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Writing Inquiry in a Post-Truth World: An Essay in Voice, Method, and Meaning

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  • Jacqueline Fendt

    (JB Say Institute of Entrepreneurship, ESCP Business School, 75011 Paris, France)

Abstract

In the wake of post-truth politics, neo-oral media, and epistemic fragmentation, qualitative researchers face intensified pressure to justify the legitimacy of our methods. This essay explores the idea that writing itself can be a form of research—not merely an act of representation, but an epistemic, institutional, and affective method. Structured in two voices—one stylized and poetic, the other scholarly and conceptual—the piece moves through five acts to examine writing as a form of border-crossing. It argues that voice-rich, situated writing is not indulgent; it is a way of thinking, navigating complexity, and holding space for uncertainty. Drawing on traditions of performative autoethnography, collective biography, data feminism, and more-than-human inquiry, the essay considers how writing can generate insight, foster civic resonance, and resist epistemic conformity. A heuristic table offers readers practical entry points for approaching writing as method. This essay is for those moments when something in the sentence feels off, but we write it anyway. It asks what becomes possible when we write not to comply, but to inquire.

Suggested Citation

  • Jacqueline Fendt, 2025. "Writing Inquiry in a Post-Truth World: An Essay in Voice, Method, and Meaning," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-15, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:14:y:2025:i:6:p:354-:d:1671091
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing, 2015. "The Mushroom at the End of the World: On the Possibility of Life in Capitalist Ruins," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10581.
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