Field research

Theoretical writing in the feminist domain exists and can even be said to be expanding but research of the practical aspect still lacks a serious place¹⁵⁰. This may be due to several reasons: the lack of awareness, tools or concepts; difficulty in research of this type, amongst other things because lack of documentation, evaluating and gathering information and, perhaps, because it is a domain that is constantly developing and has yet to be researched.

The study developed from the work arena as a bottom-up process intended to determine guidelines – from practice to theory. It is a field grounded study (Glaser and Strauss, 1967; Strauss, 1987; Mitchell, 2007) that describes part of the researcher's official work as the mayoral advisor on the status of women.

Apart from courses, some of the projects were created following or alongside the courses were studied. Some of them were ongoing projects that continue to operate and develop, allowing constant monitoring and attaining new material for future studies.

The purpose of grounded study is the growth of a theory from the activities in the field while assuring adaptation to the situation examined and the possibility of applying it in other work. The theory is created, in fact, from gathering data and their analysis by the researcher, connecting the findings to an existing theory (Sabar Ben Yehoshua, 1990; Gibton, 2001).

As Strauss and Corbin (1990:23) state: "A grounded theory is one that is inductively derived from the study of the phenomenon it represents…"

3.1.5 Phenomenology,¹⁵¹ heuristic and hermeneutics

Creswell (1998) avers that phenomenological research describes the meaning of the experiences of several people of the phenomenon, and in the above case, that of empowering women. Tangible sketching describes, as far as possible, the array that explains social, historical, and

150 . In recent years several gender study tracks have been opened in universities/colleges that emphasize the connection between the academe-research and theory and field work.

151 Phenomenon – a unique event

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economic conditions that affect the main phenomenon – discrimination and the exclusion of women. The phenomenological research will emphasize the fact that the experiences of women as a research object, are significant for those who live them, and therefore precede all interpretation or theory. The experiences of women are the absence from decision making foci and positions of power at the various levels of life.

Moustakas (1994) stresses that the researcher must set his assumptions aside to be as available as possible to hear the voices of the research participants and to construct the picture in a way that it will be a combination of the voices of the former and the researcher's attentiveness.

In fact, this is the meaning of the researcher's awareness since it is based on the participants' stories as told, but also on the way in which the stories enter the researcher's awareness through images, memories, and meanings. Therefore, the second condition is the use of the researcher's intuition and imagination regarding the way to understand the research participants (Shor, 2006). The phenomenological approach enables embarking on the research without a clear and defined theory, although the final description in the study is supposed to formulate the essence of the experiences of the research participants, in a way that also will manifest the content and the structure. This description should create insights for the researcher of the phenomenon (Shor, 2006). Since, in the current case, the researcher is an inseparable part of the process as part of her daily work, as a woman and as a researcher, she must feel that she understands better the feelings of the participants and the phenomenon studied itself.

The theoretical background that is used in this study is a collection of articles from diverse disciplines directly and indirectly linked to the research topic. They create a puzzle compiling a new theory. The very use of diverse parts and theories affords an interpretive step unto itself.

The research describes on the one hand her professional and personal growth and therefore is a heuristic study, and on the other hand it describes a process that developed due to working with women in a locale, known as female empowerment through courses (educational research), with the goal of consolidating a theory (field research and phenomenological research).

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While gathering the data the researcher attempted to bridge the gap between theory and practice through description and story of the reality, and developing an array of concepts and insights – creating a new story¹⁵² The life story method is inductive and interpretive, i.e., during negotiations with the research participants, and on the basis of the interpretation of their stories and their analysis, a theory develops and reveals the phenomenon studied (Opletka 1998:74). The narrative-interpretive method is suitable to this research also due to the need to understand the phenomenon over time, as empowerment is defined (Moser 2007).

Every phenomenon studied needs a frame of reference, the definition of its components and adapt to it tools for measuring and theoretical conceptualization that will generalize and interpret the reality studied (Shalev, 2003:55). However, the study does not purport to measure changes - 'empowerment' - but its conceptualization as a tool for social change, examining the work methods of the advisor and of the institutions in the realm of the status of women.

The uniqueness of the current study lies in its being a pioneer in the field, since there are no measurement tools or guidelines regarding empowerment courses for women as a means for social change in the State of Israel. For the first time materials on such courses have been collected in order to construct a conceptual, organizational and practical framework using products that will afford the first infrastructure in the domain for activities and for change in the work methods and for further research.

The researcher found that theories and findings from other studies that relate to female empowerment (Batliwala, 1993, 1994) or show tendencies to change amongst women are usually connected to women who are defined as weak, as victims and forlorn – in geographic locations or communities, ethnic minorities, third world countries, traditional societies that are economically and culturally weak, according to the definitions of the western white, established world. The population that she studied is of women in a country with a western character both as far as subjective perspective and global belonging are concerned, despite a complicated mix of traditional and religious attributes. The profile of the population studied in a more focused manner is of women who live in a large city, who do not belong to the periphery or are marginal in any way.

152 The narrative method aims to employ life stories as a way of understanding a phenomenon

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