‘Voice’ and the Facts and Observations of Experience

The facts of social sciences are ones that stem from scientificexpertise, but in the social world, everyone is their own expert.Everyone lives in society, and experiences either first-hand, orclosely second-hand, the same phenomena that social scientistsinvestigate. Consequently, people are not only the subjects ofscientific investigation, but are themselves amateur reflexivescientists: observing and making sense of their own experiencesin social and economic affairs, And, in a democratic community,such personal experience claims a legitimate place in knowledgediscussions. These two qualities mean that the observationsfrom personal experience can not be so lightly dismissed by thesocial scientist, in the same way as the traditional observationsof folk-lore can be trumped by the facts of scientific knowledge inthe natural sciences. Yet, these facts of personal experiencemay not travel easily, for the possibilities of voicing thatexperience depend in part on the nature of the social scienceinvolved and in part on the civic epistemology of the environmentwithin which they can be expressed. The considerations whichunderlie the successful articulation of experienced knowledgesuggest that “voice” differs from both “engagement” and“understanding” as a way to characterize public participation insocial science – as opposed to natural science – knowledgediscussions.[...]