M Van Manen
Biographic Data
| ID | 69069 |
|---|---|
| NAME | M Van Manen |
| GIVEN NAMES | M |
| FAMILY NAME | Van Manen |
| SIGNATURE | VAN MANEN M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Alberta |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6070-0314 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 28 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 57 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 28 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1994 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Pain and suffering: The ethics of our words within and beyond the Nicu
How should we put the experiences of young children into language? What are the ethics of using one’s words to describe the world of an other? Particularly those who do not linguistically live their experiences? This paper explores these questions by dwelling on the topics of pain and suffering as experienced by newborns receiving medical care. We are stuck with a certain sense of ethical dis-ease that the words we use to describe the lived exper…
Depth in Qualitative Inquiry: Deep Depth or Depth That Turns Deep
What is the meaning of depth in qualitative inquiry? How does some writing penetrate beneath surface-level meanings and reveal the deep mystery of qualis , yet other writing drifts into cliché or paltry abstraction? How is it that some qualitative texts not only stay with us but also allow us to settle into them, as if the depth they offer is a space to enter, to inhabit, or even to dwell in? In this article, we draw on phenomenology as a way to …
Meaning, speaking, writing: Textuality in phenomenological research
How should we understand meaning in relation to text in phenomenological research? What weight should we give to context or situation? How do we consider the words we use to name a phenomenon or those with whom we may engage? What are the limits and possibilities for text? In this article, we approach the meaning of textuality in phenomenological research. While phenomenological research cannot be reduced to textuality, we may appreciate how, thr…
‘Walking in their shoes’: How does externally worn diabetes technology mediate with the lifeworld of adolescents with type 1 diabetes
Despite the high prevalence of Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) among young people, there is limited understanding of how diabetes technologies affect their lives. What is it like to be a young person grappling with the challenges of T1D? How do therapeutic approaches sculpt their experiences? In what ways are medical devices constitutive of their embodiment? Through interviews with adolescents, this phenomenological study explores how insulin pumps, contin…
How Advocates Can Support Young Adults Living With Cancer and Their Transition to Palliative Care
While the cancer advocacy community has been pivotal in progressing oncology care, supporting young adults with advanced cancer transitioning to palliative care continues to be a complex challenge. Palliative care services may not be offered by healthcare providers or engaged by young people themselves. This is in the face of the recognized value that palliative care can provide young people and their families. The purpose of this study was to ex…
Parental perspectives of trisomy 18: Common threads of a life-limiting diagnosis
There is a narrative told among healthcare providers that the public stories of trisomy 18 do not reflect the experiences of the many families navigating this diagnosis. This is in the context of a recognised paradigm shift occurring in the treatment of children born with trisomy 18 from one focused solely on comfort to one that considers the potential of medical-surgical interventions to afford survival. This study aims to elicit and explore phe…
Sharing in the community of having lost a child
What does it mean to share an experience of losing a child? Not solely to put such an experience into words, but also to speak of it to others who may share their own experiences of loss? What is shared in such moments of sharing? Here, we present a phenomenological study of sharing among parents who have lost a child. We draw on observations and anecdotes from a parental bereavement group. Our thoughts are organised around thematic statements th…
On the Method of Touch in Qualitative Inquiry
Touch is the most intimate of the senses. Through it, we find contact, feel, caress, affect, pressure, and convergence. And as has been written, touch is a double gesture whereby in touching we may be touched. Touch may also occur in its physical absence to reveal a sensuality beyond what we feel for. We may experience touch through our eyes, ears, mouth, and nose even. In this way, we may consider touch as a sensibility, a sensuality of sense. A…
Engaging in Palliative Care Conversations With Healthcare Providers: A Phenomenological Young Adult Cancer Study
What is it like for young adults living with metastatic/advanced cancers to engage in conversations about palliative care with healthcare providers? Often, young people are not introduced to palliative care. Instead, healthcare providers may assume that they are already well-supported, that their symptoms are aptly managed, or that introducing palliative care will somehow spoil any remaining hope they live with. While some of the benefits of pall…
Humility, Textuality, and Method in Phenomenological Research
Have you ever been overcome with a profound feeling of humility? Perhaps this moment was unexpected or surprising, giving itself as an insight, reverence, or awe. You feel humbled. But now it seems that this feeling itself has strangely turned into some kind of opening, a sensibility, a method even. For a text, we may consider humility as a quality, recognizing it goes beyond the pairing of author and reader. The focus of this article is to explo…
Alongside: Exploring the Meaningfulness of Significant Moments in Others' Lives Through Observation and Interview
