The Second Edition of the paperback series of the Handbook of Qualitative Research is virtually all new. Over half of the authors from the first edition have been replaced by new contributors - there are 33 new chapter authors or co-authors. There are six totally new chapter topics, including contributions on: queer theory, performance ethnography, testimonios, focus groups in feminist research, applied ethnography, and anthropological poetics. All returning authors have substantially revised their original contributions, in many cases producing a totally new and different chapter.

This first volume, The Landscape of Qualitative Research, takes a look at the field from a broadly theoretical perspective, and is composed of the Handbook's Parts One (`Locating the Field'), Two (`Major Paradigms and Perspectives'), and Six (`The Future of Qualitative Research').

The Landscape of Qualitative Research attempts to put the field of qualitative research in context. Part One locates the field, providing historical context as well as background on applied qualitative research and the politics and ethics of qualitative inquiry. Part Two examines the major paradigms that inform and influence qualitative research in the human disciplines. The chapters move from competing paradigms (positivist, postpositivist, constructivist, critical theory) to specific interpretive perspectives, feminisms, racialized discourses, cultural studies, sexualities and queer theory. Part Three considers the future of qualitative research.