years. National family of survey it was
decided that we will conduct national family health survey at a gap of seven years but,
so for quick for rapid assessment of something like we have some idea in terms of some medical
intervention through which say maternal mortality race you can reduce.
Now, we will not wait to conduct a census or a national survey and wait for 5 years
10 years for results to come to implement our program. In that case we require some
research method which is quick, rapid and this rapid rural appraisal comes to our rescue.
What happen in rapid rural appraisal, either then it was suggested that if surveys are
not adequate surveys of development, which in a pejorative negative sense produced the
term development tourism development tourism. Certainly have the experts in planning for
their tours in different countries of the world, but the development tourism did not
help in making better development planning. So, RRA it was suggested by certain ward organizations
including ward bank, that if a team of experts, an interdisciplinary team of experts consisting
of sociologist, economist, political scientist, psychologist go together and talk to people
in the field and then have some kind of brain storming communication among them, communication
between experts and people, communication among experts, communication among people
you know creating a situation in which communication in all directions is facilitated. Then the
learning that takes place with this interdisciplinary team of researchers is quick and more valuable
than the findings of the survey. So, this rapid rural appraisal was developed
in response to inadequacy of survey results, but RRA was not PRA. RRA also gives more importance
to experts its interdisciplinary team of experts, who visits a rural area for a limited period
of time, talks to diverse actions of society. It is like using qualitative research methods,
by an interdisciplinary team of researchers and arriving at quick findings.
So, RRA was participatory, it was participatory in the sense that people had the opportunity
to participate and present their viewpoints before experts and it was interdisciplinary.
You cannot study development simply with the help of sociological frameworks or sociological
apparatuses, development is a holistic multidimensional concept. And in order to understand approaches
problems of and results or impacts of development policy, you require interdisciplinary team.
Now, subsequently it let to participative rural appraisal. Here the term rural is actually
misnomer, PRA has been applied both in urban and rural setting just because it is started
with rural area. So, it was called participatory rural appraisal that term rural is misnomer,
but shift from RRA to PRA is more important, RRA too is experts based PRA becomes more
people centered. We will see how PRA becomes more people centered.
The principles are the principles of PRA are reversal of learning. In the traditional methods
of learning it is believed that experts are the scholars from which ordinary people are
to learn something or experts are the scholars from which development planners or policy
makers are to learn something. So, knowledge flows from experts to people or experts to
policy makers. The principle of PRA is that people know about
their condition better, they are also in the position to analyze their condition better,
they are in a position to tell us better what is good for them or kind of policies and programs
are required in their set up which will actually benefit them. And it is we experts are development
planners who must go to people, talk to them and learn from them what is good what is good
for them or what kind of programs should be developed. This is one reversal of learning
not from experts to people or experts to policy makers, but from people to policy makers via
experts. Then rapid and progressive learning, this
is another advance principle that we want quick results. We cannot wait for surveys
or censuses and we cannot wait for experimental design, we cannot wait for field works you
know anthropology suggested that field work must be conducted for at least one year.
Now, sometimes there is no time to wait for one year for implementing your development
policy. So, another advantage of PRA techniques is that they produce rapid results and there
is progressive learning, accumulative, continuous additive there is more progressive learning
as time passes. And we learn more from experiences of people our own experiences, our implementation
of tools and techniques of PRA. Then it off setting biases in conductive research,
our research findings often reflected the biases of the researchers, the experts. In
sociology there is a great debate on whether value neutral knowledge is possible or not.
There are some people positivist who believe that yes, it is possible to generate value
free knowledge on the line of scientific, mathematical scientific experimental knowledge
and on the other there are some who say that no, values will always interfere in the work
of researches. In PRA since the focus of knowledge is on
people. So, an attempt is made, at least an attempt is made to learn from people and learn
with the biases and prejudices or assumptions or values of people, not affected our results
in PRA should not be affected by the biases, prejudices, word views or theoretical positions
of experts. If there are biases, these biases are the biases of people. So, offsetting biases
is another important aim of PRA technique. Then optimal ignorance optimal ignorance you
know this principle will mean that we do not want to know everything, we want to know things
of practical interests only. So, confined in to those areas in which we are interested,
small things, small experimentations. We want to have as much knowledge as it required optimal,
it should not be too much. We do not want to maximize knowledge in surveys or in mathematical,
in understanding of social science subjects, there is limitless learning. So, there is
no end to construction of better measurements of poverty for example, for decades we have
been talking about measurement of poverty and improvising methods of measuring poverty.
