836690

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QIXXXX10.1177/1077800419836690Qualitative InquiryMcGregor

Research Article
Qualitative Inquiry
1–7
Toward a Phenomenology of the Material © The Author(s) 2019
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DOI: 10.1177/1077800419836690
https://doi.org/10.1177/1077800419836690
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Kristidel McGregor1

Abstract
Can phenomenological approaches to experience allow me to attend to not just the human experience but also the
material discursive forces that are a part of the shifting, moving network of agents at work in a phenomenon? Focusing on
the material structures of experience means not asking what materiality is, but rather asking what it is doing in the context
of an intra-active phenomena. In this article, I consider what possibilities for data gathering and analysis are opened if I think
the Husserlian concept of encounters with the world within a feminist new materialist framework, and find the tensions
provocative.

Keywords
feminist qualitative research, feminist methodologies, methodologies, new methods and methodologies, qualitative research
and education, qualitative research

Some encounter with the world jolts us and demands our theoretical framework. What new possibilities for data
attention. It sets our curiosity to work; sends us to gathering and analysis are opened if I think the Husserlian
the library to read hoping to find others intrigued by the concept that consciousness is always of something—how
same problem; intrudes in our conversations with subjects meet the world—within a feminist new materialist
colleagues (“Have you ever wondered about —?”); framework, and find the tensions provocative? As St. Pierre,
saturates that liminal space–time between sleeping and Jackson, and Mazzei tell us—these things are not supposed
waking; and, eventually, re-orients our seeing, re-orients to relate, yet there is a productive intensity to be found in
our thinking, re-orients being, so that orthodox the pairing.
distinctions fail, normalized boundaries dissolve, and
Traditions of phenomenology are in need of unsettling yet
things that are not supposed to relate connect and
have much to offer educational researchers who seek to rei-
surge into new intensities.
magine our conception of the real. Poststructuralist theorists
—St. Pierre, Jackson, and Mazzei (2016, p. 105) like Foucault and Derrida rightly rejected a naïve conception
of empiricism as something fixed and awaiting human dis-
Introductory Musings covery, in favor of seeing the world as socially constructed.
But as the new materialists point out, matter matters, and
Phenomenology is often seen as an essentially (and possi- when we ignore matter in favor of interrogating our human
bly essentializing) humanist and realist endeavor, one that interpretations of the world, we risk losing sight of how the
requires a fixed, stable human subject for which the world material of the world can both affect significant differences
can appear. However, phenomenological approaches to in people’s lives, and resist human attempts at interpretation
experience could allow me to attend to not just the human (Alaimo & Hekman, 2008b; Bennett, 2010; Mann, 2014;
experience but also the material discursive forces that are a Mol, 2002; Rosiek, 2017). My attempt at articulating a phe-
part of the shifting, moving network of agents at work in a nomenology of the material is an attempt to articulate a kind
phenomenon. Focusing on the material structures of experi- of realism that acknowledges both sociocultural and material
ence means not asking what materiality is but rather asking factors, what Rosiek calls a “pluralist realism that frames
what it is doing in the context of an intra-active phenomena. reality as constituted by the methodological and semiotic
Likewise, investigating the experience of an intra-active apparatuses we use to interpret the world and constituted by
subjectivity isn’t asking what a separated, discrete subject
discovered in the world, but rather examining how that sub- 1
University of Oregon, Eugene, USA
jectivity was produced with and in the world, as agency and
Corresponding Author:
subjectivity are continually re-constituted and fluid. Kristidel McGregor, College of Education, University of Oregon, 1215
In this article, I ask what could be gained by rethinking University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403-1215, USA.
the tradition of phenomenology within a new materialist Email: kristide@uoregon.edu
2 Qualitative Inquiry 00(0)

the activity of a world that is obdurately other than our inter- (Barad, 2003, p. 810). What if we cease to consider subjec-
pretations of it [emphasis in the original]” (Rosiek, 2017, p. tivity as something that is predetermined, always already a
3). A phenomenology of the material could be one way to part of each human being, but instead think of subjectivity
approach this pluralist realism, one that has the potential to as something that is not exclusively reserved for the human?
