In the Midst of Stories: Is Seeing Believing?

In this chapter, the author explores issues and challenges in the narrative inquiry into Chinese families’ lived experience on landscapes of schools in transition from China to Canada. Entering the research field, the issue of narrative truth became a methodological challenge as the researcher was bounced between the boundaries of educational research. By understanding story as the phenomenon, and narrative as the inquiry (Clandinin & Connelly, Narrative inquiry: Experience and story in qualitative research, Jossey-Bass Publishers, San Francisco; 2000), the researcher asked two questions when she was located in a place of stories: “Who tells whose stories and why?” and “Which is true, ‘To see is to believe’, or ‘To believe is to see’?” In this methodologically focussed chapter ethical issues and considerations are also discussed.