Conceptualizing a Theoretical Framework: Embodied Narrative Knowing

The dominant Western epistemological and ontological perspective marginalizes “other ways of knowing” (Taylor, 1997) that adult learners use to make meaning of their experiences (Crossley, 2007; and Michelson, 1998). Other ways of knowing have also been called non-Western perspectives and are defined as having their “roots in cultures and...traditions that pre-date Western colonization, modernization, and Western-driven globalization (Merriam, 2007, p. 173). The aim of this work is to explore a theoretical framework, informed by three established paradigms, to conceptualize non-Western and other ways of knowing. This work outlines the three paradigms that are utilized: Social Constructivism, Embodied Knowing, and Narrative Knowing, to provide the values and guiding principles that this framework is based on. This work proposes the exploration of the experiences of adult learners who practice the martial arts (a traditionally non-Western practice) in order to offer preliminary validation of embodied narrative knowing as a theoretical framework for understanding non-Western ways of knowing.