take seriously the ways that matter co-constitutes human sub- I enter this tension using Barad’s methodology of diffrac-
jectivity, while not losing sight of how the material discursive tive reading, in an attempt to articulate the beginnings of a
is made real in human experience. phenomenology of the material. As Barad said in a 2006
I turn to theorists, particularly new materialist feminists interview, “diffractive readings bring inventive provocations;
and feminist phenomenologists, to help me think between they are good to think with” (van der Tuin & Dolphijn, 2009).
and across poststructural accounts of semiotics and dis- Thinking phenomenology and new materialism(s) together
course, and material lived experiences that can be beyond could be called an inventive provocation; perhaps Barad
language. I hope to think a phenomenology of the material would approve. She describes diffractive methodology as an
based on a subjectivity that is entangled and posthumanly alternative to traditional critical reflective, representative
performative: a consciousness that is continually becoming methods (Barad, 2007). By using a diffractive methodology,
aware not of but with the world. Thinking a phenomenology I can avoid the impulse to critique previous theories, and to
of the material means seeing the subject–object relationship relieve or neatly resolve the tension between them. Instead, I
as shifting and always emergent. The semiotic and the ontic, dwell in the provocation that comes with thinking feminist
the bodily and the material, are shaped by and with one phenomenology and new materialism(s) together, to begin to
another in an ongoing becoming. articulate what phenomenology of the material might look
The tension created by considering a phenomenology of like in practice, and to consider what implications of this
the material is thick. Elizabeth St. Pierre seeks to draw a bright approach on other “post” phenomenologies might be.
line between the empiricisms of phenomenology and the new I begin by grounding the discussion in theory, in particu-
materialisms, criticizing those who would “base their episte- lar the feminist phenomenologists and feminist new materi-
mological claims on lived experience, when they insist on alist thinkers I think with in this text. Next, I describe how I
preserving the phenomenon exactly as described by partici- use diffractive methodology to “read” feminist phenome-
pants in careful word-for-word transcriptions of interviews, nologist thinkers with and through feminist new materialist
and refuse to theorize in analysis, and when their research thinkers. I then move into diffractive “reading” at the site of
reports only ‘describe,’ as if description is not an interpreta- a diffractive overlap/ripple between feminist phenomenol-
tion” (St. Pierre, 2016, p. 115). The post-phenomenologists ogy and new materialism(s): the question of phenomena as
have engaged this criticism, responding that a phenomenon experience. Finally, I discuss the implications of a phenom-
doesn’t have a stable essence, but rather that within phenom- enology of the material: What does it offer educational
ena “intentional connections ‘exist,’ but they become plural researchers, and how does it compliment/complicate other
lines of flight—they elude, flee, entangle, and take on various “post” phenomenologies?
intensities in and over time, across contexts” (Vagle &
Hofsess, 2016, p. 336). In all this discussion, the central ques-
tions of the conflict remain—Should we continue to consider Feminist Phenomenology: Situated,
lived experiences as a source of knowledge as we move away
from a humanist view of the world? If so, how can it be done
Relational, Contextual
without reinscribing the human as the center of the phenom- Traditional phenomenology is centered around the act of
ena? Finally, and perhaps most importantly, what is to be phenomenological reduction. As explained by Alcoff, the
gained by unsettling phenomenological traditions, but con- purpose of this reduction is “to transform the world from
tinuing to include accounts of lived experience in our research? the realm of the actual to the realm of the phenomenon . . .
To provide possible answers to these questions, I turn to where validity is not yet determined” (Alcoff, 2000, p. 50).
