Introduction

The study of biography is slowing emerging as a significant development in the field of educational research. Such a development has promise as a way of bridging critical relationships among the balkanized research realms that characterize the study of education in the postmodern world. "Good biographies deal with the ways people faced living-tell how they met problems, how they coped with big and little crises, how they loved, competed, did the things we all do daily-and hence these studies touch familiar chords in readers" (Vandiver, 1983, p. 16). We need little convincing of such "touched chords" as we see teachers and researchers discuss and share case studies and other educational narratives. Indeed, biography and life-history, in a variety of forms, are basic to qualitative research. Academics write biographies of university presidents and increasingly construct narratives and case studies of teachers and students. Introductory qualitative research textbooks often include treatments of life-history writing, and societies for educational biography are now well established. Various educational research conferences have included biography sessions, and several publishers now offer

journals and collected essays on life-history writing in education. The past few years have seen a phenomenal growth and resurgence of interest in life writing with numerous allusions and references to biography permeating this literature.