Here in PRA, our aim is limited our aim is limited to learn what is good for the intervention
in a concrete setting, that much of learning is required, optimal not maximum. In management
literature we make a difference between maximum and optimum, in PRA we are interested in optimum
knowledge and not in maximum knowledge in any field.
Triangulation means in PRA techniques it is possible to combine, different tools and techniques,
word views, perspectives. And you can use qualitative methods of say open and read interviews,
narratives along with certain technique which are in the specific domain of PRA. PRA helps
us in unearthing the complexities and diversities of points of view. If there are differences
with regard to something between different social groups, different villages, different
regions then PRA will help us in unearthing those diversities.
The assumptions are that the poor and the marginalized are capable of analyzing their
own realities, they have the capacity. Earlier researchers felt that when they go to interview
people, it is to generate knowledge based on certain scientific assumptions and that
knowledge belongs to experts. People on their own are not capable of analyzing their reality,
for analysis we depend on experts. So, for planning commission experts should
be academicians, scholars or intellectuals. The assumption in PRA is that the poor and
marginalized understand experience of living anywhere else outside their village, but at
least in their village condition they understand their situation much better. They can analyze
it, they can discuss it among themselves, they can come up with solutions. And the only
problem is that, they are not in a position to implement what they think is the right
thing or what is to be they are not in a position to do what they think should be done, so that
they can, or their community can develop. So, with the help of PRA we are trying to
empower the people. We are also empowering also in another psychological sense that,
we are giving voice to the people and we are giving the confidence, we are telling that
that do not always depend on outside agencies, NGOS or government, you yourself capable of
understanding your situation, analyzing your situation and implementing solutions. There
are many things which you yourself can do in your situation and in that way it is quite
empowering and healing. Then the outsider should act only as conveners, catalyst and
facilitators not as generators or producers of knowledge.
Self, another assumption of PRA that self critical awareness of the facilitator is an
essential prerequisite. Who is the fittest person for conducting PRA? A person who is
self critical, who is reflective and who is aware of his own limitations and strengths
and the biases, which he carries in conducting his research, the facilitator should reflect
critically on their own concepts, values, attitudes, behavior, etcetera, on a regular
basis. If you are unreflective, you may be a good quantitative sociologist but you cannot
be a good PRA expert. And lastly learning should be experiential in nature and based
on principles of adult learning.
The methods; now, although in one hour time it is difficult to tell everything about PRA,
but I will make an attempt to present a glimpse of what are all different kinds of methods
of PRA, which have been used in the past by Robert Chambers or by Neelamukherjee or other
experts working in different parts of the world.
There are some space related PRA methods, there are time related PRA methods and there
are PRA relations method. As the word themselves show space related PRA methods, are the methods
which are used to generate a picture of space at a given point of time. When we when we
want to know the social organization of a community, we want to know the geographical
landscape, we want to know morphology, we want to know connection between morphology
and social condition we are using space related PRA methods.
When the purpose is to study trend, what is happening in a village situation, what is
happening in an organization, in an institution, what over the period of time then we go for
time related PRA methods. So, sometime we go for space related methods when the purpose
is to study a space, analyze a space and we go for time related methods when the purpose
is to understand change. And the PRA relations methods are the methods, which help us in
examining relationships between different variables or different facets of reality or
different aspects of the reality.
Space related methods are social map, resource map, mobility map, services and opportunities
map, transect and participatory census method. I am sorry, I may not be able to distinguish
between all these methods, which are space related or all the method which are time related.
In this elementary lecture the purpose is only to distinguish between space related,
time related and relations related methods, it is only an elementary lecture. If you want
to more on these things then reading of Robert Chambers or Someshkumar or Neelamukherjee
can help.
In time related PRA methods, there is an approach or a method of time line, there is trend analysis,
there is seasonal diagram and there is dream map
Relations methods are divided into following seven categories. Cause effect diagram, when
the purpose is to study cause of cause of some cause and effect, cause effect diagram.
There are some diagrams, which are specifically designed to study impact of certain policies
and programs or even may be natural catastro or epidemics devastation traumas. So, anything
any traumatic condition Then systems diagram, which help us in understanding
the total interrelated feedback, feed forward system involved in a process. Then Venn diagram,
which is also called Venn diagrams are more popular and one popular Hindi term for that
is Chapatti diagram because Venn diagrams look like a Chapatti rounded shape, so they
are also called Chapatti diagram. Matrix ranking method, then force field analysis and pie
diagram. These are some techniques, social map, time related and relations.