Barad’s agential realism, which posits a relational ontology St. Pierre (2016) describes traditional phenomenology as a
that displaces subjectivity into a broad, always shifting and study of “phenomena, things in themselves, essences, as
becoming agentic dance of human and nonhuman. This they appear to us in our consciousness” (p. 115).
material turn I’m attempting in phenomenology provokes Traditionally, phenomenology is concerned with the
immediate tensions—if human subjectivity is no longer moments when the (bounded, singular) human conscious
seen as the entry point to the phenomenon, is it still phe- examines the (external, stable, waiting) phenomenon, and
nomenology? There is something useful to be found, brackets out all that is not “essential” to the phenomenon,
though, in this tension; as Barad says, “if we follow disci- so something “essential” about the world can be “revealed.”
plinary habits of tracing disciplinary-defined causes through In recent years, many thinkers have distanced themselves
to the corresponding disciplinary-defined effects, we will from the idea of “essence” and yet found value in phenome-
miss all the crucial intra-actions among these forces that fly nology. For the post-phenomenologists, the idea of essence is
in the face of any specific set of disciplinary concerns” often rejected outright in favor of a more nuanced view of
McGregor 3

intentionality (Freeman & Vagle, 2013; Vagle, Clements, & that structure our lives in heinous ways . . . yet to give account
Coffee, 2017). In general, the “conceptions of phenomena of these structures without attention to how we live them is to
move from stable, idealized essences that are immediately risk an equally abstract objectivism that can’t grasp the lived
“present” in time and space (Husserl) to unstable, contextual- meaning of structural injustice” (Mann, 2009, p. 91). Feminist
ized, and historicized deconstructions (Derrida)” (Vagle & phenomenologists seek to explore how semiotic and discur-
Hofsess, 2016, p. 335). Feminist phenomenologists have sive practices have material consequences, manifested in
played a large role in this rethinking and redefining of the embodied, lived experiences, so they can recommend inter-
concept of the phenomenon, and articulating what is at stake ventions to disrupt oppressive patriarchal practices. This quest
and at risk when using phenomenology as a method. to account for not just the shape of structural injustice, but
Feminist phenomenologists have pointed out the limita- how that injustice is lived is at the heart of feminist phenom-
tions and possibilities of traditional phenomenology, and enology, and is a key practice that helps articulate what is lost
articulated ways to bring phenomenology beyond its mascu- when we lose phenomenological accounts of the real.
line, often essentializing roots. Alcoff’s (2000) book chapter
Phenomenology, Post-Structuralism, and Feminist Theory on New Materialism(s): Being-With-the-
the Concept of Experience points out that Husserl’s phenom-
enological depictions denote an embodied consciousness that
World
is entangled with the world. However, as Alcoff argues, mas- A feminist new materialism(s) approach to our encounters
culine mind–body dualism limits the effectiveness of this with the world turns the humanist, Cartesian idea of the human
view of subjectivity—It loses the material realities of lived subject on its head. First, the concept of a mind/body split is
bodily experience in the world, and locates reason as separate rejected in favor of a view of the self that is ontic, forever situ-
from the world, in a generalizable mind (Alcoff, 2000). This ated, always embodied, and located in context. Rejecting the
ethereal, generalizable mind is often masculine, thus firmly “medical model” of human embodiment, the bounded edges
cementing the association of reason with masculinity, and of selfhood begin to blur, become permeable (Alaimo &
devaluing any experience that is embodied/feminine as unrea- Hekman, 2008a; Mol, 2002). Material things—the writing on
sonable. Feminist phenomenologists, trying to think beyond this page, pebbles, plastics, the sound of a jet flying overhead,
the masculine generalized mind, establish distance from the the cup I drink from—are “lively matter” and agentic, acting
concept of “essence” through a unique way of theorizing sub- on and with me (Bennett, 2010). From this body of work, I
jectivity: Consciousness is embodied, and being-in-the-world focus on the work of Karen Barad, and her articulation of a
is necessarily situated, contextual, and relational (Coole, way of thinking about science and the world based on Bohrian
2005; Mann, 2009; Young, 2005). physics, rather than Newtonian, to help me articulate how a
These two strands, the embodied consciousness and rela- material phenomenology might be theorized.