How do we explore the meaningfulness of others' experiences? What means do we have to access their experiencing of the world? How do we express our understandings of others' experiences of body and place without reducing them to objectification? In this methodological paper, we reflect on how we can gain valuable insights into the lived experiences of others through research activities that are conducted 'alongside' participants. Phenomenological…
A Lasting Impression: Exploring the Meaningfulness of a Singular Moment
How do we explore the meaning and meaningfulness of a singular event that lives on with us as a lasting impression? What are the initial beginnings and final endings of such living moments? How do we make sense of the significance of events that are so meaningful that they have become a lasting impression. This paper focuses on the phenomenology of such lasting impressions, by drawing on an exemplary anecdote about parental bereavement in newborn…
Exploring and Supporting Parents’ Stories of Loss in the Nicu: A Narrative Study
Death is no stranger to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Extreme prematurity, congenital abnormalities, and other complexities can turn what was hoped to be a very exciting moment in a family’s life into one of despair and grief. There are many infants that not only do not survive but also have a medicalized death necessitating complex decision-making, weighing quality versus duration of life. We can learn from the stories of parents who …
What Does ChatGPT Mean for Qualitative Health Research
A case study unpacking the collaborative research process: Eight essential components
Doing Phenomenological Research and Writing
When looking through phenomenology articles in human science and philosophy journals, we may be excused to get the impression that they offer an inconsistent array of phenomenology publications. In this article, we describe three simple but helpful distinctions for determining some order: first, the great foundational publications; second, exegetical publications in the wake of the great works; and third, phenomenological studies done directly on…
Towards the Womb of Neonatal Intensive Care
Developing Morally Sensitive Policy in the Nicu: Donation after Circulatory Determination of Death
Policy development is an important activity for the practice of healthcare. Policies, after all, may cultivate common practices and ensure that best available evidence is employed in clinical decision making. Qualitative research and individuals with expertise in qualitative research methods have much to offer policy makers. We were confronted with the situation of developing policy for donation after circulatory death (DCD) for our newborn inten…
Teaching Phenomenological Research and Writing
In this article, we describe our approach and philosophical methodology of teaching and doing phenomenology. The human science seminar that we offer involves participants in the primary phenomenological literature as well as in a variety of carefully engaged writing exercises. Each seminar participant selects a personal phenomenological project that aims at producing a publishable research paper. We show how the qualitative methodology of hermene…
The First Cry of the Child
Vociferous, shrill, and piercing-the first cry of the newborn infant signals that a new and separate life has begun. Separated from the body of the mother, the newborn cry serves to call for care, support, and protection. Yet, what is it that is expressed in the first cry? Or is the cry not really a matter of expression at all? In what sense may the cry be meaningful? Although we may be able to explain the function of the cry, we are puzzled by t…
The Ventricular Assist Device in the Life of the Child: A Phenomenological Pediatric Study
What is it like for a child to live with an artificial heart? The use of some medical therapies in children requires developmental considerations, is associated with psychosocial consequences, and calls for ethical sensitivities. A critical case is the ventricular assist device (VAD), a mechanical pump used to support the functioning of a failing heart. As a pediatric therapy, the device can be used as a temporary solution for poor heart function…
The Ethics of an Ordinary Medical Technology
Some routinely applied hospital technologies may have unintended consequences for patients and their families. The neonatal cardiorespiratory monitor, a computer-like display used to show an infant's vital functions, is one such technology that may become part of a parent's day-to-day being with his or her hospitalized child. In this phenomenological study, I explored how the monitor may mediate parental sensibilities, reshaping the contact of pa…
On Ethical (In)Decisions Experienced by Parents of Infants in Neonatal Intensive Care
This study was a phenomenological investigation of ethical decisions experienced by parents of newborns in neonatal intensive care. I explore the lived meanings of thematic events that speak to the variable ways that ethical situations may be experienced: a decision that was never a choice; a decision as looking for a way out; a decision as thinking and feeling oneself through the consequences; a decision as indecision; and a decision as somethin…
Technics of touch in the neonatal intensive care
Medical technologies, although often crucial for the provision of healthcare, may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The highly technicised neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is the place where parents of hospitalised baby have their early encounters with their child. The aim of this study is to investigate phenomenologically how the contact and relation between parent and child may be affected by the mediating presen…
Carrying: Parental Experience of the Hospital Transfer of Their Baby
