As the biggest and most influential qualitative research center in Israel, ICQM is a hub for the teaching and implementation of qualitative research, and for the development of cutting edge research methodologies and practice.

ICQM Research
Based on hermeneutic and critical theories and methodologies, ICQM research promotes an agenda about shifting power relations within society and academia in terms of who talks, who listens, who is counted. ICQM research is centered on narratives as a source of "life knowledge", which highlight people's experiences, interpretations and theories, and established through a strong approach of partnership with local communities. By bringing the knowledges of people with direct experience into the public domain our aim is to empower the participants, to facilitate important evidence-based resource for policy makers, to make discourse inclusive and, from this, more relevant to the people themselves. 

Innovative practice with vulnerable populations. In our work we support cutting edge interventions with vulnerable populations, especially with marginalised youths, by means of documentation, conceptualization and evaluation. The intervention programs we choose to study have a strong focus on multiculturalism, and aim to give an answer to unequal power relations, to poverty, and stigmatisation.

Examples of these studies are:

  • Ethnicity, Gender, and Class in the Lives of Immigrant Youth from the Caucasus
  • Immigrant Youth Film their Lives
  • Critical Perspective on Working with Girls "At Risk": The Story of the Women's Court in Jaffa.
  • Partnership as a Root Metaphor in the Work of H'abayit H'acham for Youth
  • Speaking Academically with an Accent: An Authoethnography of Being Mizrachi in the Academia 
  • Personal and Collective Narratives in the Moshav Nevatim: Community Meaning and Intergenerational Aspects
  • Bedouin Women's Identity: Three Generations
  • Art as a Speech Act from the Margins. Narratives of Impoverished Bedouin Women through Expressive Mediums.

 

BGU-DIPEx Israel
Based on cooperation with University of Oxford, BGU-Dipex Israel studies the psycho-social experiences of people from various ethnic groups, who are affected by different health conditions. The analysis of their stories as well as audio and video clips from the interviews will be presented in a new website both in Hebrew and Arabic. The website will be a source of information for other people with similar health conditions, for their circles of support and for professionals. These studies are based on the rigorous scientific and participative research method developed in Oxford University and implemented in international network of similar centers around the world. The first studies in this project focus on chronic pain and on parents of pre-term babies. 
 

ICQM Publications
The research done in the Center has been published in peer-reviewed journals, textbooks, research reports, and booklets, the most recent ones are:

  • Data Analysis in Qualitative Research (edited by Lea Kacen and Michal Krumer-Nevo, Ben-Gurion University Publications, 2010).
  • The Limits of Quantification: Critical Perspectives on Measurement and Grading (edited by Yohai Hakak, Lea Kacen & Michal Krumer-Nevo, Ben-Gurion University Press, 2010).
  • Issues in Qualitative Research – Ethics and Quality Criterion (edited by Amia Lieblich, Eitan Shachar, Michal Krumer-Nevo and Maya Lavie-Ajayi, 2010).

ICQM Activities
Bi-annual conference: The Fourth Israeli Interdisciplinary Conference of Qualitative Research took place In February 2010 at Ben-Gurion University. More than 460          scholars and students from a wide range of disciplines attended the conference, with approximately 230 presenting their work.

Research Working Groups:

The working groups are a place for scholarly discussion of senior and young  researchers from a wide variety of disciplines and from different universities in Israel who aim to develop innovative research practice and methodologies

Feminist Research Methodologies Working Group is funded by Daphna Israeli Fund, and is facilitated in cooperation with the NCJW Women and Gender Studies Program at Tel-Aviv University. The group works during the last two years with the aim of publishing a book.
Research Reflexivity Working Group. The group has presented her work in the last Israeli qualitative conference and is now working on its publication.
Teaching Forums: Ph.D. Students' Forum; Visual Research Forum; “Thinking Qualitatively" – a Researchers Forum.

This year we have established a special course for PhD students with the support of the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at BGU and another course for educational psychologists in the framework of the Educational-Psychology Services of Tel-Aviv-Jaffa.


Workshops and Seminars
Atlas-ti workshops; Narrative Interviewing and Analysis. .
Other activities including: qualitative lab activities, electronic database, consultation services, ongoing forums, website, facebook page and an email list