tional being-in-the-world, are woven throughout feminist Barad uses the word “phenomenon” in a very different
phenomenological thought. Lisa Guenther, in her phenome- way from phenomenologists. For Barad, phenomena are
nological account of solitary confinement, describes this cor- “ontologically primitive relations,” relationships that don’t
poreal being-in-the-world as a relation between body and assume the prior existence of independent “things” that then
world that unfolds as a conversation (Guenther, 2013). The act upon one another. In this view, things, including people,
recasting of phenomenology as a bodily relation with the only exist in their intra-actions. The shift from inter-acting
world is also important for Al-Saji, as she considers how with the world to intra-acting highlights the importance of
Husserlian conception of touch and sensing can allow for this move. The term inter implies the previous independent
“opening new avenues for understanding the complex inter- existence of the things that are acting; intra-action, then,
play of social positionality and felt embodiment” (Al-Saji, posits an ongoing co-constitution of the world, with nothing
2010, p. 18). Thus, feminist phenomenology is oriented existing independent of this ongoing relational ontology.
toward movement and entanglements, as it seeks to “articu- The lively matter of the world—buildings, floors, books,
late the relation and process between macrostructures of gen- animals, plants, people, the sounds of the train going by—is
der and lived experiences of gender” (Mann, 2009, p. 87). entangled. This entanglement is what Barad calls an ongoing
For these thinkers, the phenomenological account is one of a intra-active phenomena, becoming not just a collection of
lived, gendered, raced, classed, positioned body encounter- things together, but an entanglement of relationships and
ing world shaped by discursive and structural forces. shifting patterns of agentic forces. For Barad, individual
Feminist phenomenology is very much a critical realist subjectivity becomes eclipsed—We are not being-in-the-
practice: There is work to be done, and the political and mate- world so much as we are being-with-the-world.
rial consequences of that work are manifested in lived bodies. What is the role, then, of phenomena? For Barad, phenom-
This is what is at stake for feminist phenomenologists. As ena are the world; there is no a priori, not for subject or object.
Mann describes, a feminist phenomenology must “give a In fact, “objects and the agencies of observation are insepara-
meaningful account of politics and power, of the unfreedoms ble parts of a single phenomenon,” and the roles of subject
4 Qualitative Inquiry 00(0)

and object only emerge through ongoing intra-action (Barad, begin to consider a material phenomenology, one that is
2007, p. 315). The phenomenon, then, is not how discrete located not within fixed human agency and subjectivity
individual subjects meet and experience a separate, waiting “discovering” a revealed pre-existing world, but in the care-
world, but rather how subject and world co-constitute one ful, thoughtful tracing of the marks left on living bodies
another in an ongoing becoming (Barad, 2003, 2007). (human and nonhuman). In articulating this phenomenol-
However, Barad does not spend much time theorizing subjec- ogy of the material, I hope to articulate a theory that attends
tivity itself; in many ways, for Barad, the questions of subjec- to the pluralistic nature of the real, one that takes seriously
tivity and lived experience are displaced by intra-action and how the material and the discursive come to matter in expe-
shifting agentic networks. This does not mean that lived expe- riential, intra-active phenomenon.
rience should be ignored. It means those seeking to do their In the introduction to her book of phenomenological
work from a new materialisms framework need to carefully essays, Iris Marion Young says that “consciousness that
rethink how experience is conceptualized in our research. constitutes its world is the body as lived in a tangible
Stacy Alaimo, in her book Bodily Natures, deliberately encounter with human and nonhuman others” (Young,
breaks the bounds of corporeality to begin theorizing lived 2005, p. 8). The idea of consciousness and subjectivity as
experiences within a new materialist lens. Alaimo (2010) produced by embodied encounters with the world is a major
describes “the human is always inter-meshed with the more theme of feminist phenomenology. Barad’s claims can be
than human word,” existing in what she calls a trans-corpo- seen as a radical expansion on these ideas; however, instead
real landscape (p. 12). Lived experienced, for Alaimo, allow of limiting the productive power of intra-actions only to
us to “trace how trans-corporeality often ruptures ordinary those between humans and their world, and the co-constitu-
knowledge practices,” as humans navigate experiences of ill- tion as only effective on human subjectivity, Barad decen-
ness or threat, often associated with the “toxic landscapes” of ters the human and distributes the productive powers among
a polluted environment. Alaimo (2010) tell us that “the sense and between all “human and nonhuman others.”