Some hospital practices that are routine for hospital staff may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The transfer of neonatal infants between hospitals and hospital environments is one such practice that may be covered by perfectly acceptable rules and regulations but that, at times, gives rise to unsuspected anxieties, pain, and worries in the parent. In this phenomenological study, I explored meaning aspects of the phe…
On Ethical (In)Decisions Experienced by Parents of Infants in Neonatal Intensive Care
This study was a phenomenological investigation of ethical decisions experienced by parents of newborns in neonatal intensive care. I explore the lived meanings of thematic events that speak to the variable ways that ethical situations may be experienced: a decision that was never a choice; a decision as looking for a way out; a decision as thinking and feeling oneself through the consequences; a decision as indecision; and a decision as somethin…
Teaching Phenomenological Research and Writing
In this article, we describe our approach and philosophical methodology of teaching and doing phenomenology. The human science seminar that we offer involves participants in the primary phenomenological literature as well as in a variety of carefully engaged writing exercises. Each seminar participant selects a personal phenomenological project that aims at producing a publishable research paper. We show how the qualitative methodology of hermene…
The Ventricular Assist Device in the Life of the Child: A Phenomenological Pediatric Study
What is it like for a child to live with an artificial heart? The use of some medical therapies in children requires developmental considerations, is associated with psychosocial consequences, and calls for ethical sensitivities. A critical case is the ventricular assist device (VAD), a mechanical pump used to support the functioning of a failing heart. As a pediatric therapy, the device can be used as a temporary solution for poor heart function…
Carrying: Parental Experience of the Hospital Transfer of Their Baby
Some hospital practices that are routine for hospital staff may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The transfer of neonatal infants between hospitals and hospital environments is one such practice that may be covered by perfectly acceptable rules and regulations but that, at times, gives rise to unsuspected anxieties, pain, and worries in the parent. In this phenomenological study, I explored meaning aspects of the phe…
Pedagogy, Virtue, and Narrative Identity in Teaching
The Ethics of an Ordinary Medical Technology
Some routinely applied hospital technologies may have unintended consequences for patients and their families. The neonatal cardiorespiratory monitor, a computer-like display used to show an infant's vital functions, is one such technology that may become part of a parent's day-to-day being with his or her hospitalized child. In this phenomenological study, I explored how the monitor may mediate parental sensibilities, reshaping the contact of pa…
Alongside: Exploring the Meaningfulness of Significant Moments in Others' Lives Through Observation and Interview
How do we explore the meaningfulness of others' experiences? What means do we have to access their experiencing of the world? How do we express our understandings of others' experiences of body and place without reducing them to objectification? In this methodological paper, we reflect on how we can gain valuable insights into the lived experiences of others through research activities that are conducted 'alongside' participants. Phenomenological…
Doing Phenomenological Research and Writing
When looking through phenomenology articles in human science and philosophy journals, we may be excused to get the impression that they offer an inconsistent array of phenomenology publications. In this article, we describe three simple but helpful distinctions for determining some order: first, the great foundational publications; second, exegetical publications in the wake of the great works; and third, phenomenological studies done directly on…
Technics of touch in the neonatal intensive care
Medical technologies, although often crucial for the provision of healthcare, may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The highly technicised neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is the place where parents of hospitalised baby have their early encounters with their child. The aim of this study is to investigate phenomenologically how the contact and relation between parent and child may be affected by the mediating presen…
Sharing in the community of having lost a child
What does it mean to share an experience of losing a child? Not solely to put such an experience into words, but also to speak of it to others who may share their own experiences of loss? What is shared in such moments of sharing? Here, we present a phenomenological study of sharing among parents who have lost a child. We draw on observations and anecdotes from a parental bereavement group. Our thoughts are organised around thematic statements th…
Humility, Textuality, and Method in Phenomenological Research
Have you ever been overcome with a profound feeling of humility? Perhaps this moment was unexpected or surprising, giving itself as an insight, reverence, or awe. You feel humbled. But now it seems that this feeling itself has strangely turned into some kind of opening, a sensibility, a method even. For a text, we may consider humility as a quality, recognizing it goes beyond the pairing of author and reader. The focus of this article is to explo…
A Lasting Impression: Exploring the Meaningfulness of a Singular Moment
How do we explore the meaning and meaningfulness of a singular event that lives on with us as a lasting impression? What are the initial beginnings and final endings of such living moments? How do we make sense of the significance of events that are so meaningful that they have become a lasting impression. This paper focuses on the phenomenology of such lasting impressions, by drawing on an exemplary anecdote about parental bereavement in newborn…
