Stories about learning in narrative biographical research

This article discusses the relation between narrating a story and experiencing a learning process—for both the research subjects and the researcher—as an inherent feature of narrative biographical research. It is argued that in order to do justice to the particularity, the interpretation and the agency of the research subjects and thus to the revelatory character and transformative power of their life story, the researcher has to be personally and critically engaged in the research process. Besides acknowledging the learning process of the research subjects, it is necessary to reflect on the research process itself in terms of a narrative and a learning process. Radically living up to the starting points of narrative biographical research implies consequences for the position of the researcher in the research process, for the research results and for the research report.