of selfhood is transformed by the recognition that the very The implications of this move are profound. Feminist phe-
substance of self is interconnected with vast biological, eco- nomenology has long sought to explore the relationship
nomic, and industrial systems that can never be entirely between material phenomenon and discursive practices.
mapped or understood” (p. 95). For Alaimo, humans are not Thinking of subjectivity, discursive practices, and material
living an encounter with an outside world, but human experi- phenomena as all co-constitutive of reality challenges our
ences are in and of their environment, from the air in their thinking. As Barad says, “matter and meaning are mutually
lungs, to the microbes in their guts, to the bits of plastic in articulated” (Barad, 2007, p. 152). If I consider a phenome-
their breastmilk, to the heavy metals in their blood. Human non in which all factors are inseparably entangled, and noth-
lived experience, then, is not made up of isolated encounters ing has privileged status, I can begin to articulate the
with the world; rather the world in its entangled intra-acting entanglements of material discursive practices in lived expe-
is productive of human lived experience. riences. Attending to these entanglements allows me to begin
to explore how sociocultural structures are co-productive of
Reading Phenomena Diffractively: lived experience, even when these material discursive experi-
ences elude traditional interpretation (McGregor, 2018).
Ripples and Overlaps This is the challenge and promise of a phenomenology of
Now, I turn to diffractive reading to begin to theorize a phe- the material: human subjectivity, material phenomena, and
nomenology of the material and rethink the concept of discursive practices must be seen as functioning together to
experience. Diffractive methodology requires a turning produce a world that is always becoming, without granting
away from representative analysis, and instead a careful causality or primacy to one or the other. This challenge is not
attending to the places where “waves overlap” as accounts to be taken lightly—as St. Pierre, Jackson, and Mazzei state,
are read through and with one another (Barad, 2007; Mazzei “this new work is philosophical and its application in con-
& Jackson, 2012; Taguchi, 2012). As Barad explains, ventional social science research grounded in the old materi-
“intrinsic to this analysis is an ethics that is not predicated alisms, empiricisms, and ontologies is not possible” (St.
on externality but rather entanglement” (van der Tuin & Pierre et al., 2016, p. 102). I cannot rely on the methods of
Dolphijn, 2009). In keeping with that ethic, as I read, I do traditional phenomenology; if I want to retain a meaningful
not focus on resolving the differences, or proving one right account of experience as a researcher practicing materialist
or wrong. Instead, I seek places where different ideas meet phenomenology, I must move differently.
and overlap, creating a ripple of entanglement in which the For Barad, there is nothing but the phenomena, so by defi-
differences can be productive. nition, the researcher is a part of the phenomenon she studies.
As I read diffractively across feminist phenomenological There is no place to stand outside the phenomena, no perch
thought and Barad’s agential realism, attending to these from which the human, be she researcher or phenomenologi-
places of entanglement allows me to open space. In attend- cal subject, might peer into the experience and make meaning.
ing to the echoes, ripples, and patterns of this reading, I can Instead, the experience is, itself, the phenomena: productive
McGregor 5

of the world, co-constituting all that is entangled there. This is world itself. Barad writes, “all bodies, not merely ‘human’
the central premise of what Barad calls “a relational ontology” bodies, come to matter through the world’s iterative intra-
that rejects the firm boundaries and individualism inherent in activity—its performativity” (Barad, 2003, p. 823). With
a Cartesian, humanistic epistemology (Barad, 2003, p. 814). this move, Barad conflates intra-action and performativity,
Human subjectivity is not an isolated island but rather is con- expanding the concept to include not just human agents, but
tinually produced through relations with other people, ideas, nonhuman ones. Seen through this lens, lived experience is
events, discourses, and material things. created by the performativity of everything that is entangled
Feminist phenomenologists also consider connectedness in a phenomenon, not just the human.
