“I Saw Him Clearly through My Eyelids”: Strategies for Dealing with Discordant Realities and the Phantasm in Qualitative Research

Abstract

As a rule during interviews, research and respondent share the same sense of reality. In contrast, how should researchers handle phantasmal narratives during interviews, or descriptions of events that are impossible according to natural law? In this chapter, I report on 38 interviews upon people who encountered ghosts, apply theoretical concepts (James, Schutz, Pollner, Blumer), and, through autoethnographic reflection, suggest three approaches (“debunking,” “distancing,” “detouring”) to handling such phantasmal narratives. I conclude that they are best handled by complete suspension of skeptical thought, concentrating on ghost beliefs and not ghost existence.

Citation

Aveline, D. (2021), "“I Saw Him Clearly through My Eyelids”: Strategies for Dealing with Discordant Realities and the Phantasm in Qualitative Research", Denzin, N.K. and Sarina Chen, S.-L. (Ed.) Studies in Symbolic Interaction (Studies in Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 53), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 47-63. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0163-239620210000053005