A liberatory participatory action research approach to qualitative methods: Civic engagement post disaster

This manuscript outlines an innovative qualitative approach grounded in liberatory participatory action research (PAR). A research team comprised interdisciplinary university researchers and community co-researchers from four diverse, disaster-impacted communities sought to explore residents’ experiences of civic engagement in the aftermath of a catastrophic storm. The team strove to center experiential knowledge and honor the agency of communities whose voices have often been excluded in academia, applying liberatory PAR tenets to the study’s qualitative methodology. This manuscript aims to provide avenues and inspiration for pushing research boundaries and disrupting conventional qualitative research paradigms through a collaborative approach to study design, implementation, analysis, and dissemination.