The intersection of mixed methods and social justice has implications for the role of the researcher and choices of specific paradigmatic perspectives. The transformative paradigm with its associated philosophical assumptions provides a framework for addressing inequality and injustice in society using culturally competent, mixed methods strategies. The recognition that realities are constructed and shaped by social, political, cultural, economic, and racial/ethnic values indicates that power and privilege are important determinants of which reality will be privileged in a research context. Methodological inferences based on the underlying assumptions of the transformative paradigm reveal the potential strength of combining qualitative and quantitative methods. A qualitative dimension is needed to gather community perspectives at each stage of the research process, while a quantitative dimension provides the opportunity to demonstrate outcomes that have credibility for community members and scholars. Transformative mixed methodologies provide a mechanism for addressing the complexities of research in culturally complex settings that can provide a basis for social change.

Paradigms serve as metaphysical frameworks that guide researchers in the identification and clarification of their beliefs with regard to ethics, reality, knowledge, and methodology. The transformative paradigm is explained and illustrated as a framework for researchers who place a priority on social justice and the furtherance of human rights. The basic belief systems associated with this paradigm are explained and illustrated by examples of research that is commensurate with the transformative paradigm.

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Evaluators face a challenge in responding to a call for greater inclusiveness of marginalized groups. In this presentation, I examine the contribution that transformative theory can make toward meeting this challenge. Transformative scholars assume that knowledge is not neutral, but is influenced by human interests, and that all knowledge reflects the power and social relationships within society, and that an important purpose of knowledge construction is to help people improve society. I propose the use of an inclusive model of evaluation that can address the tension between what is needed accurately represent the experiences of marginalized groups research and the traditional canons of research.

This paper is an invitation to engage critically in the discussion of indigenous languages and cultures, and the implications for pedagogical decolonisation. Among the issues raised are questions of the impacts of the beliefs, values and attitudes of the prevailing Anglo Saxon and Christian culture or New Zealand European/Pākehā society upon the aspirations and education of Tongan students in the secondary sector of the Education system. Therefore, the paper draws attention to the social and cultural contestations in affirming the place of Tongan people in secondary schooling in Aotearoa-New Zealand. A Suburban Socio-Cultural PlaceTongan and Maori students experience the full range of cultural domination by the hegemonic European approach toward education and its reporting in the media. The idea for this paper arose from a column entitled "Culture disrupts schooling" in a suburban newspaper. In the column, the issues and concerns of the Chairperson of the Auckland Secondary Schools Principals Association (ASSPA) about the students who take part in the ASB Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival are emphasized. Since its inception in 1976 the Festival has produced claims from the principals, among others which distort, devalue, and disrupt the language and culture of indigenous students. Even though, the students practice their dances and songs after school hours, during the lunch break and the weekend, claims by the principals that the "students spend too much class time practising for cultural performances" and that "rehearsals for the event are disruptive" and "effect their schooling" continue to be produced by them.The ASSPA's actions and dominant perspectives are deflating and discouraging to Māori and Tongan people who have to struggle with a lack of respect and support for their

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Triangulation is a measurement technique often used by surveyors to locate an object in space by relying on two known points in order to ''triangulate'' on an unknown fixed point in that same space. Early on, social scientists borrowed the concept of triangulation to argue for its use in the validation process in assessing the veracity of social science research results. There are alternative perspectives on the use of triangulation that argue for its usefulness as a ''dialectical'' process whose goals seek a more in-depth nuanced understanding of research findings and clarifying disparate results by placing them in dialogue with one another.This special issue of the Journal of Mixed Methods Research (JMMR) analyzes and explores the variety of ways triangulation is used in mixed methods research and the range of issues and controversies surrounding triangulation praxis. To date, there are few scholarly in-depth discussions of its deployment in mixed methods research. The choice of triangulation as the topic for this first special issue of JMMR is based on the claims made by many scholars in the field that triangulation provides a justification for the use of mixed methods.The contributors to this volume raise many questions about the meaning of triangulation, its philosophical positioning in the mixed methods community, and strategies for using triangulation in the design of mixed methods studies, analysis and interpretation of data, and making visible subjugated voices. They take provocative positions, suggesting that qualitative, constructivist, and interpretive pathways provide greater potential for research to address the social good than has been possible using mixed methods approaches that are more closely aligned with the postpositivist paradigm. They revisit the ''paradigm wars'' and ask this question: Are we still stuck with the incompatibility thesis that paralyzed advances in mixed methods in past decades? They explore and critique the potential of alternative methodologies for harnessing the synergy that is said to lie in the application of mixed methods research designs by asking another set of questions: Have members of the mixed methods community done an injustice to pragmatism as a philosophical frame for mixed methods? Is qualitatively framed mixed methods the way forward? Is it possible that qualitatively framed mixed methods are better suited to the ability of mixed methods researchers to demonstrate a causal relationship between variables? How and when should triangulation be brought into mixed methods research to obtain a more nuanced

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