The First Cry of the Child
Vociferous, shrill, and piercing-the first cry of the newborn infant signals that a new and separate life has begun. Separated from the body of the mother, the newborn cry serves to call for care, support, and protection. Yet, what is it that is expressed in the first cry? Or is the cry not really a matter of expression at all? In what sense may the cry be meaningful? Although we may be able to explain the function of the cry, we are puzzled by t…
Pedagogy, Virtue, and Narrative Identity in Teaching
Phenomenology World-Wide: Foundations — Expanding Dynamics — Life-Engagements. A Guide for Research and Study
Phenomenology is the philosophy of our times. Through the entire twentieth century this philosophy unfolded and flourished, following stepwise the intrinsic logic and dynamism of its original project
Looking into the neonatal isolette
In my everyday professional life, I encounter the medical isolette as a structural unit that houses a single sick or premature child within an acrylic glass enclosure. The unit is designed so as to incubate the developing child by providing warmth, quiet, humidity and security. Small openings allow wires or tubes to hook up the child to technological instruments, monitors and specialised medicine dispensers. Larger portholes allow limited access …
Technics of touch in the neonatal intensive care
Medical technologies, although often crucial for the provision of healthcare, may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The highly technicised neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) is the place where parents of hospitalised baby have their early encounters with their child. The aim of this study is to investigate phenomenologically how the contact and relation between parent and child may be affected by the mediating presen…
Carrying: Parental Experience of the Hospital Transfer of Their Baby
Some hospital practices that are routine for hospital staff may carry unintended significance for patients and their families. The transfer of neonatal infants between hospitals and hospital environments is one such practice that may be covered by perfectly acceptable rules and regulations but that, at times, gives rise to unsuspected anxieties, pain, and worries in the parent. In this phenomenological study, I explored meaning aspects of the phe…
On Ethical (In)Decisions Experienced by Parents of Infants in Neonatal Intensive Care
This study was a phenomenological investigation of ethical decisions experienced by parents of newborns in neonatal intensive care. I explore the lived meanings of thematic events that speak to the variable ways that ethical situations may be experienced: a decision that was never a choice; a decision as looking for a way out; a decision as thinking and feeling oneself through the consequences; a decision as indecision; and a decision as somethin…
The Ethics of an Ordinary Medical Technology
Some routinely applied hospital technologies may have unintended consequences for patients and their families. The neonatal cardiorespiratory monitor, a computer-like display used to show an infant's vital functions, is one such technology that may become part of a parent's day-to-day being with his or her hospitalized child. In this phenomenological study, I explored how the monitor may mediate parental sensibilities, reshaping the contact of pa…
Developing Morally Sensitive Policy in the Nicu: Donation after Circulatory Determination of Death
Policy development is an important activity for the practice of healthcare. Policies, after all, may cultivate common practices and ensure that best available evidence is employed in clinical decision making. Qualitative research and individuals with expertise in qualitative research methods have much to offer policy makers. We were confronted with the situation of developing policy for donation after circulatory death (DCD) for our newborn inten…
Teaching Phenomenological Research and Writing
In this article, we describe our approach and philosophical methodology of teaching and doing phenomenology. The human science seminar that we offer involves participants in the primary phenomenological literature as well as in a variety of carefully engaged writing exercises. Each seminar participant selects a personal phenomenological project that aims at producing a publishable research paper. We show how the qualitative methodology of hermene…
The First Cry of the Child
Vociferous, shrill, and piercing-the first cry of the newborn infant signals that a new and separate life has begun. Separated from the body of the mother, the newborn cry serves to call for care, support, and protection. Yet, what is it that is expressed in the first cry? Or is the cry not really a matter of expression at all? In what sense may the cry be meaningful? Although we may be able to explain the function of the cry, we are puzzled by t…
The Ventricular Assist Device in the Life of the Child: A Phenomenological Pediatric Study
What is it like for a child to live with an artificial heart? The use of some medical therapies in children requires developmental considerations, is associated with psychosocial consequences, and calls for ethical sensitivities. A critical case is the ventricular assist device (VAD), a mechanical pump used to support the functioning of a failing heart. As a pediatric therapy, the device can be used as a temporary solution for poor heart function…
Towards the Womb of Neonatal Intensive Care
Doing Phenomenological Research and Writing
When looking through phenomenology articles in human science and philosophy journals, we may be excused to get the impression that they offer an inconsistent array of phenomenology publications. In this article, we describe three simple but helpful distinctions for determining some order: first, the great foundational publications; second, exegetical publications in the wake of the great works; and third, phenomenological studies done directly on…
