Applying mixed methods: Studying work in Asia

The GIGA Institute of Asian Studies, together with the University of Manchester, cordially invite you to a one-day workshop entitled "Applying mixed methods - Studying work in Asia."

The workshop aims at exploring how mixed-methods research might contribute to improve labour research with a focus on Asia. Labour research is interdisciplinary, as it endeavours to address a number of themes such as skills, productivity, gender stereotypes, wage-bargaining, globalisation, the intensification of paid work, formal/informal and self-employment, domestic work, value chains, and the demand for labour during growth and recession. Many labour-focused projects now use mixed methods, but most studies are regularly challenged in their attempts to establish validity and generalisability. A common outcome is that qualitative material is separated from survey data and hence from statistical results. The aim of the workshop is to explore the challenges labour-focused mixed methods studies face and to introduce new and rigorous methods of creating, analysing and interrogating data in a truly mixed methods manner.

Contributions include:

• Prof. Wendy Olsen (University of Manchester): Marital Negotiations of Time and Work in Rural India & Bangladesh

• Dr. Punita Chowbey (Hallam University Sheffield): South Asian women's work and economic abuse in Britain, India and Pakistan.

• Dr. Sumeet Mhaskar (CEMIS, Universität Göttingen) Ghettoisation of Economic Choices in a Global City: A Case Study of Mumbai

• Dr. Jörg Nowak (Universität Kassel): Studying strikes in the automobile industry in India: Strikes at Maruti Suzuki (2011-2012) and Bajaj Auto (2013)

• Dr. Jagriti Tanwar (University of Uppsala): Skills Challenge in India

• Dr. Samantha Watson (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine): Wellbeing as affected by pro-poor policy in rural Bangladesh

• Ran Cheng (FU Berlin): The Effect of Minimum Wage Regulation on Income Distribution in China: Research Agenda of Mixed Methods

• Garima Singh (TATA Institute of Social Sciences / Universität Kassel): Private placement agencies and their role among non standard workers in India: through the lens of decent work