Finding academic voice: a critical narrative of knowledge making and discovery

Abstract

The narrative in this discussion article portrays the quest by two researchers to find their scholarly identity in their craft. The central issue in this narrative piece as design type of this inquiry is the space of knowledge crafting— distinguishing between adopted knowledge from the theories that sustain our thinking and the realities that they encounter in the research fields where knowledge grows in dynamic ecosystems that they wish to engage with and try to explicate and to understand. The central conundrum or the academic puzzle in this narrative is thus that they receive mixed messages about the interface between them, the researchers, the presented empirical world, and the theories from which they have learned. They are not sure where or when they speak in their own voices or portray their own identities.