Dialectical Pathways in Digital Data Analysis

In recent times of crisis, contradictions, and drama researchers stood in front of a labyrinth of multiple methodological choices and imponderable research paths and directions. In many cases, this new reality created the opportunity for the researchers to think in novel and innovative ways by involving in a critical, dialectical, and open-ended “dialogue” with their data and the analytical processes. Part II brings together four indicative examples of research labyrinths and the new methodological frameworks the researchers invented to step their way out of them. It is argued that dialectics and dialectical thinking opened new spaces for reflection and allowed new dimensions of digital analysis to emerge. Through the Chapters of the Section, it is shown how researchers developed their creative imagination by focusing on new units of analysis and uses of digital means, how they strengthened their methodological agency by inventing new methods, and how they developed their personalities as researchers through new motives and values. This complex and unique in each case process is discussed in this Chapter as a socially and culturally oriented process in motion.