as an inescapable part of being in the world. Simms and How, then, can I take up a new materialism phenomenol-
Stawarska (2013) describe feminist phenomenologists as ogy that takes both matter and experience seriously? As a
“related to our participants, even ‘entangled,’ and our phe- researcher, I am seeking to know—to somehow assert, dis-
nomenological époche demands that we become aware of cover, or create knowledge. But within a relational ontol-
it” (p. 12). Thinking this entanglement with the Baradian ogy, I am entangled in the inseparability of “observed
idea of entanglement challenges me to expand my view—It object” and “agencies of observation” (Barad, 2003). I am
is not just the researcher and participants who are entangled implicitly situated in a world from which I come to act and
but also the chairs they sit in, the building and room they which both limits and makes possible my actions; I become
inhabit, and the material discursive forces of the world they what I am through intra-actions and my ongoing entangle-
live in. This version of entanglement is a profound sense of ments with the world. Any practice of phenomenology from
not just connectedness but true inseparability. a new materialist perspective must have a theory of experi-
The feminist phenomenological concept of “intersubjec- ence that accounts for all that is entangled in the phenom-
tivity” adds another layer of meaning to the idea of entangle- ena, including both the material, the discursive, the human,
ment. Latina phenomenologist Martinez describes the role and the researcher themselves.
of communication and culture in phenomenology as funda-
mentally intersubjective, “and as such, part and parcel of the Implications of a Phenomenology of
ongoing flow of cultural meanings and historical circum-
stances as they directly affect the lives and relationships of
the Material
people communicatively engaged” (Martinez, 2014, p. 222). What, if any, clarity can be found for a phenomenology of
Martinez is focused on communication and culture, but the material among these diffractive overlaps? There are
the ideas she expresses about relationships/entanglements several key ideas that can be carried forward into the next
that precede and produce individual subjectivity is remark- intra-active iteration of this theory:
ably Baradian, as is the concept of an “ongoing flow” of
material discursive forces within the phenomena, that 1. Experience as phenomena. Subjectivity is never
directly affect lived experience. singular, never individual. We do not exist prior to
This is the stuff of posthuman performativity: another dif- our relationships with human and nonhuman beings,
fractive rippling. Performativity, as understood by poststruc- with the sociohistorical context, with the discursive;
tural theorists, is a repetition that produces a subjectivity; we are instead co-constituted, produced by and pro-
importantly, this “repetition is not simply a performance by a ducing of, our intra-active relationships with these
subject but a performativity that constitutes a subject and pro- things. Thus, the unit of analysis of a phenomenology
duces the space of conflicting subjectivities that contest the of the material is not how a singular human subject
foundations and origins of stable identity categories” (Jackson, experiences a waiting world. Instead, a phenomenol-
2004, p. 675). Interestingly, when Butler (1988) gave us ogy of the material will consider entangled phenom-
an account of performativity, she did so in the essay enon as experience, and that experience/phenomena
“Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: an Essay in as the unit of analysis: the material things and places
Phenomenology and Feminist Theory.” She says that “there of the world, the human and nonhuman living things,
is also a more radical use of the (phenomenological) doctrine the discursive and sociocultural forces, all co-produc-
of constitution,” and describes how actions and repetition con- tive of the experience.
stitute subjectivity, which can be seen as “the legacy of sedi- 2. Research as entanglement. Phenomena are intra-
mented acts” (p. 97). Butler’s account of performativity and active and performative—They are the world, in its
how these repetitions shape and re-shape subjectivity have had becoming. Tradition notions of causality and pre-
considerable influence. However, Butler’s idea of performativ- determination of subject/object relationships do not
ity is rooted in poststructuralism and human interpretations, translate well. When I enter the phenomena/experi-
and allows little room for a material account. ence as a researcher, I am entangling myself in that
Barad takes up and expands on the idea of performativ- intra-action. I am, quite literally, a part of my
ity, positing that it is not just subjectivities that are consti- research, and thus have ethical obligations to what I
tuted through repetition and continual becoming, but the enact there. Taking my own entanglement as a
6 Qualitative Inquiry 00(0)

researcher seriously will entail a different approach is not an insignificant thing. There is also an inescapable
to the research site, one that requires further thought. ethical imperative to be found here, one that has many impli-
