John Smyth's remarkable body of writing research and scholarship has spanned four decades and
the urgency of our times makes it imperative to look in some depth at the breadth of his
research and its trajectory in order to see how we can connect extend build and enrich our
understandings from it. Possibly the single most unique aspect to Smyth's version of critical
research is his passion for living and 'doing' what it means to be a critical pedagogue. For
him 'doing' is a verb that gives expression to what he believes it means to be a critical
scholar. This necessitates actively listening to lives taking on an advocacy position with
informant groups displaying a commitment to praxis and being activist in celebrating 'local
responses' to global issues. Smyth's research is pursued with vigour through the lives he
researches as he interrupts and punctures 'bad' theory supplanting it with more democratic
alternatives which by his own admission makes his research (and all research) political.