In social map, social map the most important tool of PRA is made by the participants. Now
these are some important points to note that all maps, why social time relation? All PRA
maps are made by the participants and not by experts. Social map shows people’s perceptions
of social reality such as schools, temples, houses, post office etcetera. Social mapping
provides a forum for discussion. Social map may not always be seen as the outcome of research,
social map is a method which facilitates discussion on a subject and may be seen as an instrument
or tool of facilitating discussion. It serves as monitoring and evaluation tool,
monitoring and evaluation of programs and policies. In addition using symbols it can
provide details like exact number of boys and girls, literate, illiterate in a given
situation, in a village or in a ward or in a group of villages. Here is an example of
a social map.
So, when participative researchers come of a social map, they come up with things like
this. Here is a social map of a village, some pseudonym
of village is mentioned and this map is prepared by the villager themselves. You know the villagers
may be illiterate, but they are capable of drawing maps of their villages, their canal,
their temple, their schools, their housing structures in their own manner. We are not
looking for exact map because as I said that these maps are an opportunity to have discussion
with people and understand their ways of looking at social reality.
So, whether this map is a real geographical representation of their reality or not, hat
is beside that is not the important point. The point is how do the villagers themselves,
sitting together in a group of 10,15 or may be sometime less 5, construct social reality
or geographical reality of their village. With the help of pebbles or may be with the
help of colors on paper, you know different techniques can be used for that purpose. And
this map clearly shows their understanding of where are schools located, convent, railway
track, highways, temple, post office, [FL] and you can see the connection between them
bore well, [FL]. And this social map also tells the number of boys and girls in age
group, 3 to 5 and 6 to 11, who are enrolled in schools and who are not enrolled in schools,
who are un-enrolled or who are dropouts. Means, they were enrolled at one time but later on
they dropped out. Now, when this social map is presented and
we find that there is a large number of dropouts in the village. Then you can ask the question,
what in your opinion are the reasons behind this high dropout rate or why dropout rate
among girls is higher than dropout rate among boys, and answers come. We are looking for
these answers, we are not looking for this exactness of this map prepared by the people.
Then we resource map which tells us about topography, terrain slopes, forest, vegetation,
tree species, soil type, fertility, land use, water, water bodies, watershed development,
agricultural development and cropping pattern productivity etcetera.
Mobility map, at the term mobility itself shows mobility means about movement of people.
When the purpose is to understand mobility or migration patterns, then mobility map can
be prepared. And these maps would show the places of visit and frequency, where do people
go and how frequently, what are the distances of those places. Distance plays an important
role in migration. Mode of transport on foot, by bus, by train, by aeroplanes, by ship,
purpose of visit preference either any preference for certain places and accessibility.
Here is a social map, with group membership and well being categories details. And you
know one interesting thing in this map is that simultaneously in the same village a
number of NGOS or self help groups are operating. And this map tells you in which areas, which
self help group members live. This map tells you whether well being of people living in
different parts of the village is high, middle, semi or low and age in the previous map locations
of primary school, temples, community hall, [FL] center, well, child care school, electricity,
water tank and so on.
This is an example of services and opportunities map. This is taken from Someshkumar’s book
and this map tells you that for persons belonging to this village, AR by HV village. What are
the facilities and in which direction and at what distance for example, township government
is a ten kilometer distance, some [FL] station is that three kilometer, this market is at
a distance of 15 kilometer, there is hospital which is located at the distance of thirty
kilometer and railways thirty kilometer, senior school thirty kilometer. So, this tells a
lot about the situation of the village. Now, it is quite possible sometime you know
I have seen that when I conducted PRA exercises, my co workers or assistants or field workers
were often confused and sometimes they will come and tell me, sir these villagers are
saying that this hospital is thirty kilometers from the village, but actually it is only
fifteen kilometer. I tell them that exactness of distance is not important for this, what
we have to see is that from the perspective of villagers which facilities are relatively
how distant from them. That is the purpose and then we will ask question okay, this is
at the distance of thirty kilometer, how do you go there, when how much time it takes,
when you reach the hospital do you generally find a doctor or a nurse, whether medicine,
are you happy with the medicines given at the hospital lots of questions and we are
looking for answer to those questions, we are not looking for exact maps.
