In Composing Research, Cindy Johanek offers a new perspective on the ideological conflict between qualitative and quantitative research approaches, and the theories of knowledge that inform them. With a paradigm that is sensitive to the context of one's research questions, she argues, scholars can develop less dichotomous forms that invoke the strengths of both research traditions. For example, context-oriented approaches can lift the narrative from beneath the numbers in an experimental study, or bring the useful clarity of numbers to an ethnographic study.

A pragmatic scholar with respect for both quantitative and qualitative research paradigms, Johanek moves easily across the boundaries that divide the field, and argues for contextualist theory as a lens through which to view composition research. This approach brings with it a new focus, she writes. " This new focus will call us to attend to the contexts in which rhetorical issues and research issues converge, producing varied forms, many voices, and new knowledge, indeed reconstructing a discipline that will be simultaneously focused on its tasks, its knowledge-makers, and its students." Composing Research is a work full of personal voice and professional commitment, and will be a welcome addition to the research methods classroom and to the composition researcher's own bookshelf.