A case study unpacking the collaborative research process: Eight essential components
Exploring and Supporting Parents’ Stories of Loss in the Nicu: A Narrative Study
Death is no stranger to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Extreme prematurity, congenital abnormalities, and other complexities can turn what was hoped to be a very exciting moment in a family’s life into one of despair and grief. There are many infants that not only do not survive but also have a medicalized death necessitating complex decision-making, weighing quality versus duration of life. We can learn from the stories of parents who …
What Does ChatGPT Mean for Qualitative Health Research
Alongside: Exploring the Meaningfulness of Significant Moments in Others' Lives Through Observation and Interview
How do we explore the meaningfulness of others' experiences? What means do we have to access their experiencing of the world? How do we express our understandings of others' experiences of body and place without reducing them to objectification? In this methodological paper, we reflect on how we can gain valuable insights into the lived experiences of others through research activities that are conducted 'alongside' participants. Phenomenological…
A Lasting Impression: Exploring the Meaningfulness of a Singular Moment
How do we explore the meaning and meaningfulness of a singular event that lives on with us as a lasting impression? What are the initial beginnings and final endings of such living moments? How do we make sense of the significance of events that are so meaningful that they have become a lasting impression. This paper focuses on the phenomenology of such lasting impressions, by drawing on an exemplary anecdote about parental bereavement in newborn…
‘Walking in their shoes’: How does externally worn diabetes technology mediate with the lifeworld of adolescents with type 1 diabetes
Despite the high prevalence of Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) among young people, there is limited understanding of how diabetes technologies affect their lives. What is it like to be a young person grappling with the challenges of T1D? How do therapeutic approaches sculpt their experiences? In what ways are medical devices constitutive of their embodiment? Through interviews with adolescents, this phenomenological study explores how insulin pumps, contin…
How Advocates Can Support Young Adults Living With Cancer and Their Transition to Palliative Care
While the cancer advocacy community has been pivotal in progressing oncology care, supporting young adults with advanced cancer transitioning to palliative care continues to be a complex challenge. Palliative care services may not be offered by healthcare providers or engaged by young people themselves. This is in the face of the recognized value that palliative care can provide young people and their families. The purpose of this study was to ex…
Parental perspectives of trisomy 18: Common threads of a life-limiting diagnosis
There is a narrative told among healthcare providers that the public stories of trisomy 18 do not reflect the experiences of the many families navigating this diagnosis. This is in the context of a recognised paradigm shift occurring in the treatment of children born with trisomy 18 from one focused solely on comfort to one that considers the potential of medical-surgical interventions to afford survival. This study aims to elicit and explore phe…
Sharing in the community of having lost a child
What does it mean to share an experience of losing a child? Not solely to put such an experience into words, but also to speak of it to others who may share their own experiences of loss? What is shared in such moments of sharing? Here, we present a phenomenological study of sharing among parents who have lost a child. We draw on observations and anecdotes from a parental bereavement group. Our thoughts are organised around thematic statements th…
On the Method of Touch in Qualitative Inquiry
Touch is the most intimate of the senses. Through it, we find contact, feel, caress, affect, pressure, and convergence. And as has been written, touch is a double gesture whereby in touching we may be touched. Touch may also occur in its physical absence to reveal a sensuality beyond what we feel for. We may experience touch through our eyes, ears, mouth, and nose even. In this way, we may consider touch as a sensibility, a sensuality of sense. A…
Engaging in Palliative Care Conversations With Healthcare Providers: A Phenomenological Young Adult Cancer Study
What is it like for young adults living with metastatic/advanced cancers to engage in conversations about palliative care with healthcare providers? Often, young people are not introduced to palliative care. Instead, healthcare providers may assume that they are already well-supported, that their symptoms are aptly managed, or that introducing palliative care will somehow spoil any remaining hope they live with. While some of the benefits of pall…
Humility, Textuality, and Method in Phenomenological Research
Have you ever been overcome with a profound feeling of humility? Perhaps this moment was unexpected or surprising, giving itself as an insight, reverence, or awe. You feel humbled. But now it seems that this feeling itself has strangely turned into some kind of opening, a sensibility, a method even. For a text, we may consider humility as a quality, recognizing it goes beyond the pairing of author and reader. The focus of this article is to explo…
Psychology (21 works) · Sociology (18 works) · Medicine (14 works) · Qualitative research (13 works) · Epistemology (10 works) · Nursing (10 works) · Computer Science (7 works) · Philosophy (7 works) · Family and Patient Care in Intensive Care Units (6 works) · Health care (6 works)