You know, here in one village you know this is timeline kind of. In 1990, 95, 97, 99 2000,
2006 villagers are saying that these were the years in which certain special diseases
broke out in this area. In 90 measles, then dengue, then malaria, 97 malaria, malaria
in 99 again, then dengue, then in 2006, eye infection and dengue so that means, this is
a place where you have to concentrate on treatment, eradication and prevention and treatment of
infected diseases like malaria and dengue and sometime eye infection.
This is an example of timeline, in a hypothetical village Manthana. And this tells us that in
different year 47, 85, 98, 2000 which problems were more severe lack of food, scarcity of
water. And then number of circles, like these circles made by the villagers, show how severe
the problem was.
Trend analysis; you know, I was once talking to some villagers in Rajasthan in desert areas,
semiarid zone extreme shortage of water more [FL]. They say that we could provide more
[FL] to our gas to eat, but there was no water to be offered for bathing. There was lack
of irrigation facilities and people used to go to Sindh and Bengal for employment. Housing
was poor but diseases were also less, life was simple, there was no school, people use
to eat [FL], [FL] and whatever could be grown there in un-irrigated area and there were
no roads. Now, today there is drinking water because
canal has come, better irrigation facilities, less migration because local jobs are available
and partition of the country also prevented people from migrating to Sindh and quality
of construction of houses has improved, stone houses but along with water, malaria has also
come. When there was no water there was no mosquito and no malaria, but today there more
malaria. And also with prosperity and development there are more conflicts, fraction fights,
politics, schooling facilities have certainly improved and people are now eating wheat,
in place of [FL] and there is good connectivity.
Now, this then and now listing of conditions tells a lot about the village. Similarly here
is a seasonal diagram, showing impact of lift irrigation
Now let me tell you in 2, 3 minutes something about Venn diagram, which is an important
tool of PRA. Venn diagrams are made in the form of circles, like here this Venn diagram
of caste hierarchy two things are shown, size of the circle and distance. Now this map prepared
by the villagers themselves, showed that in this village there are 4 major cast groups
and most numerous is 3, followed by 1 then followed by 2 and then 4 and there is good
interaction between 2 and 3. 1 is away from 2 and 3, 4 is also away and there is no interaction
between 1 and 4, least interaction between 1 and 4, maximum interaction between 2 and
3, some interaction between 1 and 2 and 3 and some interaction between 4 and 2 and 3.
Another perspective, but this Venn diagram may be from the perspective of some people
of the village. Other people in the same village may feel that no, we have a larger number
of social groups they may say that not 4, but 7 and c 3 is most numerous, they may define
the social groups in their own manner. So, it is possible that in one Venn diagram something
is shown as less numerous, in another diagram from another perspective. Anyway we are looking
for diverse perspectives. So, from the perspective of the second group, c 3 is most numerous
and c 3 interacts with c 5 and they are close relatively closer to c four and c 2 and c
1 and c 6 are the communities which have least interdependent, which have least interaction
with other groups in the village.
Here is a Venn diagram of institutional relationships and size of circle shows the importance of
the institution for the community, interaction shows overlapping or you know joint responsibilities
and difference in a distances show whether there is any relationship between institutions
or not. So, these diagram shows that the most important institution in the village today
is PRI and it interacts a lot with the institution of watershed program. PRI has almost no interaction
with banking and PRI cannot interfere in culture and religion of the village community.
Here is a social map of Chinese village; social map we have already seen. Here is a Venn diagram
of diseases
Now, this Venn diagram can show a number of things. This Venn diagram shows perceive danger,
the size of the circle shows perceive danger, the biggest circle here is tuberculosis. The
people of this village where this Venn diagram was prepared are most afraid of tuberculosis
because they think that the danger of tuberculosis, is highest you know risk in tuberculosis is
highest. Then there are some coins inside the circles
or some small circles inside the circles of diseases, which can show how costly it is
to have treatment of that disease. So, tuberculosis is very risky, it can be fatal from the perspective
of people and it is also costly. Similarly Aids is very risky and aids very costly to
treat. Fever, perceive danger of fever is less and treatment of fever is also less costly
and then the distance of different diseases from the person can show what from their perspective
the chance of getting the disease.
Venn diagrams can also sometime show the changes in institutional relationships, like here,
there are two types of Venn diagrams. Diagram made with smooth lines and diagrams made with
dotted lines and if I had time I could explain this in more details, but one thing I can
tell immediately that, you know here this bigger circle is about money lender, in the
village money lender was very important at one time, but as time is passing the size
of circle of money lender you know this has shrink to this is smaller circle
Role of money lender or [FL] has become less important, role of society come fair price
shop which was only this munch earlier has expanded, now it has become bigger and similarly
role of NGOS, which was only this much earlier has become this much. And that closeness or
distance between different circles tells us about interaction. So, in short this is what
I wanted to tell about this PRA, I know that there are lots of questions in your mind and
it should be possible for us to take a one or two questions today.
