Participatory Action Research as Value-Laden Practice: Values that Matter to the Participants
Johannes Veli Nhlapo 
Issue: Vol.6 No. 1 January 2025 Special Issue Article 4 pp. 43-57
DOI : https://doi.org/10.38159/jelt.2025614 | Published online 14th March, 2025.
© 2025 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
This study aimed at resolving the vexing question: Which values do participants cherish and bring into a participatory action research project? To resolve this question, diverse stakeholders comprising heads of departmental, principals, deputy principals, SGB members, and a community development worker were mobilised to participate in this study. Using participatory action research, the principles of the critical emancipatory paradigm were operationalised. Monthly meetings were held where data was generated through the Free Attitude Interview. Discussions were tape-recorded for later analysis using critical discourse analysis to make sense of the meaning-construction processes of the participants. The study contributes to scientific knowledge by revealing the values that participants brought into a PAR study, namely, intellectual humility, transparency, democracy, inclusion and beneficence. The study concludes that these values are a conditio sine qua non for a PAR study and that in their absence a study may collapse. It is recommended that these values be heeded by PAR researchers because the participants placed a high premium on them. There is a need for more theorisation and scholarisation on the appropriateness of positivistic nomenclatures such as sample/sampling and data collection in PAR.
Keywords: Values, Participatory Action Research, Critical Emancipatory Research, Critical Discourse Analysis.
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Johannes Veli Nhlapo holds a PhD degree in Educational Management from the University of Free State, South Africa. Currently works for Free State Department of Education as the Deputy Chief Education Specialist: Management. Published two articles in 2021 and 1 chapter in a book edited by Proff. Tsediso Makoelle, Raj Mestry and Pierre du Plessis, published by Cambridge Scholars in 2023.
Johannes Veli Nhlapo. “Participatory Action Research as Value-Laden Practice: Values that Matter to the Participants.” Journal of Education and Learning Technology 6, no.1 (2025): 26-42. https://doi.org/10.38159/jelt.2025614
© 2025 The Author(s). Published and Maintained by Noyam Journals. This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
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