Critical Realism

Abstract

This chapter explains that the book is written from a critical realist perspective, a philosophy which fits the author’s own naïve sense of reality. It explains that the approach taken in this volume is very different from that presented in mainstream work on written composition, and that understanding the realist perspective is crucial to understanding why the modelling took place (i.e. to understand the nature of writing) and why it took this particular form (i.e. as describing an observable process, an “event” in Bhaskar’s ontology). It also points out that what is axiomatic in one paradigm is often a fallacy in another. As the problem of agency is considered problematic in critical realism, and composing is a social process carried out by human agency, the chapter suggests that the author has made some contribution to the field in suggesting a distinction between “intentional” and “contingent” determination, and in pioneering the use of the “conceptual mechanism” as educational tool. This will, however, be discussed in the next chapter, Chapter 3, which explores the key critical realist concept “mechanism” in more detail.