Between time and history: Epistemological considerations about the biographical perspective in social and educational research

Whereas the current basis of the biographical approach in social and educational research have been strengthening, this article propose some points of view to stress four key topics concerned to studies in the field of life histories: time, memory, testimony and story-telling. According to logical affinity, those categories can be structured as two couples which point out epistemological strands to understand some important ways in the biographical research. The couples are shown here related to the ongoing self-build process as an important issue for studying the human being from a specific point of view about experiencial time (time-memory) and personal storytelling (testimony-storytelling).