Читать книгу Rural Women in Leadership - Lori Ann McVay - Страница 36

In order to provide a context facilitative of an informed and relational hearing of the women’s accounts of their ‘lived reality’ (Jack, 1991), it will be helpful here to profile the range of social locations that they occupied (Emirbayer, 1997). These profiles are drawn from the women’s responses to the interview questions, and so broadly adhere to the contours of the interview schedule beginning with participants’ identities as rural/woman/leader and continuing from their families of origin to the subjects of religion and church involvement, educational experiences, extracurricular activities and leadership opportunities.

In the final step (Step 4) of Gilligan et al.’s ‘Listening Guide’ (2003, p. 168), the listener is instructed to ‘return to the research question that initiated this inquiry’ and ask what she or he has ‘learned about this question through this process’. In revisiting this study’s primary research question, it became apparent that listening to the women’s verbalizations of themselves as rural, as women and as leaders was primary to any discussion of their leadership development. Bearing this in mind, a summary of the ways in which participants identified themselves as ‘rural’, as ‘woman’ and as ‘leader’ is presented below.

The women’s articulations of their identities as ‘rural’ and ‘woman’ were often less formal than their articulations of the definition of leadership and how they saw themselves filling (and/or not filling) that role. In part, this can be attributed to the directness of the questions I asked regarding their definition of leadership and fulfilment of the role of leader, as opposed to the more generalized discussions of the subjects of rurality and womanhood dispersed throughout the interviews. This may also be partially attributed to their comfort level in self-identifying as ‘rural’ and ‘women’ (which appeared as well-defined concepts in their narratives) and the nebulous nature of the definition of leadership. Nevertheless, clear articulations of their self-concepts in all three areas emerged as they narrated their lived experiences.