Now, at the end I can summarize that here are some questions and exercises that you
can do on based on these four lectures. Difference between positivism and phenomenology, I do
not think there is any difficulty now in distinguishing between positivism and phenomenology. It is
a debate between scientific method and subjective meanings
Then you can try this exercise, select a national level study of fertility and critically examine
its methodology and analysis plans. Third, what is the difference between interview and
observation methods? Fourth, suppose you are to conduct a sample survey of child mortality
in U P, develop a research design for this you have to consult some sampling, some statistics
book to develop your sample design. Then what is the difference between primary and secondary
data? Today itself I commented on this, there should not be any problem in this. What are
major sources of demographic data in India? Census, surveys, RCA data, NFS data, sample
register these are the data sources. And then suppose you are to conduct, FGD of rural youths
to explore factors that expose them to risk of ***. What steps you would follow? We have
to prepare a self design then write short note quantity method, limitations of observation
methods, census, experimental, RCH surveys. Most of these things are available on net
you do not have to go to library. And about RCH surveys like questions, type of analysis
done, you can even find some research papers based on RCH data on net, go to IIPS website
and you find lots of thing. Census data, you go to census website, I have given you the
address of census website and you can find lot of material there.
Here are some references, census, some reference of population and development preview. These
are through net sources then reports, it will be a good idea if students of population studies.
See at least the report of national family health survey 3, 3 is latest and it is more
comprehensive and as I said in one of the lecture that for the first time we made use
a biomarkers and that is interesting to see how that was done, and what is the outcome
of research.
Then report of RCH and some other sources, it will be good, if you go through some of
this material. So, you know in one of my lecture on qualitative methods, I mentioned about
counter structure approach, and this Wilson ST, this article is a good article to understand,
what is counter structural approach. Now let me take up one or two questions from you.
Thank you sir, for such a detailed lecture on PRA, you said that PRA seeks diversity,
looks beyond standardization. Then how is consensus drawn, and how valid is the final
output? Could you just elaborate on that? You have asked a very interesting question
that how to arrive at… You see that in the beginning we had RRA not PRA.
Yes And in RRA with the help of interdisciplinary
team of researchers, an attempt was made to arrive at consensus regarding policies and
programs of development. But then if this is a fact that people in a rural community
differ with respect to their ideologies, problems, biographic situation, culture, values or dreams
of the future. Then should our research not highlight that. So, the purpose of PRA exercise
is to unearth, uncover, understand the nature of diversity. Let first diversity come out
and later on by sitting together again experts and people can decide what should be our priorities.
Actually, in PRA exercises even priorities come from interaction with people and we give
this opportunity to people that okay you have so many problems or you have So many differing
points of view, but then you decide develop a consensus among yourself and tell us what
should be the priorities of development planners. So, this opportunity to prioritize among various
options is also given to the people. Secondly, do we need to make the insider,
outsider distinction while doing PRA, the distinction between the expert and the marginalized
group, the insider, outsider distinction? It is with this recognition of the difference
between insiders and outsider that PRA was created, people are insiders and experts are
outsiders. Yes sir.
And we are looking for the understanding of insiders, how do the people themselves feel
about themselves? How do the outsiders.
Outsiders are only facilitators Facilitators
Outsiders only create that situation in which the insiders or people sit together and reflect
on their situation, analyze their situation and come up with solutions, which can later
be transfer to policy makers. And sir the last question would be, do we
require more than single researcher while doing/conducting PRA and how different is
it from an approach applied by a social anthropologist? The basic difference between social anthropological
approach of fieldwork and PRA is, that in anthropological approach understanding of
a situation was ultimately developed by the researcher.
Yes Here researcher is only a convener of research.
He only creates that condition that he brings people together. He encourages them to talk
and he creates that situation in which it is possible to facilitate communication among
people regarding their own problems, to make people involve, to make people analyze their
situation in their own ways. And even the recording of what transpires between people
in the form of graph, diagram, charts that is also done by the people. So, experts have
virtually no rule to play in generation of knowledge, except that they are facilitators
of knowledge. So, thank you, we stop here, and our next lecture will be devoted to the
issue of modeling in population studies. Thank you.