3. Material as active in experience. Taking the mate- cations for social science researchers.
rial seriously as an actor in experience changes the When I study a phenomenon, whether it is violence in
focus dramatically from traditional phenomenology schools, gender disparities in science education, or equity in
but might allow us to articulate an account of how the advanced coursework, I am entangling myself. This isn’t an
material discursive comes to be lived in a pluralist act of my own agency, but a product of the intra-action I
reality. This means not just attending to the material have been of/with. I don’t just observe what appears to me
things but also the material discursive forces that are from the phenomena; rather, what is “‘discovered’ is the
a part of the shifting, moving network of agents at effect of the intra-active engagement of (my) participation
work in the intra-action. Focusing on the material with/in and as a part of the world’s differential becoming”
structures means not asking what materiality is, but (Barad, 2007, p. 361). Rejecting the ethics that accompany
rather asking what it is doing in the context of this the idea of human individualism, doing a phenomenology
intra-active phenomena. Likewise, focusing on the of the material entails an entangled ethics, an ethics based
experience of an intra-active subjectivity isn’t asking on connections and relationships. Those who conduct
what a separated, discrete subject discovered in the research from a material phenomenology framework do not
world, but rather examining how that subjectivity do research on people or school sites, but with.
was produced with and in the world, as agency and Ultimately, there is much to be gained from rethinking
subjectivity are continually re-constituted and fluid. phenomenological accounts of experience through a new
materialist lens. Material phenomenology allows for an
There are two major things to be gained through enact- accounting of experience that is not based in a humanist
ing a phenomenology of the material that includes the three subjectivity, “but is instead emergent and contingent,
concepts articulated here. First, it allows researchers to per- part of a trans-corporeal landscape that includes other
form that balancing act described by feminist phenomenol- material and non-material beings, political and economic
ogists—We can attend to material lived experiences, while systems, and even dominant discourses” (McGregor,
still articulating material/discursive structures of inequity. 2018). Whether a phenomenology of the material can
Indeed, material phenomenology takes this a step further: fulfill all these promises remains to be seem, but this
The material discursive is active within the intra-active phe- theorization opens up possibilities for exploring a con-
nomenon, both producing and produced by it. ception of experience that can avoid essentialism while
Material phenomenology allows researchers to consider taking seriously both material conditions and material
material conditions, that pluralistic real, without reinscrib- discursive forces.
ing essentialism and, thus, reinforcing structures of inequity.
As Barad (2007) says, considering experience as intra-active Declaration of Conflicting Interests
phenomena “makes it possible to take the empirical world The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect
seriously once again in the construction and testing of theo- to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
ries, but this time with the understanding that the objective
reference is phenomena, not the ‘immediate giveness’ of the Funding
world” (p. 244). This shift is important; research using a
phenomenology of the material will not “disclose” what is The author(s) received no financial support for the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.
already there in the world, but it will allow us to think about
the effects of our own intra-active entanglements with the
ongoing becoming of the world. We can articulate how ORCID iD
social/discursive forces come to matter, and recognize the Kristidel McGregor https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7946-4534
effects of these forces on lived experiences, without rein-
scribing essentialism. In turn, material phenomenology also
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McGregor, K. (2018). Material flows: patriarchal structures Kristidel McGregor is teacher-becoming-researcher who
and the menstruating teacher, Gender and Education. doi: studies how the material things of schools influence teaching
10.1080/09540253.2018.1451624 and learning. She is currently a doctoral candidate in Critical
Mol, A. (2002). The body multiple: Ontology in medical practice. and Sociocultural Studies in Education at the University of
Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Oregon.