Research Poetry (communicating research results and expressing their significance through poetry)

The creation of poetry with impact is a foundational area for would-be research poets to consider. One aspect of transitioning to an impactful poet includes considering what the goal of poetry is. Poetry is not only writing about our own experiences but also trying to write primarily for the reader, so the reader can experience new feelings and understandings or re-experience them in a novel way. Here, we would like to point out research poets have an advantage because the science part of our goals are always about others even when we are motivated by deeply personal experiences. Qualitative researchers and research poets alike are trying to understand and represent the world for the reader. This has been called a move

away from writing poetry to celebrate, commemorate, or capture your own feelings (in which case you, the poet, are the center of the poem’s universe) towards writing poetry in order to generate feelings in your reader (in which case the poem exists entirely to serve the reader. (Ziehl & Jerz, 2013)

Lahman, Maria K.E., Veronica M. Richard, and Eric D. Teman, “ish: How to Write Poemish (Research) Poetry.” Qualitative Inquiry, 2018, pp. 1-13. Sage Journals doi: 10.1177/1077800417750182